city bites
WASTE NOT, WANT NOT FOOD
RAMADAN FEASTING
By Justin Thomas
Ramadan is of course a time for fasting, but much feasting also takes place with the setting of the sun. My recollections of Ramadan dining are always special, and in preparation for this year, I will share my reflections on one of Abu Dhabi’s great Iftar restaurants. Families, extended families and friends gathered to break fast. Despite the restaurant being over-full, there was no animosity, no snarling, and no berating of table staff. A genuine, if rather ineffable, sense of community hung in the air. Fasting had not only reawakened people’s gastronomic appreciation, but at some level it had also heightened their appreciation of our shared humanity. There is an Arabic proverb that goes something like “the cure for toothache is to set fire to the house”. The idea being, big problems distract us from relatively trivial issues, thereby affecting a cure. In some subtle way I think fasting achieves However the idea of an all-you-can-eatthe same end. It’s harder to be overly buffet does have its disadvantages. For upset about trivial things or one, it seems to encourage dissatisfied with ones’ lot in over-consumption, even Ramadan life when you’re weak from gluttony. For some people should never hunger and thirst. the ‘all-you-can-eat’ prefix
be a time when
is taken as a statement of Last year my Iftar venue both waist and challenge. Plates are heaped was Sadaf on Muroor Road, waste increase and re-heaped with gravityAbu Dhabi, a restaurant defying mounds of meat as that I hope to visit this well-fleshed diners the limits coming Ramadan. Sadaf, I’m told, is an of test their stomachs. Arabic word for ‘pearl’. They offer an extensive Arabic menu featuring some of my favorites such as chello kebab and the princess of all desserts, Falooda Shirazi, a kind of ice cream but so much more. I’m no expert on Arabic cuisine but for me, Sadaf offer an exotic array of palette pleasers and I’m a huge fan of pomegranate which features as an ingredient in every other dish. Along with being fairly affordable, Sadaf is also a buffet specialist – throughout the year, they operate an all-you-can-eat spread. A la carte is still an option, but not one that I imagine is exercised much during Ramadan.
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The real issue for me at this particular Ramadan Iftar was not how much food people ate, but rather how much food people wasted. One table of six diners left behind enough food to comfortably feed a party of 20. This was sadly not the exception, but rather the rule. There is a well-known and often repeated verse from the Quran pertaining to dining: “Eat and drink but waste not by excess”. It’s wisdom worth remembering as the holy month approaches. Ramadan should never be a time when both waist and waste increase.
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