In my opinion, the overpriced and underwhelming food to be found in Palestinian cities like Jerusalem & Bethlehem have nothing on Ramallah. At least that’s what I’ve concluded from my short stay in the West Bank this winter. The lively and cosmopolitan city of Ramallah is the administrative capital of the occupied Palestinian Territories and a great place to experience some of the best food in the Middle East.
Despite the apparent normalcy of the hustle and bustle of everyday life in the city, the Israeli occupation is impossible to escape when you’re in the West Bank. Just outside of Ramallah, the Jalazone refugee camp is a living reminder, established following the Nakba and still home to more than eleven thousand Palestinians whose villages and homes inside present-day Israel were taken and occupied in 1948. A clearing between buildings near the old city reveals a view of expanding illegal Israeli settlements that mimic the cookie-cutter streets of a California suburb.
Stories of when Israeli Defense Forces raided the city center to arrest a group of foreign activists flow into casual conversations with local residents. All roads from Ramallah lead you to the foot of the ominous apartheid wall that Israel has constructed, towering over the human frame and blocking Palestinians from reaching their own land.
Traffic jams spread out from Israeli checkpoints choking circulation in streets surrounding the city, eliminating the possibility of ever knowing how long it might take to get from point A to point B on any given day.
Palestinians’ olive tree orchards have been cut down by the IDF, and the remains make up a hilly landscape of lifeless stubs.
It may seem trite to write about Palestinian cuisine in the context of everything else I witnessed and absorbed during my time in the occupied West Bank; however on this leg of our trip, warm and delicious food came to mean a lot more to us than just another good meal.
We arrived to Ramallah for the first time after having spent over six hours held up at the Israeli side of the King Hussein Bridge/Allenby border crossing. In case you didn’t know, the only way into the West Bank is through an Israeli point of entry. For anyone who has spent time in Arab countries before arriving to Israel, this typically means enduring a day of absurd interrogations and waiting for hours on end to retrieve your passport, which is being kept from you without any explanation from the Israeli authorities. All this waiting is only aggravated once you realize there is no access to food or water after the snackbar closes early in the day.
We experienced all of this. Six hours after entering the passport control area we were finally handed back our US passports and told with a fake smile: “welcome to Israel”. At that point, as you can imagine, we couldn’t wait to leave Israel.
After finding our driver - a Palestinian with Israeli plates who was able to circumvent the worst checkpoints - by 9pm we crossed into the West Bank and arrived in Ramallah. The first thing we did was eat. Standing in the manara roundabout, after a long and frustrating day at the border, it felt like an incredible relief to be back in a warm and hospitable city, eating one of the best sandwiches I’d ever tasted in my life. I fell in love with Ramallah on the spot.
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EAT STANDING UP : Shawarma at the Manara
If Ramallah is world-famous for its shawarma, I wasn’t aware of the fact before traveling there myself. To be perfectly honest, I generally find shawarma too greasy and disappointing throughout most of the Middle East. I rarely order it.
But during our stay in Ramallah, I’m pleased to say that I couldn’t get enough! We enjoyed daily doses of some of the juiciest, most flavorful and best dressed lamb and chicken shawarma I’ve ever tasted. Opinions of where to buy the best shawarma were free-flowing, however I settled on the small shop that is just off of the central manara roundabout (under the Stars & Bucks cafe) as my favorite.
Freshly-baked, soft, fluffy bread wraps the hot slices of lamb together with a selection of pickled goodies that are glued together with the subtle nutty flavor of tahini. A bottle of coke and a sandwich cost near to nothing, and all the service comes with a friendly smile. This has definitely been one of my favorite meals in the Middle East to date.
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EAT SITTING DOWN : Nothing Tops Home-cooking
Catering to its sizable middle class and many international aid-workers, activists and students, Ramallah boasts a number of really impressive restaurants and cafes. We tried a few that served up everything from local cuisine to some seriously delicious pizza, however no one can argue with the fact that no restaurant will ever be able to top the experience of eating in a Palestinian home.
We were blown away by the hospitality and generosity of the families who open their homes to us - guests they hardly knew or just met - to feed us and make us feel entirely welcome in Palestine. To our delight, the food they served was always handmade, homemade and scrumptious.
Each morning our hosts in the Ramallah suburb of Al-Mesrah served up a massive breakfast featuring fresh homemade dishes like moutabbal (from eggplants roasted that morning), zeytoun/olives (cured locally), zeyt/olive oil (pressed from their own olives), a wonderful and tangy zaatar and sumac mixture (blended by their mother), and bread (baked that morning).
One morning we were invited by some neighbors to enjoy a huge brunch that was prepared by the matriarch of the house, a warm and caring older woman with a serious talent for cooking. We feasted on a table of fresh cheeses, piles of handmade bread coated in zaatar or fresh tomato paste, and homemade fitayar (spinach pies). For a family who barely knows us to feed us so lovingly, I think, truly speaks to the strong and sincere human spirit of the Palestinian people.
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DRINK SOMETHING SWEET : The Best Hot Chocolate I’ve Ever Had!!
I’m not exaggerating. Palestinian hot chocolate is the best in the world, and they know it. When I ordered my first HC in Ramallah at the cafe/bar Azure I was intrigued by the fact that it was literally called ”The Best Hot Chocolate You’ve Ever Had!!” But to be honest, I was more than a bit skeptical. When my drink arrived and I had my first taste, I was proven wrong in the best way possible.
The ingenious method used throughout Ramallah’s best cafes - like Zam’n, pictured above - is to start with really rich milk chocolate chunks placed at the bottom of a glass, and then flood it with hot foamy milk. Stir and enjoy. It is simple, rich, and joyful. And you’ll never ever be satisfied with syrup or powder based HC again.
Here’s to imagining a better world and a more peaceful Palestine in 2011.
