Dolma

• 1. Introduction

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  Dolma first shows up in writing in a 16th-century Persian book called Mâddet ol-Hayât, and the author treats it as a curiosity from abroad. Cabbage dolmeh, the book says, is commonly prepared in the land of the Rûm, meaning Turkey, but is not well known in Iran. That remark describes a family of stuffed dishes in which vegetables, leaves, and sometimes seafood, offal, fruit, or meat are hollowed out or wrapped. The filling is usually rice, minced meat, herbs, and spices. Today dolma is a staple across the modern cuisines of regions and nations that once belonged to the Ottoman Empire. How did a dish that puzzled a Persian author become so ordinary across such a wide territory? Who first thought to stuff a vegetable, and why did one court turn the idea into a whole genre of cooking? And why do neighboring nations still quarrel over who invented it?

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• 2. A Word Meaning Stuffed

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  The Turkish verb dolmak means to get filled or stuffed, and dolma simply means something stuffed. That verb descends from the Old Turkic tolmak. The scholar Gerard Clauson found the root tol-, meaning to be filled or full, widely attested in Turkic texts from before the 13th century. It survives in the modern Turkic languages with similar meanings.

  In 1680, Franciscus a Mesgnien Meninski recorded the Ottoman Turkish word dolma in his dictionary Thesaurus Linguarum Orientalium, Turcicæ, Arabicæ, Persicæ. He glossed it in Latin as ripieno, which means stuffed or filled. English took far longer to notice it. The earliest written English mention dates to the late 19th century, in James William Redhouse's A Turkish and English Lexicon of 1890. Redhouse defined it as an act of filling, and as a dish of meat, fruit, or vegetable filled with rice and forcemeat.

  Inside Turkey, cooks draw a line that other languages blur. Dolma, the stuffed thing, names hollowed vegetables filled with a stuffing. Sarma, the rolled or wrapped thing, names fillings wrapped in edible leaves such as vine leaves or cabbage. Elsewhere in former Ottoman lands and beyond, dolma stretches to cover wrapped leaves as well.

  Many languages chose their own word for stuffed instead. Greek says gemista, Arabic says maḥshī, Hungarian says töltött, Romanian says umpluți, and Hebrew says memulah. Judeo-Spanish speakers say rellenada. In Syrian and Kuwaiti Arabic, maḥshī yabraq fuses the Arabic word with the Turkish yaprak, meaning leaf. Persian uses dolmeh, Turkmen uses dolâma, and Swedish uses dolme.

  Then there is the meatless kind. Turks call it yalancı dolma, meaning fake or counterfeit dolma, and it is typically filled with seasoned rice. Arabs used the word muzawwaj, which also means counterfeit. The label reflects an old habit in medieval Islamic societies of treating vegetarian dishes as substitutes for genuine ones. That is striking because Islam does not prescribe abstention from meat on any occasion. The same term lives on as gialantzí in Greek, yalanchi tolma in Armenian, and ialanchi tolma in Georgian.

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• 3. Before the Sultans

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  The exact origin of dolma is disputed, and one possibility is that the Turks learned it from the Greeks. The dish already existed in the Byzantine Empire. A much older hint sits in the Roman cookbook Apicius, which records cucumbers stuffed with forcemeat and cooked in broth or wine sauce. That recipe may date back to late antiquity.

  In the Abbasid world, stuffing was already a recognized technique. Kitab al-Tabikh, a 10th-century compilation of Baghdad court cuisine by Ibn Sayyar al-Warraq, lists stuffed sausages, meats, pastries such as sānbusaj, and sweets such as crepes. Savory fillings were built on meat and herbs. The stuffed sweets held nuts alone. Far to the east, Central Asian cooks sealed fillings, usually meat, inside thin dough to make dumplings such as manti.

  Stuffed vegetables appear in the 13th-century Syrian cookbook Kitab al-Wuslah ila l-habib, though only eggplant and snake melon. Cooks filled them with meat and simmered them in broth, fat, and aromatics. In the same century, the cookbook Kitāb al-ṭabīẖ from North Africa and Moorish Spain held 50 recipes for stuffed and wrapped dishes. Eggplant was its main vegetable. By then the eastern and western Arab worlds had been politically separate for five centuries, and their kitchens had drifted apart. Eastern savory stuffings were usually meat or nuts, while western ones often used eggs and cheese.

  Eggplant turns up in East Asia too. Hu Sihui, an Uyghur imperial doctor who served the Chinese Emperor during the Yuan dynasty, set down a recipe in his 13th-century cookbook and medical text Yinshan Zhengyao. Eggplants were stuffed with minced meats, sheep's fat, onions, and mandarin orange peel, then steamed. The finish was garlic, cream or yogurt, and ground basil.

  Charles Perry argues that the story is more recent than these recipes suggest. Medieval Arabic cookbooks contained many stuffed dishes but rarely stuffed vegetables. In his account, stuffed vegetables became a characteristic food of the Eastern Mediterranean only when the Ottomans made them a regular culinary category about 500 years ago.

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• 4. Palace Kitchens, Lenten Tables

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  One observer in the 19th century remarked that it was "on the preparation of vegetables that the Turkish cook expends all his art." Eggplants stood out among them. Most Ottoman families kept gardens for their own vegetables and fruits, and in season the market prices were low.

  In the 15th century, stuffed vegetables began modestly, with onions and apples. Over the following centuries the range grew to include a wide variety of vegetables and leaves. By the 17th century, Istanbul had 50 cookshops called dolmacı that specialized in stuffed vegetables. Rich men and high-ranking state officials began to employ specialist dolma cooks, so the dish became a marker of status.

  Foods can leave their mark on place names. Because stuffed zucchini was the most common variety, foreigners have suggested that the Dolmabahçe Palace was named for a garden where zucchini grew. The dish may have reached ordinary people through wealthy Istanbulites, who copied the imperial kitchens and made up their own recipes.

  Priscilla Mary Işın credits the imperial court with driving the innovation. The palace kitchen, known as Matbah-ı Âmire, set cooks against one another as they experimented to impress the Sultan and his council. The empire's size added fuel. In her words, "vegetables from across these regions flowed into Istanbul's kitchens, where they were hollowed out, filled, and reimagined."

  Claudia Roden notes that stuffed vegetables are missing from the very early Persian and Arab manuscripts but were known under the Ottomans, served at the sultans' lavish banquets. Alan Davidson likewise tied the term dolma itself to Ottoman court cuisine. Roden and Alta Ann Parkins describe the dishes as "invented and prepared for a rich and powerful leisured class to excite their curiosity and titillate their palates, as well as to satisfy their desire for ostentation." The long, delicate work implies many specialized cooks. As the dishes reached poorer households, the fillings were simplified, but the slow preparation stayed, since it showed off the cook's skill to guests.

  Ottoman sources record the widening pantry. The 15th century adds tripes, quinces, and spleens. The 16th brings gourds, vine leaves, cabbages, carrots, eggplants, pumpkins, and lamb. The 17th adds fish such as mackerels, bonitos, and cuttlefish, along with watermelons, luffas, and borage leaves. The 18th contributes leeks, spinach, okras, and Jerusalem artichokes. The 19th lists mussels, melons, ducks, bell peppers, red tomatoes, and hazelnut leaves.

  Religion shaped the menu as well. Christians in the empire fasted for nearly 180 days a year, and their rules barred animal products. Cooks found inventive ways to fill leaves and vegetables without meat, and by the late 18th century meatless and dairyless varieties were mainstream. Armenians call a Lenten cabbage roll pasuts tolma, and it holds seven grains: chickpea, bean, lentil, cracked wheat, pea, rice, and maize. Assyrians also prepare meatless dolmas for Lent.

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• 5. Journeys Beyond the Empire

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  Under centuries of Ottoman rule, dolma traveled through the Middle East, the Mediterranean, the Caucasus, and the Balkans. Communities adapted it to local tastes and ingredients and gave it new names. Today it appears in Balkan, West Asian, North African, and Central Asian cuisine.

  It even reached Sweden, thanks to a military defeat. King Charles XII lost the Battle of Poltava to Russia in 1709 and spent his exile in the Ottoman Empire. When he returned to Sweden in 1715, he brought a taste for stuffed dishes and a retinue of Turkish chefs. They made stuffed cabbage rolls, which gave rise to the Swedish kåldomar. Swedish chefs developed a sweeter version, dressed with a traditional syrup called ljus sirap and served with lingonberries.

  Persian kitchens had versions of dolma as early as the 17th century. In 19th-century Iran, the chef of Naser al-Din Shah Qajar recorded recipes for stuffed vine leaves, cabbage leaves, cucumbers, eggplants, apples, and quinces. The fillings used ground meat, sauteed mint leaves, rice, and saffron.

  Jewish communities made the dish their own. Iraqi Jewish families cook a version with sweet and sour flavors not found in other versions. Dolma is part of Sephardic cuisine too. Jews in the Ottoman Empire used locally grown grape leaves and adopted the Turkish name.

  Armenian merchants who settled in Kolkata in the 16th century brought the idea of stuffed vegetables to Indian kitchens. Bengali cooks then invented potoler dolma, using the native potala gourd. They filled it with fish, prawns, potatoes, poppy seed paste, raisins, and cottage cheese, and cooked it in a fragrant curry.

  In the Persian Gulf, basmati rice is preferred, and tomatoes, onions, and cumin boost the flavor of the stuffing. Cabbage matters most farther north. In winter it was a staple for peasants in Persia and the Ottoman Empire, and it spread to the Balkans. Jews in Eastern Europe made cabbage rolls with kosher meat, called holishkes. Meat was expensive, so rice was sometimes mixed in, and European Jews sometimes substituted barley, bread, or kasha. Slavic cousins include golubtsy in Russian, holubtsi in Ukrainian, and gołąbki in Polish.

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• 6. The Stuffed Pantry

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  Olive oil and clarified butter divide the family in two. Oil-based dolmas are usually stuffed with rice and served cold with a garlic-yogurt sauce. Meat-filled versions are served warm, often with tahini or avgolemono sauce.

  The origins of stuffed vine leaves are unknown. They may hold meat or grain, and come with garlic yogurt, tarbiya, or sweet and sour sauces made with pomegranate syrup and sour cherries. Greeks say dolmades, Cypriots say koupepia, Kurds say sarme, Azerbaijanis say yarpaq dolması, and Syrians say yebra. Egyptians call them mahshi waraq enab and eat them in summer. Meatless versions are served at room temperature.

  In Egypt, winter calls for cabbage, and the rolls are called mahshi kromb. Elsewhere, cabbage rolls are stuffed with red beans, garbanzo beans, lentils, cracked wheat, tomato paste, and onion. Turkey calls them lahana dolmasi, and Azerbaijan says kələm dolması. Armenian cooks sometimes flavor them with rose hip syrup.

  Soğan dolması, the stuffed onion, is traditional in Turkey, Armenia, and Bosnia. Cooks boil whole onions and gently pry off the outer layers, which are called "shirts." Those shirts hold a beef and rice filling. The shirts then simmer slowly in broth, and the dish is usually served with dense yogurt.

  Peppers are popular in Armenia, Greece, and Turkey. The Armenian version adds tarragon, mint, walnuts, or pine nuts to the stuffing. Among the Crimean Tatars, dolma means peppers stuffed with minced lamb or beef and rice. When grape leaves get that same filling, they are called sarma.

  Root vegetables have their own homes. Stuffed turnips are popular in Jordan and the West Bank, notably in Hebron and as-Salt. They are filled with spiced rice and minced meat, lightly fried, and cooked in a tamarind sauce. Armenian and Palestinian cooks stuff carrots in similar ways.

  Eggplant has the widest cast of characters. In Turkey, Halep dolması is named after Aleppo and uses a meat and rice filling flavored with sour plum syrup or lemon juice. In the Arab world, makdous is a dish of miniature oil-cured aubergines stuffed with walnuts, red pepper, and garlic. In the Turkish city of Mardin, a regional platter wraps sumac and Urfa pepper rice in onion layers, vine leaves, and cabbage. The remaining rice fills eggplant, zucchini, and peppers, and the whole pot cooks in sumac-flavored water.

  The sea supplies its own versions. Stuffed mussels may carry rice, pine nuts, allspice, and lemon juice. One squid dish uses halloumi cheese, onion, breadcrumbs, garlic, and parsley. In Armenian cooking, mackerel or sevan trout is carefully separated from its skin. The meat is sauteed with onions, currants, dried apricots, nuts, and spices, then returned to the intact skin and grilled until it browns. Stuffed sardines often use kasseri cheese and may appear as meze in Greek and Turkish tavernas and meyhanes. Offal is not left out: mumbar dolması is intestine stuffed with ground meat, rice, pepper, and cumin, boiled, and sometimes sliced and fried in butter.

  Fruit joins in too. Armenian stuffed quinces are known as Etchmiadzin Dolma, made with minced meat, rice, nuts, dried fruit, and grape syrup. Iranian quinces use almond, pistachio, barberry, and saffron. Turkish stuffed apples pair lamb and rice with sumac-flavored grape syrup, and a meatless filling combines diced apples, pears, walnuts, and currants. Stuffed melons belonged to the Ottoman palace cuisine, and the recipe survives in modern Turkish, Yemenite, Iranian, and Armenian cooking. Sorrel and mallow leaves round out the list, filled with lamb and rice or sometimes rice alone.

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• 7. Feast Days and Festivals

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  Dalak dolması, spleen stuffed with rice, meat, and herbs, is a meze that may be paired with rakı. It comes from Armenian cuisine and is a traditional Armenian Orthodox New Year dish, served with anoushabour and chi kufta. The Diyarbekir style, made with lamb and lamb's tail fat, was registered as a geographical indication by the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office in October 2021.

  Jewish households eat holishkes cabbage rolls on Simchat Torah. Persian Jews may serve stuffed quince, called dolma bay, as a Sabbath meal or during Sukkot. Greek tables commonly feature gemista or tsounidis, stuffed vegetables with names of their own.

  For the Armenian Christian community in West Bengal, India, Christmas brings potoler dorma, a local variation from Anglo-Indian cuisine. They turn to it when traditional ingredients are not available.

  Muslim families often serve dolma as part of the iftar meal during Ramadan and during the Eid al-Fitr celebrations that mark the end of the holy month. At the Nowruz festival, large pots of dolma are prepared.

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• 8. A Contested Dish

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  In 2011, Azerbaijan's president Ilham Aliyev told the annual conference of the country's Academy of Sciences that if you ask an Armenian what dolma means in their language, they will not be able to answer. "It is a meaningless word for them," he said. Armenia answered by holding its own dolma festival, named uduli.

  The quarrel is not only about words. In Armenia the dish is typically rolled into a tube, while in Azerbaijan it is folded into a small parcel. Historian William Pokhlebkin contends that the dish traces back to Armenian culinary heritage and that Azerbaijani dolma was adopted from neighboring Armenian cuisine. Azerbaijani sources point instead to the Turkic origin of the name.

  Both countries have given the dish formal recognition. In 2017, dolma making in Azerbaijan was included in the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Lists. The culture of tolma preparation and consumption is on the intangible cultural heritage list of Armenia.

  The Armenian side adds an argument from the ingredients. Dolma needs grape leaves, which Armenians take as evidence of early agricultural development. They also cite archaeological evidence of viticulture and wine consumption in ancient Armenia.

  The Armenian word itself carries a layer of this debate. Armenian dolma, or tolma, is borrowed from Ottoman Turkish, but it was also influenced by an older root. A wild grapevine in Armenia is called toli, from the Urartian word uduli, meaning grape or vine. That is the very word Armenia chose for its festival.

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