AndFarAway Online Since 2004.

Time 2020-12-24 10:04:25

Web Name: AndFarAway Online Since 2004.

WebSite: http://www.andfaraway.net

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when you re at work staring at excel sheets you ve been looking at for so long, and a song randomly pops up on up next on youtube and the song is sooo beautiful that for the first time in what seems like years, you actually stop what you re doing and head to that open tab to see who the hell made this beautiful thing and it turns out to be a jordanian band that you ve never heard of. wow. enough to wake someone up from stupor. When I travel, the only thing I research is what to eat and where :) I mean, what better way does a person have to know a city and its people than food? So, from a Amman local with a deep appreciation for delicious and authentic food experiences, here s a short and quick guide on how you as a visitor to my city can explore Amman food culture starting with breakfast.Note: While there are many great places to have international food in Amman (Brisket Fatty Dabs for burgers; Vinaigrette for sushi; Tandoori Oven for Indian; just to name a few), this guide will only cover local food and street food. In some instances, the word Lebanese might make an appearance, but don t be fooled by Lebanon s excellent PR prowess. The food culture in the Levant is one and the same.Breakfast (and Jordanian Dinner): Breakfast is our best game as Jordanians. When I travel, it takes me just a few days to get breakfast homesickness. One note: traditionally dinner in Jordan is exactly like breakfast, with lunch being the main course of the day. Of course this is changing with 9-to-6 workshifts having become the norm, but all these breakfast options (except Abu Khamees) also work for dinner.Manaeesh Kaek: A breakfast staple that s very similar to pizza. You can also have it for dinner.Where to Eat:B Lebanese Pastries, Second Circle $: My favorite is the simple Zaatar Jibneh (thyme cheese), but practically everything on the menu is excellent. Try: kafta extra; kaket halloum; potatoes with rocca.Abu Khamees, Sweifeyeh $: Go early and expect to queue up on Fridays. The bakery only offers a few options and it is worth trying all. Closes early.Manaeesh are probably my favorite breakfast itemSalaheideein, Abdali $: Kaek is a type of local bread. Grab some cheese and zaatar by the door and make a sandwich on the spot.Kaek from Salaheddine in AmmanHummus Foul:Amman has some of the most delicious hummus foul you can have in the world.Where to Eat:Hashem, Downtown $:You ll find this in every guidebook about Amman and trust me when I say it isn t a tourist trap. Order hummus, foul masri, falafel mahshi, and lots of tea. Also great after a long night out.Enjoying food at Hashem late at nightHamada, various branches $: A chain with many branches around Amman that is probably the most consistent food establishment in the Kingdom. Try their falafel sandwiches and their fatet hummus.Food spread from HamadaAl-Arabi Al Qadeem, 7th Circle $: For a simple sandwhich that s better than the more famous Falafel il Quds in Jabal Amman. Don t bother with anything beyond the first item on the menu falafel khobez hamam.Hawader Beit Breakfasts:At home, all Jordanians eat hawader beit for breakfast, which literally translates to available in the house . That is brined olives, cheese, eggs, thyme, and other sorts of delicious Arabic tapas . Go with a group, it is traditional to share different platters with everyone.Hawader Beit at home the working girl wayWhere to Eat:Hattouteh, Abdoun $$: My favorite, though I might prefer this late at night. Make sure you order a bunch of plates and tea to get the real Hawader Beit experience. My favorites: fokharet hattouteh, fokhara nabelseyeh, olives, magdoos, labaneh jarasheyeh, beid bi jibneh.A hawader spread at HattoutehWild Jordan, Jabal Amman $$: Their menu changes often but they always have really good organic options. They also have an amazing and very affordable gift shop where you can buy Jordanian herbs and handmade items that were sourced ethically. I ve been trying really hard to raise my protein intake to 100g per day (so far, I m finding it impossible), so I ve been doing tons of googling about high-protein foods. One item that s always on ANY list is Greek yogurt , which really confuses me because when I had yogurt in Greece, its taste, taste, texture, and consistency were exactly the same as those of the regular yogurt we eat daily in Jordan (laban zabadi).So given the similarities, I was:1. Really annoyed at how Greek Yogurt had 3 times the grams of protein2. Really confused as to whyAnd so I decided to google it, and share the knowledge with random Arab googlers who are just as annoyed as I am about how our yogurt is so lacking when compared to the Greek variety *Drum roll*The truth about Greek Yogurt , my fellow worldly protein seekers, is the same truth about American football : just like the latter is not football at all, the former isn t Greek, either. And the protein-rich variety mislabeled as Greek Yogurt is actually an American misnomer for what the rest of the world would call strained yogurt , and which we call labaneh.AMreeeeeeeeeeeeeeericaaaaaaaaaa strikes again!!!Traditional yogurt in Greece = 6g of protein and 93 calories per 100gTraditional yogurt in Jordan = 3g of protein and 60 calories per 100gDiet labaneh in Jordan = 11g of protein and 62 calories per 100g:American Greek Yogurt = 10g of protein and 57 calories per 100g:And so, the clear winner in the protein game is diet labaneh from a local brand like Hammoudeh.Cheers to more protein. You know those moments when you re just going on with your day and then a memory no, a memory of a feeling hits you completely out of the blue. The sweetness of a gingerbread man on TV, a cupcake turned into a dress. Wobbly jello dancers. Heart-shaped lips. I loved that cartoon when I was a kid. I had it recorded on a VCR and I played it over and over and over again.Thank god for YouTube. I ve always really enjoyed stoic wisdom. Here s a nice snippet from a post on happiness on LifeHacker:I like to think of life as a drinking glass, and water as the things you want and need in life. Happiness and contentedness—what Seneca calls “enough”—is when your glass is filled to the brim with water. The more you want, however, the larger your glass has to be, and that means it will take you more water to fill your glass and achieve happiness. Moreover, you’ll spend your life hating the fact your glass isn’t full, when you could have spent your energy finding ways to actually fill it. On the other hand, if you have a small glass, it takes very little water to fill it, and that makes it much easier to reach that state of contentedness. Sometimes, it s easy to forget just how new borders and nationhoods are. It s even easier to forget that globalization in our part of the world (the Old World ) has been around for centuries, if not millennia. We have always lived in a cultural osmosis, with constant seeping of food, words, ideas, costumes, clothes, and almost everything else, a cultural osmosis that knows no borders or identity, no religion or geography.Last month in Athens, my husband and I randomly picked a popular-looking coffee shop to rest and get some water and coffee. After getting a nasty look from the waitress because I mistakenly asked for Turksish coffee instead of Greek coffee (both varieties tasting exactly like our own coffee, of course), we noticed that everyone in the coffee shop was ordering the same item: a fried-looking pastry covered with white powder. Upon inquiry, we were told by the same waitress (now pleased by our interest in Greek food) that the pastry is called bougatsa , and that it s a very special Greek dish unique to an area called Thessaloniki. Never able to resist a dessert specialty, my husband and I braved how deep fried the bougatsa looked for so early in the morning and ordered some:Upon eating the first bite, imagine my surprise as I realized that I was actually eating tamreyeh Nabelseyeh, a dessert specialty (that I thought was) unique to my family s small Palestinian hometown of Nables. Tamreyeh is so specific to Nables that even my non-Nabelsi husband, who makes dessert for a living, had never had it before.I went inside the store to see how they make it, and I was taken back to 20 years ago, when my grandmother used to show off her dough tossing skills as she made tamreyeh, and when I would steal some of the semolina custard stuffing.Here is a video of that coffee shop making bougatsa:And here is a video of tamreyeh being made in Amman:It turned out the original version started out in Constantinople, and was culturally spread by the Ottoman empire. It seems like the Greek version is not deep fried, but baked.The best tamreyeh in Amman is available at Tamreyet Omar on the 2nd Circle. What is good writing? Let s start with the obvious. Good writing has solid character development. It explores important or interesting ideas, and progressively builds an exciting story. It has meaningful and tightly-woven plotlines every page of the way. It s made up of words and sentences that are sharp and to the point, yet descriptive enough to really get the reader to imagine the universe being created. What good writing is not is scrambled metaphors that conceal incoherency (cough, Paulo, cough, Coelho). Good writing will never depend on countless flat, lifeless characters that are there for no reason beyond as many shocking tragic endings as possible. And my friends, good writing is George RR Martin. While I would never say that he is among the best in the genre (he doesn t even make it to top 20), he is definitely a good writer. Maybe a little confused, sure, but I enjoyed the A Song of an Ice and Fire books tremendously when I read them almost ten years ago (a little secret: I enjoyed them so much I even took a few days off work just to binge read). And you know what feeling I never felt as I devoured 1.5 million words?Shock.I never felt shock at surprise twists, at tragic fates, or at convoluted plotlines because none of the books were about shock.What I did feel was an assortment of other feelings.I felt amazement at the rich, vivid and believable world. I felt love towards some of the characters, who were skillfully developed chapter-to-chapter. I felt satisfaction at the underlying theme of universal duality life isn t simply good OR evil, it s usually a bit of both. And most importantly I felt pleasure at George RR Martin s lack of creating stupid, implausible plots just to save important characters. Amusingly, it is this last thing that seems will be the undoing of a potentially-great fantasy series, very much in thanks to all the trigger-happy show watchers, who have been brainwashed by Hollywood to appreciate unexpected plot twists over good character development, rich worldbuilding, and meaningful ideas.How many times in the past two months have you heard It s becoming so predictable. I m not enjoying it anymore, everyone made it alive to the end no violent deaths this season! It is these sorts of comments I ve been hearing on a daily basis that make me feel really bad for George RR Martin. Every such comment is like nails in the Could Have Been a Fantasy Masterpiece coffin, in the Cheap Thrills graveyard. Ultimately, good writing isn t about cheap thrills. It isn t about shocking the audience. Dude, that s why there is FIVE Sharknado movies. So for the sake of all that is good in all the fantasy worlds out there, please shake the bullshit Hollywood-trained expectations out of your head. And just enjoy the story. I know, it s quite random to come back after a long hiatus with a recipe. Or maybe it isn t that random.The recipe s keyword is: Sumac.Crack two eggs directly into the pan, and fry until the white is just set but the yolk is still runny, and the edges are browned. Once the eggs are almost ready (but still runny), cover with two thin slices of brie, then fold.Move to a plate, and sprinkle generously with sumac and zaatar.Wait, what. Brie with eggs and sumac and zaatar?Just trust me on this. Snippets from New York Mag:It is, I promise, worse than you think. If your anxiety about global warming is dominated by fears of sea-level rise, you are barely scratching the surface of what terrors are possible, even within the lifetime of a teenager today. Since 1980, the planet has experienced a 50-fold increase in the number of places experiencing dangerous or extreme heat; a bigger increase is to come. By the end of the century, the World Bank has estimated, the coolest months in tropical South America, Africa, and the Pacific are likely to be warmer than the warmest months at the end of the 20th century. As soon as several decades from now, the hajj will become physically impossible for the 2 million Muslims who make the pilgrimage each year. By 2080, without dramatic reductions in emissions, southern Europe will be in permanent extreme drought, much worse than the American dust bowl ever was. The same will be true in Iraq and Syria and much of the rest of the Middle East; some of the most densely populated parts of Australia, Africa, and South America; and the breadbasket regions of China. None of these places, which today supply much of the world’s food, will be reliable sources of any. Already last year, a boy was killed and 20 others infected by anthrax released when retreating permafrost exposed the frozen carcass of a reindeer killed by the bacteria at least 75 years earlier; 2,000 present-day reindeer were infected, too, carrying and spreading the disease beyond the tundra. Some speculate that the elevated level of strife across the Middle East over the past generation reflects the pressures of global warming — a hypothesis all the more cruel considering that warming began accelerating when the industrialized world extracted and then burned the region’s oil. There is a 12 percent chance that climate change will reduce global output by more than 50 percent by 2100, they say, and a 51 percent chance that it lowers per capita GDP by 20 percent or more by then, unless emissions decline. By comparison, the Great Recession lowered global GDP by about 6 percent.

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