Assyrian cuisine tomato sauce and baked in the oven, not unlike the Levantine version of moussaka), "shamakhshi" (fried rolled eggplant stuffed with ground beef in tomato sauce), "Dolma" (rice and tomato sauce stuffed in grape leaves, cabbage, various peppers, zucchini, and eggplant), "Masgouf" (fish spiced with olive oil, salt, and turmeric, topped with tomatoes, potatoes, and onions then oven-baked) and "Lahmacun" (flatbread topped with ground beef, tomato paste, spices, and onions). Sesame seeds are important to the cuisine and used to make tahini, there is even an Assyrian folk tale about the gods drinking sesame wine on the night before they created
Tahini called "tahin-pekmez". Due to its high-caloric nature, it is served as a breakfast item or after meals as a dessert to dip pieces of bread in, especially during the wintertime. In Iraq, tahini is known as "rashi" and is mixed with date syrup (rub) to make a sweet dessert usually eaten with bread. Tahini is called "ardeh" () in Persian and "harda" in Kuwait. In Iran it is used to make "halvardeh" (), a kind of halva made of tahini, sugar, egg whites, and other ingredients. It is also eaten during breakfast, usually with an accompanying sweet substance, usually grape