BS: Who call them Sultanas

Subject: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 10:30 PM

I've never called them Sultanas I've always called them raisens so like who else here calls them Sultansas? Doesn't anyone have some good recipes for them they sound like a thanksgiving thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Haruo
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 10:40 PM

Context, please, GUEST. Somewhere in The Truth I know that I have run across a reference to stringy sultanas. For Thanksgiving, they should be plump.

Haruo

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 11:03 PM

G'day GUEST,

Well I call raisins raisins and sultanas sultanas.

Admittedly, sultanas are made from a species of small seedless raisin - but they are small, yellowish and fairly insipid, while raisins are larger, plumper, darker and much richer in flavour ... around this part of the world, anyway! (Sydney, Australia ... eating dried friuts from the Australian Riverina).

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Haruo
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 11:13 PM

I always thought "raisin" was French, as in "raisin d'être", roughly the dried grape of being.

Haruo

PS Thanks for the clarification, Bob. Are sultanas also more likely than raisins to be stringy?

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Art Thieme
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 12:37 AM

SULTANA was a riverboat transporting prisoners of war North from Andersonville Prison following the end of the American Civil War. The captain was paid for each person tansported and he had crowded thousands more onto the steamboat than was safe. When the boiler exploded near Memphis, Tennessee this became the single worst disaster on any body of water. More died on the Sultana than on the Titanic. (1865)

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Haruo
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 12:51 AM

Any songs come out of it? Gotta be...

Haruo

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 02:34 AM

Aren't sultanas white grapes and raisins red grapes in a former life?

Sultanas are better for lighter, less sweet recipies, like rice puddings or in "English" curries (yellow water, elderly carrot, 3 bits of unidentified meat, 1/2lb sultanas). Raisins are more robust and are better for preserved fruit pies (mince pies - too early to explain mincemeat to anyone), fruit cake, Spotted Dick (see note about mincemeat) and Christmas pudding.

Alternately, Sultanas are called Sultanas in the same way that the wife of a prince is called a princess....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: IanC
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 06:07 AM

The US Standards for Grades of Processed Raisins is a useful research document in this discussion.

Page 2 has a summary of varieties.

;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: daithi
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 06:27 AM

Indeed Liz, the wife of a Sultan is also called a Sultana; something to do with getting their just desserts I s'pose....

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 08:14 AM

Transport Information Service
Cargo loss prevention information from German marine insurers

Product description

Sultanas belong to the grapevine family (Vitaceae) and are native to the Caspian Sea. Currants, sultanas and raisins, including those still on the bunch, are known collectively as "raisins". The difference between these three dried fruits is explained below:

- Sultanas: seedless, large-berried and light yellow. Larger than currants and smaller than raisins. [French: Raisins de Smyrne = raisins of Smyrna]
- Currants: seedless, small-berried, purple/black color. Their name derives from the Greek city of Corinth.
- Raisins on the bunch: seeded, large-berried, generally with stalk.

For further information see: http://www.tis-gdv.de/tis_e/ware/f_inhalt22.htm

That's appetizing, insn't it?
Wilfried

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 08:38 AM

Pardon me, have put in the wrong URL.
correct: Sultanas
The insurers' homepage.

Wilfried

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Greyeyes
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 02:43 PM

The sultana/raisin debate came up in a thread a couple of years ago about christmas puddings. Apparently Sultanas are known as golden raisins in the U.S. this site seems to verify that.

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 03:36 PM

But does anyone actually give a fig?

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Mudlark
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 03:59 PM

And then there are the Sultanas of Swing...

Haruo....dried raisin of being...LOL

Sultanas (golden raisins) may not be as robust as the darker variety, but once plumped up by steeping for an hour or so in rum or brandy they are not only very beautiful but quite tasty.

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 04:52 PM

Hey, you squeazing larks in the mud - thanks for the puns.
I mostly enjoyed the raisin d'etre (correct accent AWOL on the keyboard - bad luck)

Wilfried

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: smallpiper
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 06:49 PM

I thought he was a great guitarist - did some dead impressive stuff in the 70's

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Haruo
Date: 23 Nov 02 - 10:15 PM

(refresh) not about raisins, but about the Civil War ship disaster Art Thieme mentioned. (See the fifth post in the thread.)

Haruo

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Haruo
Date: 23 Nov 02 - 10:23 PM

If anybody does have any good Wreck of the Sultana songs, it'd probably be a good idea to start a new, non-BS Lyr Add thread for them, but if you do, please add a link to it here so I'll know it's there. Thanks,

Haruo

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Art Thieme
Date: 24 Nov 02 - 12:36 AM

www.disastercity.com/sultana

story on the disaster and photo of the overloaded boat leaving Memphis

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Nov 02 - 12:53 AM

Thanks for the link, Art. Quite a disaster story.

Sultanas are good, but I would say that Thompson raisins are considerably better.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 24 Nov 02 - 11:35 PM

sultanas=wife of sultan-golden raisins.
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Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: Haruo
Date: 20 Jan 03 - 11:12 PM

Just yesterday (actually while looking for the Husbands and Wives version of the Titanic) I ran across this Sultana (the riverboat disaster not the fruit) song by... Art Thieme, who got it into the DT but forgot to note it here. He says he wrote it years ago but was reminded to put it in the DT by this discussion.

Haruo

Subject: RE: BS: Who call them Sultanas
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 20 Jan 03 - 11:35 PM

Sultanas called that as well as golden raisins in both States and Canada. The dark raisin is reddish when living. Currants should properly be called Corinthian raisins.
They are not related in any way with either the red or black currants from the saxifrage family (Ribes) so popular in jellies.