Amid Grief Over Gaza, Palestinian People Are Looking for Consolation in Molokhia

Manal Farhan misplaced her urge for food. It was November of 2023, greater than a month because the October 7 assault by Hamas in Israel, killing 1,139 civilians and members of the Israeli army and taking greater than 200 hostages. The violence that day sparked an Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip that had already killed greater than 14,000 Gazans (the toll has climbed astronomically since), flattening buildings, and making a dire humanitarian disaster. Farhan, a Palestinian American within the throes of intense grief, hand-stitched a Palestinian flag and hung it exterior her dwelling in Logan Sq.. Then, she says she acquired a name from the administration firm representing landlord Mark Fishman telling her to take away it — if she didn’t, she’d be evicted. “I mentioned ‘I’m Palestinian and there’s a genocide.’ They mentioned, ‘It’s a must to stay impartial,’” Farhan recounts.

Between anxiousness in regards to the eviction and the horror of witnessing Palestinians slaughtered and dismembered by bombs each day on social media, Farhan struggled to eat. “Once you’re carrying that degree of stress, your physique stops responding to starvation. Starvation turns into a secondary concern,” she says. However starvation would typically return when her mom Karima would make molokhia (ملوخية), a leafy stew with roots in Egypt that right this moment represents a unifying dish throughout the Arab world. Molokhia, the nationwide dish of Egypt, is historical. The pre-Arabized roots of its identify means “for the royals” or “for the gods.” The leaves, additionally referred to as jute mallow, unfold from Egypt throughout the Arab world with migration and commerce. It’s seasoned merely with salt, garlic, and lemon, boiled in rooster broth, and sometimes served with rooster or lamb.

In instances of turmoil, we flip to the dishes that make us really feel secure, and an increasing number of as of late, individuals in Chicago — dwelling to one of many nation’s largest and oldest Palestinian immigrant communities — are looking for solace in a bowl of molokhia. As one depend estimates at the least 186,000 Palestinians might have been killed by Israeli forces — in line with a letter revealed by researchers within the British medical journal the Lancet — Arab People are looking for consolation and solidarity by any means. In that local weather, the dish is taking up a brand new political significance for a lot of Arabs launched to it for the primary time. Virtually each weekend, organizations just like the U.S. Palestinian Neighborhood Community and College students for Justice in Palestine set up massive protests downtown. On Thursday, August 22, teams assembled exterior the United Middle to protest the exclusion of a Palestinian American speaker on the DNC. Autonomous teams blockade streets in Wicker Park, protest weapons producers like Boeing within the Loop, and even dyed Buckingham Fountain blood-red, spray-painting “Gaza is bleeding.” And now, because the Democratic Nationwide Conference descends upon Chicago, protestors march and disrupt politicians’ speeches, condemning them for funding Israel’s military. To disregard the political actuality of the individuals who love this dish, then, can be to inform an incomplete story of molokhia’s place in Chicago.

“I don’t know a Palestinian who doesn’t love molokhia,” Farhan says as we eat and talk about her case on the Palestinian-owned Salam Restaurant in Albany Park. The identical Palestinian flag Farhan made in November stays hanging exterior her dwelling as she continues to combat what she contends is an illegal eviction. (The owner argues {that a} lease settlement bans any article from being displayed out of a window.) Palestinian Chicagoans and allies have protested the eviction, boycotting the Logan Theater, which Fishman owns. Being evicted right here in Chicago for “expressing love and pleasure” for her heritage, as her federal lawsuit in opposition to Fishman states, is ironic for Farhan. Her maternal grandmother’s dwelling in occupied Palestine is now inhabited by Israeli settlers. (Farhan’s lawsuit, which argued neutrality was by no means the target — different tenants might fly Christmas and Hanukkah decorations out their home windows, in line with Farhan’s lawsuit — was dismissed in March and Farhan awaits an enchantment.)

Alongside graphic images of corpses and rubble, I see displaced Palestinians making molokhia in Gaza on social media. “Mloukhieh is among the hottest dishes liked and made by Gazans. Normally, it’s made with rooster or rooster broth, however since no protein supply is at the moment out there, we’re making it with processed rooster broth. As ordinary made with love, amidst the warfare,” Renad, a 10-year-old content material creator from Gaza, writes in a caption. The shortage of rooster is obtrusive; meat being practically inconceivable to seek out or purchase as a consequence of Israeli blockades of meals, hygiene merchandise, and drugs. Many, particularly in North Gaza, have died of hunger. Nonetheless, the dish appears to retain its celebratory and comforting which means, even within the depths of hell. “Palestinian meals is among the foundational features of socialization in our tradition … no matter the truth that [the refugees] have been displaced and dispossessed,” says Lubnah Shomali, the advocacy director of Badil, a human rights group for Palestinian refugees.

Lubnah, a Palestinian Christian, was raised within the Chicago suburbs earlier than transferring her household, together with her daughter, my good friend Rachel, to the West Financial institution to attach with their tradition, regardless that life was tougher below occupation. Lubnah says refugees typically decide up totally different strategies of creating molokhia from one another, the identical debates I hear in Chicago melded. “Inside the refugee camps, there persists this must host, invite individuals, and make meals,” Lubnah says.

For Mizrahi Jews, Jewish individuals of Center Jap descent, molokhia is a part of their reminiscence too, regardless that the Nakba severed these ties. Hisham Khalifeh, proprietor of Center East Bakery in Andersonville, remembers assembly an 80-year-old Mizrahi Jewish man there in Chicago. “He nonetheless had his Palestinian ID in his pocket,” Khalifeh says. The person wished to speak in regards to the meals he’d liked in Palestine and all that had modified since he was cleaved from his Muslim and Christian neighbors by Israel’s formation, apartheid, and ethnic cleaning. Khalifeh says the person advised him in Arabic, their shared ancestral language, “Naaood lal tareekh.” Allow us to return to historical past.

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“White individuals love tacos [and] enchiladas… however I bear in mind being a child, consuming molokhia at college and everyone being like, ‘Ew, that is slimy inexperienced stew,’” remembers Iman, a Mexican Palestinian Chicagoan. Iman agrees molokhia is a core a part of Chicago however is uncertain others will see it that manner — which she doesn’t thoughts. “It’s a kind of issues I really feel is so liked however hasn’t been claimed or taken over by white tradition but.”

The primary Palestinians arrived in Chicago within the 1800s, lengthy earlier than the fashionable Israeli state was established, in line with Loren Lybarger, a professor at Ohio College and creator of Palestinian Chicago: Id in Exile. He remembers consuming molokhia regularly on the houses of Palestinian neighborhood leaders in Chicago throughout his analysis.

Molokhia, the nationwide dish of Egypt, is historical. The pre-Arabized roots of its identify means “for the royals” or “for the gods.” A Thirteenth-century Syrian cookbook lists 4 totally different variations; one which requires charred onions floor into paste and one other with meatballs. It’s a meals that’s impressed fable and non secular fervor, because it’s mentioned that the soup nursed Tenth-century Egyptian ruler Fatimid Caliph al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah again to well being — therefore the identify. (It’s additionally generally referred to as Jew’s mallow, referring to a declare that Jewish rabbis have been the primary to find and domesticate it.) The Druze, an ethno-religious group in West Asia, believed and nonetheless consider the caliph was God. So many Druze don’t eat molokhia even now, obeying his command. For most individuals, although, molokhia is now not solely for kings or gods anymore. However making it may be an affair match for royalty.

Cooked molokhia leaves have a “viscous high quality, much like nopales in Mexican delicacies,” Lebanese chef Sabrina Beydoun says. Molokhia is consolation meals, one thing teeming and proper within the deep greens, the grassy and earthy odor. “My mother would put together it with lots of pleasure,” she says. “As I’ve gotten older, I look again on [it] with fondness and nostalgia.”

And everybody has a special manner they like their molokhia — the variations and debates are virtually a part of the expertise. “Everybody does it their manner, and everyone seems to be satisfied their manner is healthier,” Beydoun says, laughing.

My good friend Rachel, a former participant on Palestine’s nationwide basketball workforce, prefers molokhia leaves entire (Beydoun says that is frequent amongst Lebanese individuals), whereas my different Palestinian good friend Rayean grew up with floor leaves. Farhan’s mom Karima’s particular ingredient is a little bit of citric acid.

At Cairo Kebab, the town’s solely Egyptian restaurant, molokhia grew to become the second-most requested dish amongst its Arab diners because the spot started serving it each day in 2023 off Chicago’s fabled Maxwell Road in College Village, in line with co-owner Mohammed Saleh. “House meals floor us and make us into who we’re,” he says. Molokhia is arguably half of a bigger shift, the place eating places owned by marginalized ethnic teams are more and more serving dishes as soon as relegated to the house, as a consequence of each wider consciousness by means of media, want for the dishes amongst immigrant communities eager for acquainted meals, and cooks feeling empowered to discover their identities in a deeper manner.

“Lots of our prospects who’re Palestinian or Jordanian will ask for a bunch of lemon, or will ask for us to not prepare dinner it with garlic,” says Mohammed.

Ahmed, the proprietor and head chef of Cairo Kebab and Mohammed’s father, provides that except they’ve had molokhia earlier than, “People eat it nonetheless we serve it.”

Ahmed makes the restaurant’s model with plenty of garlic in scorching butter, whereas Raeyan’s household goes mild on garlic. I like the rooster with crispy, roasted pores and skin, and regularly alternate between spooning the molokhia onto the rice and rooster, and spooning rice and rooster into the molokhia. Some prefer it skinless and boiled. Most of my buddies eat it with rice; Ahmed says many choose sopping it up with bread, and a few eat it plain like soup, with a spoon or mild sips from the bowl. Normally, it’s served with squeeze after squeeze of recent lemon.

Khalifeh has fond reminiscences of molokhia with quail. Ahmed says in Egypt’s second-largest metropolis, the port city of Alexandria, it’s typically made with shrimp, and a few use rabbit. In Tunisia, the molokhia is dried and floor right into a powder, leading to a silky, practically black-colored stew with lamb. Sudanese individuals, due to their shared historical past with Egypt, additionally love molokhia. It’s spelled molokhia, mlokheya, molokhia… The variations are limitless and dizzying.

“After I was a child in Egypt, molokhia wasn’t only a meals, it was an occasion,” Eman Abdelhadi, an Egyptian Palestinian author and sociology professor on the College of Chicago, wrote in an e mail. “A complete day can be spent within the arduous processes of washing, drying, and reducing it. It was one thing all of us appeared ahead to.” Ahmed says that in Ramadan iftars, a time of gathering after fasting all day within the Muslim holy month, many shoppers request at the least two plates of molokhia when breaking quick.

For Arab Chicagoans who didn’t develop up with molokhia, Chicago is commonly the place they first tried it. “We don’t have molokhia in Morocco. However I heard of it as a result of we used to look at previous [Egyptian] motion pictures,” says Imane Abekhane, an worker at Cairo Kebab. “Then I got here to Chicago, tried the Egyptian molokhia, and I liked that.”

After I first began investigating molokhia for this piece, so lots of my Arab buddies advised me Cairo Kebab’s was the very best place to attempt it in Chicago — a bowl made me perceive why. Tender roasted rooster, vivid inexperienced molokhia balanced with simply sufficient garlic and salt, vermicelli noodles within the rice, and a aspect of home made tomato-based sizzling sauce with chile flakes, chile pepper, and black pepper — all scrumptious. Ahmed made the molokhia at my desk the way in which it’s generally made in Egypt, with aptitude and efficiency, a gloopy river of inexperienced cascading from one saucepan into one other earlier than pooling in my bowl. Mohammed notes that he’s seen extra Palestinians and Arabs come into Cairo Kebab for dwelling dishes like molokhia because the devastation started in Palestine final yr.

Even when everybody can not agree on make it, everybody I spoke to agrees that molokhia is an Egyptian dish. However due to the massive inhabitants of Palestinians in Chicago, many’s first assembly with molokhia — together with mine — is at a Palestinian good friend’s dwelling, or at Palestinian-owned grocers like Center East Bakery, the place Khalifeh says non-Arabs typically are available after seeing it on-line as a part of a rising advocacy for Palestinian delicacies and the Palestinian trigger — their resistance in opposition to Israeli occupation. That provides the dish a sure political significance.

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After we made molokhia, Rachel used dried leaves her grandmother introduced her from Palestine, an expertise Mohammed Saleh says is frequent. “After we go to Egypt, my dad and mom are at all times gonna carry again at the least one suitcase filled with dry pre-packaged items, together with molokhia,” he says.

Frozen and dried leaves are additionally available in Chicago, at Center East Bakery, Sahar’s Worldwide Market, or Feyrous Pastries and Groceries in Albany Park. Each Raeyan and Rachel insist that dried — which produces a darker colour than frozen — is healthier. Ahmed says dried has its deserves, however frozen leaves protect molokhia in its unique state extra successfully, the method of drying giving it a special style and colour. “Frozen is as near molokhia leaves harvested in Egypt by hand as you will get,” he says. Khalifeh, in distinction, is adamant that dried is at all times higher, saying it has a taste and texture that frozen can by no means obtain. Certainly one of his techniques is to place somewhat little bit of frozen leaves into the dried, serving to with colour and consistency. However he and Ahmed each say that not everybody could make dried molokhia appropriately.

And maybe one thing is misplaced within the modernity of freezing, one thing exchanged when sifting by means of the molokhia leaves is forgone. “My mother and aunts sit on the ground, eradicating stems and remnants of different harvest[s] like tobacco leaves,” Beydoun says. “It’s a communal apply. It’s a poetic factor to witness.” In dried leaves, I see survival — a option to transport ancestral vegetation for scattered diasporas. Frozen molokhia have to be shipped. However dried might be carried; it isn’t depending on any firm, simply those that have a relationship with the plant.

Nonetheless, virtually everybody agrees recent leaves are greatest — if you will discover them. Sahar’s has recent molokhia leaves this summer season, however “they go quick and we generally don’t know once they’ll are available,” a grocer advised me over the telephone. Hisham additionally directed me to Việt Hoa Plaza, the place I discovered recent leaves that the grocers there additionally mentioned are hardly ever stocked because of the rising recognition of molokhia in East Asian delicacies. In response to the Markaz Evaluation, Japanese farmers began rising the plant after ads within the ’80s pushed molokhia with slogans like “the key of longevity and the favourite vegetable of Cleopatra!”

“[It’s] very fashionable in Japanese grocery shops in addition to Korean grocery shops,” says Kate Kim-Park, CEO of HIS Hospitality, including that their model is barely stickier. “The plant is named 아욱 (ah-ohk) in Korean,” she says.

Chef Sangtae Park of Omakase Yume within the West Loop has fond reminiscences of cooking molokhia and consuming it with family and friends. “I add it in conventional [Korean] miso soup or as aspect dishes [banchan] by blanching the leaves and generally mixing sesame oil, sugar, and Korean pink pepper flakes,” Park says.

You can even develop them your self. Iman determined to begin planting molokhia and different vegetation utilized in Palestinian delicacies like wild thyme (generally referred to as za’atar, although it’s utilized in a different way than the spice mixture of the identical identify) this March. “I felt prefer it was an act of preservation and resistance when individuals are making an attempt to erase Palestinians,” Iman says. Globally, Indigenous cultures stress the significance of seed-keeping, and Palestinians are not any totally different. However planting molokhia was troublesome in chilly Chicago. “[Molokhia] prefers temperatures between 70 levels Fahrenheit (21 levels Celsius) and 90 levels Fahrenheit (32 levels Celsius) and well-drained, loamy soil wealthy in natural matter,” says Luay Ghafari, Palestinian gardener and founding father of City Farm and Kitchen, including that Chicagoans ought to begin planting the seeds indoors below develop lights “4 weeks earlier than the final frost date,” transplanting them into the backyard when the prospect of frost is over and the soil has warmed.

“It could get actually sizzling after which it could get actually chilly once more, so I used to be consistently operating them out and in of the house once they have been little seedlings,” Iman says. Now, the molokhia vegetation are wholesome and mature, nothing just like the yield Iman sees from Palestinian fields, however one thing she’s happy with. Ghafari says molokhia is an annual that may develop a number of ft tall in optimum circumstances. “Throughout harvest season, you typically discover it bought in massive bales as a result of it takes a big amount of leaves to yield sufficient portions for consumption.” However dwelling vegetation in Chicago like Iman’s don’t yield sufficient leaves for a lot in addition to smaller pots of stew. Iman’s Mexican mom tends to the vegetation at their household dwelling close to the suburbs. “It’s our bonding factor,” Iman says.

Raeyan’s mom Nancy Roberts, an Arabic translator, typed up Raeyan’s grandmother’s molokhia recipe — the recipe we cooked from — that was handed down by means of generations. This, too, is a form of sacred seed-keeping.

“I plan to move [recipes] to my youngsters till liberation,” Abdelhadi says. “Mahmoud Darwish mentioned the occupiers concern reminiscences, and Palestinians have made reminiscence a nationwide pastime.”

After operating round in the summertime warmth of Chicago seeking tales about this plant, what have been my reminiscences of molokhia? They weren’t Rachel’s, Raeyan’s, Iman’s, or Laith’s — reminiscences of childhood, household, heritage. However I used to be constructing a relationship with molokhia.

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A colleague as soon as mentioned, “Palestine traces my thoughts.” I by no means forgot it as a result of it so aptly described these previous 10 months for me. Now, by some means, molokhia had settled there too, changing into a part of my reminiscence of this brutal time, intertwining with Palestine, with Gaza. “It was very dangerous right this moment,” Hisham says quietly once I talked about Gaza throughout our interview, referring to the Israeli airstrike that day in al-Mawassi, a delegated “secure zone,” that killed over 100 individuals in a matter of minutes, most of them youngsters. In each interview I did for this text, the genocide both saved developing or the strain was thick because it was talked round. So how might writing about molokhia ever simply be about meals? How might researching, consuming, and making molokhia not make Palestine fill my thoughts, and enter my goals?

One evening I dreamt that Rachel, Raeyan, and I have been bustling round my kitchen making molokhia, me sifting the leaves with henna-stained palms, Raeyan stirring by the range, Rachel chopping garlic. My good friend Omar was within the kitchen too, watching. It was virtually an actual duplicate of how we had appeared after we cooked it.

Besides Omar doesn’t stay in Chicago. He’s in Gaza.

The day of the dream, Omar advised me the bombing was heavy; he won’t stay by means of the evening. “I hope you reside. Might Allah shield you,” I messaged again. The subsequent dawn, I received a reply. Alhamdulillah. Thank God. Omar was nonetheless alive. For months, this has been the cadence of our messages. I’ll not stay by means of this evening. I hope you reside. Might Allah shield you. Alhamdulillah.

There was an evening when, after all of us noticed yet one more horrific picture of a Palestinian individual’s physique mutilated by Israeli assaults and U.S. weapons, it was recommended, I neglect by whom, that we go to Lake Michigan and scream. After we received there, we have been silent for a very long time. It wasn’t embarrassment, however the concern that God had stopped listening to our screams. What proof did we now have in any other case? Then, virtually in unison, we screamed, the sound carrying over the water. And I’ve to consider we have been heard.

Naaood lal tareekh. Allow us to return to historical past. Nataqadam lal horeya. Allow us to go ahead into freedom.

Nylah Iqbal Muhammad is a James Beard-nominated journey, meals, and leisure author with bylines in New York Journal, Journey + Leisure, and Vogue. You possibly can observe her on Instagram, Substack, and Twitter/X.