Mersu (Date and Pistachio Pastry)

Bakers who specialized in this treat were known as the episat mersi, so mersu-making was probably an involved and respected process." ---Cooking in Ancient Civilizations, Cathy K. Kaufman [Greenwood Press:Westport CT] 2006 (p. 31)

An exact recipe for mersu doesn’t exist, but archaeologists have been able to reconstruct it indirectly from administrative sources, such as the delivery notice from Mari during the reign of King Zimri-Lim:

From The Oldest Cuisine in the World: Cooking in Mesopotamia by Jean Bottero, The University of Chicago Press, 2004

"Before the Yale culinary tablets were discovered, we had only two recipes in our possession: one that had been restored indirectly, the other explicitly.
The first, which concerns a "cake" called mersu in Akkadian, is not actually developed as a recipe anywhere; but we can easily gather a few scattered, lexicographical or economic details of it which enable us more or less to reconstruct its formula.
The term mersu etymologically refers to a sort of "mixing" (marasu) of a flour that has been soaked in a liquid; the end product is justifiably called "bread". According to the various, more explicit Sumerian equivalents, the liquid used in the mixture could be water (a); milk (ga); beer (kaš) or oil (i), even "clarified butter" (i-nun).
Our "indirect sources" (primarily delivery notices of the type illustrated above), add a certain number of complementary elements to this basic operation. Thus in Mari, notably:

(Received)
liters of dates
and 10 liters of pistachios,
for making mersu.
Meal of the king,
the 14th of the month of Kiskissu,
of the year that followed
the seizing of Ašlakka by King Zimri-Lim.

The last three lines show how the documents were dated then, as there was no universal era for chronological reference.

We learn through such partial notices that in Mari, at least, the task of preparing mersu was often conferred upon a specialist (epišat mersi: "maker of mersu"), which no doubt possessed a secrete technique for making it. We are also informed that large pots (diqaru) were used for mixing, and that to enhance the flavor and richness of the dish's various complementary elements - dates, pistachios (see above), dried figs, raisins, apples (?), or condiments such as nigella (?), cumin (?); coriander (?), and even something that to our palates seem somewhat unlikely, garlic - Incorporated into the duly blended flour mixture. Once the mixture was cooked - we know none of the specifics concerning the way of how long it was cooked - it could be presented as something like a cake."

According to Laura Kelley, "Mersu was interpreted as a cake because of the similarity between that word and marâsu, which means “to mix,” and because mersu was described as comprised of nuts and dates. Yet there is nothing to imply that mersu was a cake, let alone any instructions on how to make it."

Although no details are given—in this text or in others—about how to cook mersu, we learn that it was mixed in large pots and often prepared by specialists in Mari. We see that it varied by ingredients and came in different shapes and sizes.

The text below is from http://www.silkroadgourmet.com/, by Laura Kelley.

"The original description for mersu comes from one of the many thousands of tablets recovered from the ancient city of Mari by French archaeologists in the 1930s. Most of the tablets have been dated to 1800-1750 BCE, a time slightly before the Yale Babylonian Culinary tablets and more than 1000 years before the Lamb and Licorice “recipe” from Erech. The original description mentions only pounded dates, and ground “flour” for a coating (ARM 11, 13: l and 124: 4) and a sort of nut that I think are pistachios (ARM 11, 13: 2) (not terebinth [a small European tree (Pistacia terebinthus) of the cashew family] as has been suggested). Now, the “flour” coating could be semolina (samidu), or it could be a sort of ground nut. . ., because many types were enjoyed in the ancient Near East, including almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, pinenuts, and pistachios.

In a reference I just pulled last night by Marcel Sigrist (JCS 29, 1977) on the creation of food offerings for celebrations at the Temple of Nusku (light/fire) in Nippur, the author cites tablets that suggest alternate (not additional) ingredients for mersu**. Other ingredients that could be used in place of dates include figs and raisins and another unspecified type of date. Other ingredients that could be used in the place of the minced nuts in the body of the confection are minced apples. Other ingredients listed as potential reference include fat, cheese, wine and oil from oilseeds. . .

Summary of additional ingredients from the Sigrist paper are: figs, raisins, another type of date, apples, fat, oil from oilseeds (or oil seeds (possibly sesame seeds) themselves), cheese and wine (or must or pomace).

**(Sigrist makes the connection between “ninda-i-de-a” and mersu. However, as Bottero assumed mersu was a “cake”; Sigrist assumes it is a type of bread. Sigrist also writes that all of the ingredients are included in the bread, not that it is a list of possible ingredients to be used in combinations according to the cook’s need or desire.)"