Bangladeshi Traditional Food

Patali Gur is sugar extracted from the sap of date palm trees. It's darker in color and richer in flavor.Winter season, date juice extractors trim date trees to collect juice for making molasses. Every year with the onset of winter the professional date juice extractors, locally called ‘Gachhis’, trim the trees for extracting date juice.They are busy preparing places for boiling date juice and collecting necessary tools, including ropes etc. The potters are also busy making clay-pots for extracting date juice while the blacksmiths in the village are engaged in making various sizes of tin made flat-jars for boiling juice. In winter date molasses is available in abundance in the hats and bazaars. Fine quality of date molasses named ‘Patari’ .  

Patali’ is very much delicious. The date palm sap is made into three types of gur: liquid, grainy and the solid chunks of patali. At the beginning of the season. Gur is sold in its liquid. It would be used like maple syrup in America, poured over hot luchis or chapattis and as a sweetener in the milk. It ferments easily and so has to be eaten quickly. The solid patali gur can be stored and used for quite a few months after winter is over, and refrigeration gives it even longer life. 

The most notable application for its use is in payesh, in place of sugar. Traditional kheer (rice pudding) made with patali gur. The gur imparted a caramel-ly , smoky flavor to the kheer. It was intensely rich, incredibly delicious, and definitely memorable. Using it in more like the almond halwa (twice),cookies etc.