Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there was a certain Sultan who believed the way to a woman's heart was through her stomach. Operating on this rather embarrassing misunderstanding of basic human anatomy, the Sultan ordered his chefs to create for him a new delicacy with which to woo a wife.

The chefs got to work immediately, the kitchen fires burned long into the night, and in the morning the head chef nervously presented his creation to the Sultan: a roasted pig with a small amount of parsley in its arse.

"Hmm," said the Sultan, "I see where you're going with this, but I'd like to suggest a few minor changes. What if, instead of the pig, you mixed stiff starches and sweet sugars and beat the hell out of them until they formed a sort of jelly? And what if, instead of parsley, you flavoured this jelly with a splash of rosewater and a handful of exotic berries?"

"Well," said the head chef, "it would certainly be kinder to the pig."

And so it was done, and that is the entirely factual and completely true story about how Turkish Delight came to be.