the Times of oman 100 october 2016
For the love of limoo omani The name itself speaks to the Omani origins of this beloved ingredient, used in Persian, Iraqi and even Egyptian kitchens to impart a tangy, bitter flavour to soups, stews, and rice dishes. And though you can’t enter a supermarket or a souq without coming across bags of the dried brown orbs, most people are unaware of how this ingredient came to be, or how to use it. Both bitter and sweet, citrus auantifolia, or “true limes,” were brought from Malaysia to Oman in the Middle Ages through Muscat where merchants shrewdly began drying the perishable fruit to preserve them for up to two years. In the process they created a new ingredient: black limes or limoo Omani. The whole dried limes were simmered in stews and soups; the gummy, black flesh added to rice dishes; and ground black lime powder sprinkled on dishes to impart a distinctive tangy, dry-earthy flavor, which gained popularity along Oman’s maritime spice route, especially in Iran and the Iraqi port of Basra. Known as black limes, these whole dried limes are more commonly light brown in color and may also be sold as Persian limes or limoo Omani. The color makes little difference in flavor, the main things to look for are limes that are completely dry with no soft spots that sound a bit hollow when tapped. Once broken open, they should be free of mold and should not be hollow, but have gummy or slightly papery flesh. This distinctive ingredient lends a subtle tart, musky, almost fermented tang to dishes.
Here are a few ways to use them Whole
Whole Pierced
Flesh Only
Ground ground in a spice grinder for
Whole lime can be tossed
After washing and soaking
After breaking the lime with
in a pot to add a slightly
briefly to soften the skin, a
something blunt and cutting
Halving the limes and, in
bitter-tartness, but be sure
single hole can be poked into
it in half, the gummy black
some instances removing the
a black powder that adds a
to scrub your limes well
the lime to allow more of the
flesh can be removed (the
bitter seeds, allows the flavor
deeply layered citric flavor to
before adding.
The entire lime can be
bitterness from the seeds
dry skin and seeds discarded)
of sweet-tart flesh and skin
soups, stews, and our Omani-
and sour flavor of the flesh
and added into dishes like
to be fully released.
style potato chip seasoning
seep into a dish.
Tuna Kabuli (page xx) where it will melt into the dish.
6
Broken or halved
(page xx).