A Cuisine Shaped by a Tumultuous History

The early origins of Middle Eastern food can be found in Bedouin dishes and the peasant dishes of each of the countries involved. In the case of Egypt, one can go back as far as Pharaonic times to find the foods still eaten by the Egyptians today: roast goose, melokhia soup, bamia and batarekh. In his Dictionary of the Bible, J. Hastings writes that the ‘Hebrews in the wilderness looked back wistfully on the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic of Egypt; all of these were subsequently cultivated by them in Palestine’. He also lists other foods mentioned in the Bible, such as varieties of beans and lentils, chick peas, bitter herbs (still eaten today in the Passover ritual), olives, figs, grapes and raisins, dates, almonds and nuts. These were prepared in a manner similar to that of the Egyptians, probably remembered by the Jews from their time in Egypt. One speciality the Hebrews adopted was a fish, split open, salted and dried in the sun. It was very useful to take on long journeys, and it is still considered a great delicacy all over the Middle East.