Prickly Pear (Sabbara) in Damascus

Sabbara is the fruit of the Opuntia cactus, the prickly pear. In Damascus it is sold at street stalls from early summer to the end of November, for about four months. The vendor peels the spiny skin and puts the flesh in the customer’s hand. Most people buy one or two and eat them standing; a cardboard tray of 12 goes home.

Why it is a street fruit

Because of the peeling. Qamus al-Sinaat al-Shamiyya, a dictionary of Damascene trades compiled by Muhammad Said al-Qasimi in the early 20th century, describes the vendor’s method step by step. The fruit is picked in the morning with a bent iron hook on the end of a long pole. It is swirled in water again and again so the spines soften, then laid out on wooden trays. The customer points to the one he wants; the vendor cuts it open with a knife, peels it, hands over the flesh, and picks the spines out of his own hand with tweezers.

Al-Qasimi writes that it tastes best eaten in the cool of the morning, and notes that older books call it tin al-jabal, the mountain fig. Little has changed: today’s vendor peels with two layers of gloves, and families buy the fruit ready peeled.

Where it grows

In al-Qasimi’s time it grew in only two warm spots around Damascus: the Salihiyeh quarter and the village of Mezzeh. The Mezzeh farms still produce it, but most of the crop now comes from Deir Adas, al-Kiswah, Qatana and Darayya. On the coast, Latakia is known for the fruit. In Tartus and Banyas the cactus is planted as a garden hedge; since 2022 the red cochineal insect has cut the harvest around Tartus.

What a Damascus stall looks like

The stalls stand in Mezzeh, Abu Rummaneh and along the Rabweh road. They are decorated with potted plants and coloured bulbs and stay lit at night; the fruit is chilled on blocks of ice. The vendors’ calls name the neighbourhood: “Mezzawiyye ya helwe”, the beauty from Mezzeh, and “helwe ya umm al-shamat”. The Damascus Governorate issues a separate seasonal stall licence for sabbara and confiscates unlicensed stalls.