Grape syrup is a condiment made with concentrated grape juice. It is thick and sweet because of its high ratio of sugar to water. Grape syrup is made by boiling grapes, removing their skins, and squeezing them through a sieve to extract the juice. Like other fruit syrups, a common use of grape syrup is as a topping for sweet cakes, such as pancakes or waffles. It is found in multiple Balkan, Middle Eastern and Caucasian cuisines, under a variety of names.
Names and etymology The ancient Greek name for grape syrup is siraios (σιραίος), in the general category of hepsema (ἕψημα), which translates to 'boiled'. The Greek name was used in Crete and, in modern times, in Cyprus. In modern times, petimezi is the common name for Greek grape syrup. The word comes from the Persian petmez (پتمز), which usually refers to grape syrup, but is also used to refer to mulberry syrup, which is especially popular in Armenia, and other fruit syrups. In Turkey, it is known as pekmez, a word recorded in the 1073 dictionary Dīwān Lughāt al-Turk by Mahmud al-Kashgari. In Armenia, Iran, Azerbaijan and more West Asian countries, this grape syrup is known as doshab, and in Palestine, it is (Arabic: دبس) dibs or dibes. Iranians also call it shir-e angoor. Vincotto (not to be confused with vino cotto) is the southern Italian term for grape syrup. It is made only from cooked wine grape must (mosto cotto), with no fermentation involved. There is no alcohol or vinegar content, and no additives, preservatives or sweeteners are added. It is both a condiment and an ingredient used in either sweet or savory dishes.
History
Greco-Roman One of the earliest mentions of grape syrup comes from the fifth-century BC Greek physician Hippocrates, who refers to hépsēma (ἕψημα), the Greek name for the condiment. The fifth-century BC Athenian playwright Aristophanes also makes a reference to it, as does Roman-era Greek physician Galen. Grape syrup was known by different names in Ancient Roman cuisine depending on the boiling procedure. Defrutum, carenum, and sapa were reductions of must. They were made by boiling down grape juice or must in large kettles until it had been reduced to two-thirds of the original volume, carenum; half the original volume, defrutum; or one-third, sapa. The Greek name for this variant of grape syrup was siraion (σίραιον). The main culinary use of defrutum was to help preserve and sweeten wine, but it was also added to fruit and meat dishes as a sweetening and souring agent and even given to food animals such as ducks and suckling pigs to improve the taste of their flesh. Defrutum was mixed with garum to make the popular condiment oenogarum. Quince and melon were preserved in defrutum and honey through the winter, and some Roman women used defrutum or sapa as a cosmetic. Defrutum was often used as a food preservative in provisions for Roman troops.
There is some confusion as to the amount of reduction for sapa and defrutum. As James Grout explains in its Encyclopedia Romana, authors informed different reductions, as follows:The elder Cato, Columella, and Pliny all describe how unfermented grape juice (mustum, must) was boiled to concentrate its natural sugars. "A product of art, not of nature," the must was reduced to one half (defrutum) or even one third its volume (sapa) (Pliny, XIV.80), although the terms are not always consistent. Columella identifies defrutum as "must of the sweetest possible flavour" that has been boiled down to a third of its volume (XXI.1). Isidore of Seville, writing in the seventh century AD, says that it is sapa that has been reduced by a third but goes on to imagine that defrutum is so called because it has been cheated or defrauded (defrudare) (Etymologies, XX.3.15). Varro reverses Pliny's proportions altogether (quoted in Nonius Marcellus, De Conpendiosa Doctrina, XVIII.551M).Defrutum is mentioned in almost all Roman books dealing with cooking or household management. Pliny the Elder recommended that defrutum only be boiled at the time of the new moon, while Cato the Censor suggested that only the sweetest possible defrutum should be used. In ancient Rome, grape syrup was often boiled in lead pots, which sweetened the syrup through the leaching of the sweet-tasting chemical compound lead acetate into the syrup. Incidentally, this is thought to have caused lead poisoning for Romans consuming the syrup. A 2009 History Channel documentary produced a batch of historically accurate defrutum in lead-lined vessels and tested the liquid, finding a lead level of 29,000 parts per billion (ppb), which is 2,900 times higher than contemporary American drinking water limit of 10 ppb. These levels are easily high enough to cause either acute lead toxicity if consumed in large amounts or chronic lead poisoning when consumed in smaller quantities over a longer period of time (as defrutum was typically used). However, the use of leaden cookware, though popular, was not the general standard of use. Copper cookware was used far more generally and no indication exists as to how often sapa was added or in what quantity. There is not, however, scholarly agreement on the circumstances and quantity of lead in these ancient Roman condiments. For instance, the original research was done by Jerome Nriagu, but was criticized by John Scarborough, a pharmacologist and classicist, who characterized Nriagu's research as "so full of false evidence, miscitations, typographical errors, and a blatant flippancy regarding primary sources that the reader cannot trust the basic arguments."
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