Food
What to eat, where to find it, what it costs.
235 Food
The Damascene Rose
A rose that blooms in May, is picked before noon and entered the UNESCO list in 2019. Dried for tea, distilled into rose water, boiled down into a jam.
Variable — ask the price per kilo for buds and per bottle for rose water · Damascus
Mulukhiyah
A green leaf cooked with garlic and coriander and eaten over white rice. The texture recalls okra, and a Damascus table sets lemon down right beside it.
Variable — ask the price of a plate when you order · Damascus
Aleppo Pistachio
In Arabic the word for pistachio is already “Aleppo nut”. How the tree works, how to tell a good kernel from a bad one, and what to ask at the counter.
Variable — in-shell and kernels are priced separately, ask the price per kilo · Aleppo
Aleppo Pepper
Dark burgundy flakes, oily, faintly salty, with heat that arrives late. Known for a raisin-like sweetness — and here is how to pick a good batch at a stall.
Variable — ask the price per kilo; jarred versions cost more · Aleppo
Tamarind Sherbet
Dark, sweet-sour and served over ice. In Ramadan it is the first sip after the fast on a great many Damascus tables, and the dry pods travel home well.
Variable — a glass is a small cash sum; ask the price for pods and paste at the stall · Damascus
Arabic Coffee and Murra
Cardamom-heavy, boiled rather than filtered, poured a mouthful at a time. How the bean is roasted, how murra is brewed, and what the three cups really mean.
Variable — coffee offered at home is never paid for; ask a café's price before you sit · Damascus
Znoud el-Sit
Thin pastry rolled around clotted cream, fried and dipped into cold syrup, then dusted with crushed pistachio. The name means a lady’s arms, after the long shape.
Variable — ask the price per piece at the counter · Damascus
Shish Barak
Small dough parcels filled with minced meat and folded into ears, cooked in garlic yoghurt. A dish recorded in the cookbooks of Damascus for centuries.
Variable — ask the price of a plate when you order · Damascus
Pomegranate Molasses
Sour pomegranate juice boiled down until it thickens. The sour edge of Aleppo cooking rests entirely on it: muhammara, cherry kebab and kibbeh safarjaliyeh.
Variable — ask the price by weight for the loose kind · Aleppo
Mujaddara
Lentils with rice or bulgur under a lid of onions fried until they are nearly black. Meatless and cheap, served with yoghurt, green salad and pickles.
Variable — ask the price of a plate when you order · Damascus
Maghtuta
Hot tannour bread pressed onto raw milk that has thickened overnight into cream, then finished with fine sugar or honey. It is the morning plate of old Homs.
Variable — ask the price of a plate when you order · Homs
Kibbeh Safarjaliyeh
Kibbeh balls simmered with meat in a sour broth of quince, pomegranate juice and pomegranate molasses. An Aleppo dish that arrives with quince season.
Variable — ask the price of a plate when you order · Aleppo
