on food

People keep asking me what we're eating here. We're eating pretty much what we eat at home, with the exception that we can't find black beans, long and hard as we might search. So anyone coming to visit us, bring some dry black turtle beans. Black soy beans are available, but they're totally different. We have canellinis, navys, kidneys, garbanzos, lentils, even pintos and limas and of course favas, but none quite scratch the black bean itch. Also we're waiting and hoping for kale and chard to come into season. Broccoli season has begun.

A connected question is if we're having a tough time eating vegetarian here. The diet of the average Egyptian seems to mirror our diets pretty well in being vegetarian, mostly. Beans and vegetables and fruits and bread are the staples of the diet here. Eggs and milk and cheese are common. Meat is eaten, but most Egyptians can't afford to eat it on a daily basis, and many can't even weekly. The way chicken dominates the American palate is absent here (most of it seems to be sold through KFC), as is pork, though we're told that those who look hard enough find pork chops. Chicken exists, but is no more common than beef or lamb. Pigeon and goose are also common, as is fish. Islam forbids the forbidding of that which isn't forbidden, so Muslims aren't supposed to consider themselves vegetarians, but that doesn't mean that they have to eat meat more than occasionally. The typical Egyptian eats fava beans and pita once or twice a day.

Below is a stir-fry I was working on with some of the most common vegetables here. These are all from a produce guy downstairs from our building who sells only the most common local veggies and fruits, cheap and fresh and very convenient. Here we have tomatoes, eggplant (both thin white and fat purple are usually downstairs), onions (sometimes only red, and often half-red half yellow), cilantro, carrots, bell peppers, zucchini and garlic. Also always downstairs are potatoes, small lemons, hot peppers, spinach, okra, and yams. As is typical for Egypt, often the produce is out, but it takes some yelling and patience to find the seller.

We didn't detail it, but the bigger market two or three entries ago has much more selection, including many imported items. Guavas are local and abundant and cheap, apples imported and expensive. There are also supermarkets nearby with produce wrapped in styrofoam and plastic-wrap, but they just look sad in there.

Also, we're up to all our usual baking madness. Cakes, cookies, brownies, you name it. Rachel took no time getting used to an oven with numbers from 1-10 instead of temperatures. Here the pancake king strikes again, although alas no maple syrup. We're using cream cheese and jam.

We also haven't mentioned it, but alcohol is easy to find. Even during Ramadan a few liquor stores stayed open. A couple of chains deliver liquor in under an hour, and are popular since most drinking seems to be done in homes. Most restaurants don't sell liquor, and cafes almost never do. Maadi has a small variety of bars, with prices generally about what we'd pay in NYC.

This brings me to restaurant culture. Egyptians seem to love to hang out in cafes and restaurants, usually just for a drink, usually juice or tea, and maybe an appetizer or dessert, or maybe a series of appetizers spread over hours. There might be a bit of stigma about eating a full meal out, like it means you're not getting fed well at home.

dates

Clockwise from top left: black date as sold, red date as sold, red date with a big bite out of it, black date slipped out if its skin.

Dates are wildly popular in Egypt. Fresh dates come in red, less ripe, and black, more ripe. When red the meat of the date is like under ripe pears or granny smith apples: crispy and acidic. When black the flesh is gooey and soft like mashed bananas. The skin of a black date is papery and annoying but it's easy to pop the fruit out of the skin. The skin of a red date doesn't come off and is eaten with the flesh. Sometimes you get lucky and get one that walks the line, loose on the outside but still a bit crunchy inside.

A Little History

Zach and I organized a day trip out to some of the earlier (and lesser) pyramids. There were six of us total with a very knowledgeable guide.

This site is known as Saqqara. It is one of the oldest pyramids and it was a huge burial site for a few pharaohs and then countless numbers of nobles and priests.

Saqqara is across from Memphis, which was one of the many capitals of Egypt throughout the Pharaonic period. Memphis was the place where people lived. Saqqara was the place where they went for eternity. Ancient Egyptians put a lot more money and energy into their eternal residence than they did in their living home. This is an archaeological dig in which it is possible to see three different layers of burial sites, as people were being buried here for 3,000 years. The green that is in the background of the picture is the fertile land along the Nile, but the transition from fertile farm land to barren desert is quite abrupt.



Cop on a camel. We never get tired of it.




This is my (rachel) favorite display from the museum. Since Saqqara was such a huge burial site, there is a TON of information about daily life, burial rituals, etc. This is an actual mummy (which we never get to see at most sites). Most of the time you get to see an empty sarcaphogus, but you never get to actually see the mummy. Unfortunately the glare makes it hard to see but you are looking at a mummy's head and the body is wrapped in linen. This mummy (including the linen) is 3,000 years old at least. There is still flesh and even the lines of some veins that are still visible.


This is Zach's pick. It is petrified cheese. There was the faintest fuzzy layer of mold, but I think I have eaten cheese with more fungus on it than these. I am still not conviced, though, that these aren't just rocks put in a bowl to look like ancient cheese.




Here's Zach cruising by a Sphinx. How's that for scale?


This is a giant statue of Ramses II. It fell over and only broke into two pieces. It was submerged in a swampy canal of the Nile when it was found.

The Other Side of the Tracks

This is the little vegetable market where we like to do our week's shopping. Since there is a subway line that runs through Maadi, we have to cross over the tracks on an elevated ramp to get to this side of the neighborhood. There is about a one block span that feels a little rougher around the edges (more like the real Cairo), but then it transitions right back into fancy restaurants, tall apartment buildings, and cute boutiques.



Zach is locking up our bikes while we fill up on produce. On the way back, our baskets will be overflowing with fruits and veggies.






The vegetable purveyors are particularly proud of their displays. They are always friendly and I (Rachel) get to practice some basic Arabic. Nuss kilo is a half kilo; ruba kilo is a quarter. Berengen is eggplant and felfel is pepper. These eggplants are 4 LE/$0.80 per kilo, while the peppers above are 10 LE/kilo.




Zach is chowing down on kushari, Egypt's big thumbs down to the Atkins diet. This bowl is filled with rice and three different kinds of pasta (spaghetti, small tubes, and vermicelli). Then they sprinkle lentils, chickpeas and lots of friend onions on top, and give you a small personal bowl of spicy tomato sauce (empty here). Finally you can dress your kushari with vinegar (small pitcher) or oil with hot peppers soaking in it.




Here is a typical juice stand. You can tell which fruits are in season based on what's hanging from the bags. When we first arrived there were mangos and guava everywhere. Now it is pomegranate (called roma) and orange season. The big sign says Jewel of Maadi.


They press the pomegranate in halves just like an orange. It took three pomegranates to make this one glass of juice, which cost about $0.60. Anti-oxidant magic!