Torshi left is a popular Arab pickle and in Egypt they make it in brine, without any vinegar at all. The beetroots give the turnips a lovely pink color.
•1 kilo turnips (about 2 lbs)
•2 beetroots, raw and sliced or quartered. (you only need a peice really)
•2 cloves of garlic, finely sliced
•just over a litre or 2 pints of water enough to cover the turnips
•5 tablespoons of salt
Use firm, unblemished turnips. Trim and wash them and peel them if necessary (if large). Cut them in half or quarters and leave baby ones whole.
Place the turnips in sterilised preserving jars and layer with slices of beetroot and garlic. Traditionally you put a piece of beet at the bottom, so that when the top turnips turn pink you know its time to serve and eat them
Put the water and salt into a pan, bring to the boil and pour over the vegetables. Seal the jars and leave in a warm place for 3 or 4 days, by which time the pickle will be ready to eat.
Then keep refrigerated and eat within 2 weeks.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
The Cat lady
Madame Vera Baiucci was the cat lady of Maadi. She lived in an apartment building not far from our house. Her husband was a fastidious man in both dress and deportment.......alwasy a gentleman. Vera was not, she was often disheveld and smelled of old cats, and the fish /scraps she carried around the town to all the animals that she fed. When ever she went outside, she was followed around by a long line of cats and dogs who were more interested in the aroma of the food she was carrying. They walked behind her with their noses in the air like they were in ecstasy. At night the animals congregated around her building waiting for her to come out again. One of the stops she made was our house on road 17. Although we had a dog named Pedro at that time, Vera came to feed a cat that had been left behind years ago by the previous residents of our Villa. Twice a day Vera came into our yard, (pedro following her like she was a goddess) calling out Neferr..............TITI!!! NeferrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrTITI!. The old black and white cat would come out of the jasmine bush and climb down the portcullis to get her bowl of food. The cat lady gently would pick her up and place her on a sunny window ledge out of reach of Pedro and feed her. She would scoop a mash of food from her bucket into a small battered aluminum bowl (recovering the bucket so that pedro counldnt stick his nose in it, and hold it up on the ledge for the old cat. She would then pet the black and white cat talking soft nonsence while Nefertiti ate. Then when she was done eating, Madame B would take her bowl and bucket and walk back out to the street.
Friday, January 1, 2010
work in progress
Madame Baiocci the cat lady of Maadi
Going to get a Ramadan Lantern with badraya
Eid al Adha with Salem's kids
Food Stands, Corn, shuwarma, lib fitir
Ras el bar trip "the fleas are coming"
Torshi Lift: stealing Auntie marys pickled turnips
going to camel market in the city of the dead
Let them eat cake
Sahara city picnic with Hala;s family
Going to get a Ramadan Lantern with badraya
Eid al Adha with Salem's kids
Food Stands, Corn, shuwarma, lib fitir
Ras el bar trip "the fleas are coming"
Torshi Lift: stealing Auntie marys pickled turnips
going to camel market in the city of the dead
Let them eat cake
Sahara city picnic with Hala;s family
Monday, December 28, 2009
Lanterns
I was at a store in cleveland area called World Market and they have this lanterns from middle east, pakistan and India. It reminded me of a time when I used to go with Salem to a street in the Khan al Khalili during a feast day and we would buy them. His daughter Badraya and I would walk along swinging our lamps chanting the song of the season WA-HA-WE YA WAH-HA-WE! eh yo hoya...was Kaman wahwee .........eh yo hoya.......... Bint al sultan labis kaftan (daughter of the sultan wears a kaftan)......eh yo hoya
I wish i could remember the entire chant!
Salem picked me up with his daughter Badraya. it was a special event for the Eid ( festival/feast). we walked hand in hand down the road looking at all the shops that had special cakes, cookies and the entire street was covered with lanterns. Alot of them had been recycled from old tin cans and glass bottles. some were very beautiful. Salem chose one for me and one for Badraya. we put candles in the lanterns. Chanting while swinging the lighted lanterns......walking down the street. Salem bought a tray of kakh ( cookie covered with powdered sugar) and ghoryiba (a kind of shortbread cookie) ladies fingers ( sponge cake cookie), Angel wings ( cookie shaped like wings that was covered in a sticky syrup. These would be his gift to my family for the eid.
We stopped also at the Fitr shop. Fitr is a cake made with very thin layers. The baker takes your order and then rolls out the dough then he picks it up and swings it over head a couple of times and lays it on the marble top its see thru thin!! I had ordered Mukasarat ( it means broken bit ...its a peanut one) he puts a layer of fine peanut crumbs over the dough then folds it up inot layers ( like filo dough ) in each fold he puts more peanuts with sugar . then he puts it in a mud brick oven ( ike a pizza oven ) when he pulls out the golden goodness he pours orange blosson syrup all over it. the "cake" sizzles ......finally he puts a big dollop of sweet cream in the center.
Wow it was the best thing I have ever eaten!!
I wish i could remember the entire chant!
Salem picked me up with his daughter Badraya. it was a special event for the Eid ( festival/feast). we walked hand in hand down the road looking at all the shops that had special cakes, cookies and the entire street was covered with lanterns. Alot of them had been recycled from old tin cans and glass bottles. some were very beautiful. Salem chose one for me and one for Badraya. we put candles in the lanterns. Chanting while swinging the lighted lanterns......walking down the street. Salem bought a tray of kakh ( cookie covered with powdered sugar) and ghoryiba (a kind of shortbread cookie) ladies fingers ( sponge cake cookie), Angel wings ( cookie shaped like wings that was covered in a sticky syrup. These would be his gift to my family for the eid.
We stopped also at the Fitr shop. Fitr is a cake made with very thin layers. The baker takes your order and then rolls out the dough then he picks it up and swings it over head a couple of times and lays it on the marble top its see thru thin!! I had ordered Mukasarat ( it means broken bit ...its a peanut one) he puts a layer of fine peanut crumbs over the dough then folds it up inot layers ( like filo dough ) in each fold he puts more peanuts with sugar . then he puts it in a mud brick oven ( ike a pizza oven ) when he pulls out the golden goodness he pours orange blosson syrup all over it. the "cake" sizzles ......finally he puts a big dollop of sweet cream in the center.
Wow it was the best thing I have ever eaten!!
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Pearl of the Desert
My parents announced that we were all going on a picnic at someone’s farm. I thought about the mud huts along the Nile or even the more modern rough brick huts and wondered who we were going to see.
Are we going to stay at a mud hut with a gamoosa (water buffalo) and a ‘saqqiya’ (water wheel)? I asked. That might be exciting but very uncomfortable.
“No we are going to one of Saneya’s friend’s farm. Its called the Pearl” mom replied, and then added “Hala will be there.” I was very excited at the prospect of seeing Hala again! Then I started to think and I became
confused for a moment and so I said, “I know that there is NO farm in Egypt called ‘the pearl’. Mom smiled at me.
“Well it’s actually called “al Luqluq” which means the pearl.” she replied.
OOOOOOOOHHHHH so that’s it I thought.
We all got into the fiat. Dad was driving as usual like a mad demon, dodging the donkey carts and pedestrians along the way. We drove into the Giza area of Cairo and along the ‘strip’ where all the night clubs were just before you get to the pyramids….and we parked in one.
Hala’s father pulled alongside our car. My father got out and so did Mohammad (Hala’s father). As they spoke, I was granted permission to ride with Hala and I quickly skipped all the way to her car! While her brother Tarek (not to be confused with Tareq who lived accross from us on road 12) got into our car to keep my brother company.
When we started driving again, we drove along side a canal. It was not a main road at all and it seemed to pass thru very rural farm villages. All along the canal interesting things seemed to be happening. Boys were jumping off bridges into the water below for a swim, while girls herded their goats along the road. One girl walked beside her gamoosa. Hala and I stared out of the window watching the scenery go by while eating molasses sticks. The sticks are hard at first, but got softer as they got warm in our hands. When we bit off a bit it became real chewy and it got stuck in our teeth. They tasted a bit like the American “Mary Jane” candies, only they were really long. Saneya seemed to have brought tons of the candy and she did not object to us eating it …so we ate them all.
After a while the road appeared smaller, like it was going between fields. The fields were under irrigation so the rows of green alternated with rows of glinting blue as it reflected the sky. You could tell one man’s field from another because of the alternating field patterns. One fields rows were horizontal, the next vertical; each one separated by a wider channel that the water flowed through. Some fields had an abundance of date palms, others did not, yet the whole area had a “green” feel unlike the rest of Egypt which had a “Khaki” feel. Ahead of us on the right was a large stand of date trees with huge red fruit almost ready for picking and rising up behind them were huge mud brick dove (in this case pigeons) cotes. They were like 3 tall spires in tannish gold that were perforated by many holes and sticks.
“Why do people build such huge mud building for birds” I asked?
“Because they eat them”, Hala replied then continued “Hammam Mashwiy is considered a delicacy.”
“Grilled pigeon! People eat birds!” I exclaimed. Saneya laughed, “Well Erin, a chicken is a bird no?” I knew when to shut up…they were still laughing. Hala’s father became very serious (as he always was) and went into a lecture on the economics of village life and how they depend on such things as pigeon. As he spoke my mind wandered. It was such a lovely place. I wish I had a camera for every image that I saw.
W finally got to the farm house. It resembled the villas like they had all around Maadi where I lived…..not very farmish to me. It even had marble mastabas along the front steps.
Hala and I waited until all the adults had finished with their introductions. This seemed to take an eternity and so we made our escape into the house. Hala and I wandered from room to room, hunting for hidden treasure. It was a disappointing hunt. The only thing we seemed to find was some very old coats and Š—abaya’s. When Hala and I searched the pockets we found a bunch of papers carefully folded in one of them. We were unhappy that it did not turn out to be an old treasure map.
“These look important” Hala said, “we must take them to the adults.”
How do you know?
They have a stamp…see. she pointed at what looked like a postage stamp. I even said so.
Hala looked at the papers. “ I am having a hard time reading the handwriting she said but these are not postage stamps…its what we use to make something official.
I sighed. she was going to make having an adventure very difficult. I followed her back to the Salon where they were all sitting, drinking lemonade and chatting. We showed the paper to Mohammad and asked what it was from. It was a work agreement of some sort. A girl had been hired to be a maid in the house for 13 piasters a month (13 cents. It was a stupid piece of paper but the adults seemed to be very amazed at it and began a lengthy discussion on how things used to be and how things had changed.
Our Hostess asked us what we would like to do and always I asked if I could ride a horse. She said no,,,but she could arrange a donkey ride for us around the farm.
Hala and I rode back to the mud towers that housed the pigeons. The whole area around there was so calm and green. The shaded area under the trees was even cool. Every where there were people working and preparing the harvest of something, some unknown greens. Huge heaps of these greens were being piled so high that you could not see the donkey underneath. This gave the impression of a huge shrubbery walking on 4 legs.
As we rode a long the road we met a man who had a wagon load of sugar cane. the wagon was piled high and the grassy ends hung off the back of the wagon and trailed along the ground. Hala pulled up her donkey and spoke to the man. He stoped the wagon and carefully cut off 2 segments off for us. While she negotiated the price of the sugarcane, I rode off thru the trees and dismounted. Riding the bare back of a donkey was a lot different than riding a horse….it was not very pleasant. I stretched and touched my toes. The donkey could not resist the target of my rear end and so head butted me. I fell down. I got up and reached for the halter of the donkey...but he jerked his head and ran off a ways and stopped. I walked toward him slowly. He trotted off a bit more keeping distance away from me until finally he just ran off altogether. Now I was in a pickle.
Hala came up behind me with the sugarcane sections. She looked as the donkey took off down the road. I wondered what I was going to tell her. I was not about to tell her the truth; that was too embarrassing! So my plan was to get sympathy instead.
What happened to your donkey?
It got spooked by something in the trees. I do not know what it was but it frightened the donkey and I was kicked off. It ran down the road. I said as I pointed.
Too bad she said. “you will have to walk back to the house” and she handed me a section of sugar cane.
I looked at it and said “how do you eat this..it looks like bamboo?”
Hala demonstrated from the back of her donkey,” You hold onto the hard part like this and use your teeth to crack the end. then you grab the cracked outer part with your teeth and pull it up and back …like this” she cracked her cane. I tried and found that it was fairly easy to do. Once we had all the hard stuff off she continued “you bite a section off, chew it and suck the juices. do not swallow…when all the juice is gone you spit it out”
Ok I said as I bit off a piece.
I chewed. It was a bit hard on your teeth but the sugar came juice was worth it.
Are we going to stay at a mud hut with a gamoosa (water buffalo) and a ‘saqqiya’ (water wheel)? I asked. That might be exciting but very uncomfortable.
“No we are going to one of Saneya’s friend’s farm. Its called the Pearl” mom replied, and then added “Hala will be there.” I was very excited at the prospect of seeing Hala again! Then I started to think and I became
confused for a moment and so I said, “I know that there is NO farm in Egypt called ‘the pearl’. Mom smiled at me.
“Well it’s actually called “al Luqluq” which means the pearl.” she replied.
OOOOOOOOHHHHH so that’s it I thought.
We all got into the fiat. Dad was driving as usual like a mad demon, dodging the donkey carts and pedestrians along the way. We drove into the Giza area of Cairo and along the ‘strip’ where all the night clubs were just before you get to the pyramids….and we parked in one.
Hala’s father pulled alongside our car. My father got out and so did Mohammad (Hala’s father). As they spoke, I was granted permission to ride with Hala and I quickly skipped all the way to her car! While her brother Tarek (not to be confused with Tareq who lived accross from us on road 12) got into our car to keep my brother company.
When we started driving again, we drove along side a canal. It was not a main road at all and it seemed to pass thru very rural farm villages. All along the canal interesting things seemed to be happening. Boys were jumping off bridges into the water below for a swim, while girls herded their goats along the road. One girl walked beside her gamoosa. Hala and I stared out of the window watching the scenery go by while eating molasses sticks. The sticks are hard at first, but got softer as they got warm in our hands. When we bit off a bit it became real chewy and it got stuck in our teeth. They tasted a bit like the American “Mary Jane” candies, only they were really long. Saneya seemed to have brought tons of the candy and she did not object to us eating it …so we ate them all.
After a while the road appeared smaller, like it was going between fields. The fields were under irrigation so the rows of green alternated with rows of glinting blue as it reflected the sky. You could tell one man’s field from another because of the alternating field patterns. One fields rows were horizontal, the next vertical; each one separated by a wider channel that the water flowed through. Some fields had an abundance of date palms, others did not, yet the whole area had a “green” feel unlike the rest of Egypt which had a “Khaki” feel. Ahead of us on the right was a large stand of date trees with huge red fruit almost ready for picking and rising up behind them were huge mud brick dove (in this case pigeons) cotes. They were like 3 tall spires in tannish gold that were perforated by many holes and sticks.
“Why do people build such huge mud building for birds” I asked?
“Because they eat them”, Hala replied then continued “Hammam Mashwiy is considered a delicacy.”
“Grilled pigeon! People eat birds!” I exclaimed. Saneya laughed, “Well Erin, a chicken is a bird no?” I knew when to shut up…they were still laughing. Hala’s father became very serious (as he always was) and went into a lecture on the economics of village life and how they depend on such things as pigeon. As he spoke my mind wandered. It was such a lovely place. I wish I had a camera for every image that I saw.
W finally got to the farm house. It resembled the villas like they had all around Maadi where I lived…..not very farmish to me. It even had marble mastabas along the front steps.
Hala and I waited until all the adults had finished with their introductions. This seemed to take an eternity and so we made our escape into the house. Hala and I wandered from room to room, hunting for hidden treasure. It was a disappointing hunt. The only thing we seemed to find was some very old coats and Š—abaya’s. When Hala and I searched the pockets we found a bunch of papers carefully folded in one of them. We were unhappy that it did not turn out to be an old treasure map.
“These look important” Hala said, “we must take them to the adults.”
How do you know?
They have a stamp…see. she pointed at what looked like a postage stamp. I even said so.
Hala looked at the papers. “ I am having a hard time reading the handwriting she said but these are not postage stamps…its what we use to make something official.
I sighed. she was going to make having an adventure very difficult. I followed her back to the Salon where they were all sitting, drinking lemonade and chatting. We showed the paper to Mohammad and asked what it was from. It was a work agreement of some sort. A girl had been hired to be a maid in the house for 13 piasters a month (13 cents. It was a stupid piece of paper but the adults seemed to be very amazed at it and began a lengthy discussion on how things used to be and how things had changed.
Our Hostess asked us what we would like to do and always I asked if I could ride a horse. She said no,,,but she could arrange a donkey ride for us around the farm.
Hala and I rode back to the mud towers that housed the pigeons. The whole area around there was so calm and green. The shaded area under the trees was even cool. Every where there were people working and preparing the harvest of something, some unknown greens. Huge heaps of these greens were being piled so high that you could not see the donkey underneath. This gave the impression of a huge shrubbery walking on 4 legs.
As we rode a long the road we met a man who had a wagon load of sugar cane. the wagon was piled high and the grassy ends hung off the back of the wagon and trailed along the ground. Hala pulled up her donkey and spoke to the man. He stoped the wagon and carefully cut off 2 segments off for us. While she negotiated the price of the sugarcane, I rode off thru the trees and dismounted. Riding the bare back of a donkey was a lot different than riding a horse….it was not very pleasant. I stretched and touched my toes. The donkey could not resist the target of my rear end and so head butted me. I fell down. I got up and reached for the halter of the donkey...but he jerked his head and ran off a ways and stopped. I walked toward him slowly. He trotted off a bit more keeping distance away from me until finally he just ran off altogether. Now I was in a pickle.
Hala came up behind me with the sugarcane sections. She looked as the donkey took off down the road. I wondered what I was going to tell her. I was not about to tell her the truth; that was too embarrassing! So my plan was to get sympathy instead.
What happened to your donkey?
It got spooked by something in the trees. I do not know what it was but it frightened the donkey and I was kicked off. It ran down the road. I said as I pointed.
Too bad she said. “you will have to walk back to the house” and she handed me a section of sugar cane.
I looked at it and said “how do you eat this..it looks like bamboo?”
Hala demonstrated from the back of her donkey,” You hold onto the hard part like this and use your teeth to crack the end. then you grab the cracked outer part with your teeth and pull it up and back …like this” she cracked her cane. I tried and found that it was fairly easy to do. Once we had all the hard stuff off she continued “you bite a section off, chew it and suck the juices. do not swallow…when all the juice is gone you spit it out”
Ok I said as I bit off a piece.
I chewed. It was a bit hard on your teeth but the sugar came juice was worth it.
The Garbage boy
Months had past and the new school opened, which was a relief because now I could walk to school rather than ride the bar of Salem’s bike.
On the way to school every morning I pass the carts of the garbage collectors on Port Said Street. They were called Zabaleen after zabala (garbage). They were the self appointed garbage people who rode down the streets of Maadi and collected all of our garbage. Most of it they burned outside the walls of the old city of Fustat, they rest they recycle in some way. The NOISIEST carts belong to them. Their donkey carts looked like huge boxes with no top and one side missing, the wheels of the cart were huge, bigger than the cart made out of what looked like a single slab of wood.
The children sat on the heaps of garbage in the cart while the father sat on the shaft of the cart. Flies buzzed around the cart and were often seen in the corner of the eyes of the children. They flew down Port Said Street, laughing and joking, their father calling out greetings to passersby.
Early one morning we woke to a banging sound. Someone was banging on the door. It was the ‘Zabala’ boy who daily collected the trash from our house into a huge loosely woven basket. This time he looked like he had cleaned up some. His face was somewhat cleaner, like it had been washed and there were no flies in his eyes. His donkey cart waited just outside our garden gate, His hand was outstretched. “Merry Christmas” he said and stared at me. “Merry Christmas? Its not Christmas.”” I replied and stared back at him. The boy remained standing at our doorstep. As I started to close the door, he said again rather quickly this time “Ya Mazmazelle….Merry Christmas Bakshish!?
He wanted baksish? I was confused it was not Christmas and he got paid. I know that my mother even paid extra for him to collect it everyday.
Mom came down the stairs and handed the boy 5 piasters. “Merry Christmas” she said and smiled. He saluted her with the money in his hand and said “Merry Christmas Madame” with the biggest smile he could muster. He then leaped off the stoop and ran out of the gate. He pulled his donkey cart along to the next house and ran inside.
“It was his holiday present” mom said softly as she closed the door.
“But Mom”…I said, “it is not Christmas, its not even thanksgiving!’
No, princess its not, the garbage boy is Muslim, and its one of their feast days. Today you will not see Ateya or Salem either, they are with their families. I suggest you go read a book.
Please note that most of the Zabaleen were Christians)
On the way to school every morning I pass the carts of the garbage collectors on Port Said Street. They were called Zabaleen after zabala (garbage). They were the self appointed garbage people who rode down the streets of Maadi and collected all of our garbage. Most of it they burned outside the walls of the old city of Fustat, they rest they recycle in some way. The NOISIEST carts belong to them. Their donkey carts looked like huge boxes with no top and one side missing, the wheels of the cart were huge, bigger than the cart made out of what looked like a single slab of wood.
The children sat on the heaps of garbage in the cart while the father sat on the shaft of the cart. Flies buzzed around the cart and were often seen in the corner of the eyes of the children. They flew down Port Said Street, laughing and joking, their father calling out greetings to passersby.
Early one morning we woke to a banging sound. Someone was banging on the door. It was the ‘Zabala’ boy who daily collected the trash from our house into a huge loosely woven basket. This time he looked like he had cleaned up some. His face was somewhat cleaner, like it had been washed and there were no flies in his eyes. His donkey cart waited just outside our garden gate, His hand was outstretched. “Merry Christmas” he said and stared at me. “Merry Christmas? Its not Christmas.”” I replied and stared back at him. The boy remained standing at our doorstep. As I started to close the door, he said again rather quickly this time “Ya Mazmazelle….Merry Christmas Bakshish!?
He wanted baksish? I was confused it was not Christmas and he got paid. I know that my mother even paid extra for him to collect it everyday.
Mom came down the stairs and handed the boy 5 piasters. “Merry Christmas” she said and smiled. He saluted her with the money in his hand and said “Merry Christmas Madame” with the biggest smile he could muster. He then leaped off the stoop and ran out of the gate. He pulled his donkey cart along to the next house and ran inside.
“It was his holiday present” mom said softly as she closed the door.
“But Mom”…I said, “it is not Christmas, its not even thanksgiving!’
No, princess its not, the garbage boy is Muslim, and its one of their feast days. Today you will not see Ateya or Salem either, they are with their families. I suggest you go read a book.
Please note that most of the Zabaleen were Christians)
side note coptic church
This church was completed before I left Egypt, and I was there when His Holyness, Shenouda, the Pope of Alexandria and the Patriarch of All Africa on the Holy Apostolic See of Saint Mark the Evangelist of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. he is the head of The Holy Synod of the Coptic Orthodox church.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)