This article is about a rice pilaf. For the sovereign state, see Palau.
At the time of the Abbasid Caliphate, such methods of cooking rice at first spread through a vast territory from India to Spain, and eventually to a wider world. Achaya, the Indian epic Mahabharata mentions an instance of rice and meat cooked together. Also, according to Achaya, “pulao” or “pallao” is used to refer to a rice dish in ancient Sanskrit works such as the Yājñavalkya Smṛti. Similarly Alexander the Great and his army, many centuries earlier, in the 4th century BCE, have been reported to be so impressed with Bactrian and Sogdian pilavs that his soldiers brought the recipes back to Macedonia when they returned. In doing so, he described the advantages and disadvantages of every item used for preparing the dish. Another primary source for pilau dishes comes from the 17th-century Iranian philosopher Molla Sadra.
