Secrets of Syria's Jewish Cuisine

Poopa Dweck, author of the cookbook Aromas of Aleppo, is a member of the tightly-knit Syrian Jewish community in the United States that hails from Aleppo, a city in the north of Syria near the Turkish border-Raised in Brooklyn, Dweck lives in Deal, the exclusive New Jersey town where many Syrian Jews have settled. Moment editor Nadine Epstein visits Dweck at her home, where over kaak sweetened with anise seed, they discuss how Aleppo became "the pearl of the Arab kitchen" and the symbolic foods of the Aleppian Rosh Hashanah meal.

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Why is food from Aleppo unique?

Throughout the centuries of Ottoman rule, the city was at the crossroads of key trade routes. The grandest Silk Road caravans traveled through, and it had the largest souks. Aleppo's people, therefore, had access to exotic foods such as the pistachio nuts that they used in baklava instead of walnuts. In addition, the city was known as "the queen of the meshi." Meshi means stuffed vegetables in Arabic. Because meat used to be very expensive, it was ground up and mixed with rice--that's called …

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Publication information: Article title: Secrets of Syria's Jewish Cuisine. Contributors: Not available. Magazine title: Moment. Volume: 35. Issue: 5 Publication date: September-October 2010. Page number: 82+. © 2009 Moment Magazine. COPYRIGHT 2010 Gale Group.

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