Tahini cuneiform document written 4000 years ago that describes the custom of serving the gods sesame wine. The historian Herodotus writes about the cultivation of sesame 3500 years ago in the region of the Tigris and Euphrates in Mesopotamia. It was mainly used as a source of oil. Tahini is mentioned as an ingredient of "hummus kasa", a recipe transcribed in an anonymous 13th-century Arabic cookbook, "Kitab Wasf al-Atima al-Mutada". Sesame paste is an ingredient in some Chinese and Japanese dishes; Sichuan cuisine uses it in some recipes for dandan noodles. Sesame paste is also used in Indian cuisine. In the
Yellow soybean paste the modern day, and potassium sorbate may be used as a preservative. Yellow soybean paste is used most notably in the noodle dish called "zhajiang mian" ("fried sauce noodles"), in which the yellow soybean paste is fried together with ground pork, then poured over the top of thick wheat flour noodles. Outside of Beijing, sweet bean sauce or hoisin sauce is often mixed with or used in place of the condiment, thus giving the dish a sweeter taste. Yellow soybean paste is widely available in China, as well as in Chinese grocery stores overseas, and comes in plastic packages, bottled