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Cereals and bread from Greece and Cyprus

Trahanas (Greek and Cypriot sour trahana)τραχανάς

Sheep or goat milk is left to sour for several days, then heated and cooked with crushed wheat into a thick paste. The paste is cooled, cut into pieces and dried in the summer sun, and the hard sour pieces are later boiled into a winter soup.

Fully documentedCereals and bread14 days – 16 days

Recipe

Amounts from a sourceProportions are those of a family dairy in Paphos district studied by Bozoudi et al. 2017 and of the Cyprus government gastronomy guide. Households use their own amounts.
Sheep or goat milk2 partsEwes' milk with up to about 10 % goat milk in the studied dairy[bozoudi2017][gov-cy-gastronomy]
Crushed wheat1 partMilk to wheat 2:1[bozoudi2017][gov-cy-gastronomy]
Natural starter (milk fermented from the previous batch)20 L per 380 L of milkA small amount of sour milk with salt is added to the milk[bozoudi2017][gov-cy-gastronomy]
Salt[gov-cy-gastronomy]
Starterbackslop (milk from the previous batch, taken when it reaches pH 3.8); traditional yogurt in warmer areas

Total time across the recorded steps: 14 days – 16 days

Start
Drag the bar or press Play
shapes, not to countLactobacilliYeasts20–30 °CpH 6.7 → 3.8StarchSugarAlcoholCO₂

What changes: Lactic bacteria from the milk and old starter turn the milk sour over several days

Step 1 of 4
Sour the milk with a little old sour milk
Time
5–7 days
Reported
Temperature
20–30 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
pH 6.7 → 3.8
Measured
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactobacilli
Yeasts
Lactococcus lactis
Lacticaseibacillus
Saccharomyces unisporus

Output: sour milk; some is kept to start the next batch.

Flavour
clearly sour
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

lactococci lead at first, then lactobacilli and the yeast Saccharomyces unisporus

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Sheep or goat milk is left to sour for several days, then heated and cooked with crushed wheat into a thick paste. The paste is cooled, cut into pieces and dried in the summer sun, and the hard sour pieces are later boiled into a winter soup. Made in 4 steps over 14 days – 16 days. The longest step, cut into pieces and sun-dry, takes at least 8 days (Republic of Cyprus). Lactococcus lactis and Lacticaseibacillus casei/paracasei do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main stepat least 8 daysReported[gov-cy-gastronomy]Cut into pieces and sun-dry
Temperature20–30 °CReported[bozoudi2017]Sour the milk with a little old sour milk
AciditypH 6.7 → 3.8Measured[bozoudi2017]Sour the milk with a little old sour milk

What makes this one different

In the Cypriot process the milk ferments first and the wheat is cooked in it afterwards, so the cereal is cooked rather than fermented raw. Turkish tarhana instead ferments a dough of flour, yogurt and vegetables.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Oven-dried trahanasNewer facilities dry the pieces in air-flow ovens so they can produce outside summer.

Safety

The milk sours to about pH 3.8 before cooking, the paste is boiled, and the pieces are dried to low moisture (8.6–11.5 % in Greek samples), which is how the product keeps through the year.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

The Cyprus government guide quotes Weaver (2002) calling trahanas a national dish of Cyprus. It gives the earliest written reference as apparently a 1553 request by the Holy Monastery of Kykkos to the Venetian authorities for a hundred moddi of wheat, and says the historian Florio Bustron wrote in 1554 that halloumi was made through March and trahanas in July. Bozoudi and colleagues (2017) say it is made mainly in summer, when milk is plentiful and the weather suits sun-drying, and that newer dairies also use air-flow ovens.

  1. [bozoudi2017] Bozoudi D., Agathokleous M., Anastasiou I., Papademas P., Tsaltas D. 2017, Microbiological characteristics of Trachanas, a traditional fermented dairy product from Cyprus, Journal of Food Quality 2017:8749316, doi:10.1155/2017/8749316paper
  2. [lazos1993] Lazos E.S., Aggelousis G., Bratakos M. 1993, The fermentation of trahanas, a milk-wheat flour combination, Plant Foods for Human Nutrition 44(1):45–62, doi:10.1007/BF01088482 (abstract)paper
  3. [gov-cy-gastronomy] Republic of Cyprus, Gastronomy in Cyprus, 2nd revised edition, government publications portal (trahanas page)gov