Arabic food

We do have quite a number of Mid-Eastern restaurant in KL thanks to the influx of Arab Gulf tourists every summer. But I doubt many (if any) Malaysian make it a point to visit and dine in any of these restaurants. Therefore, besides kebab, I guess most Malaysians don't know much about Arabic food.

Therefore I decided to blog a bit about the Arabic food (Disclaimer: pictures are not mine, plucked from the web).

There is first shish taouk which is BBQ meat. It is usually chicken (but can also be lamb or beef). Sometimes it is the filling of a sandwich but mostly eaten like the following picture.

And there is also the kebbeh which is ground lamb meat mixed with some herbs and wheat.
Hommus is the sambal of Arabic food. It makes an excellent dip to go with the bread, salad and meat. There are two types... the original one is made from chickpeas. They have another type which is mixed with eggplant to give a coarse texture and darker color.

Another appetizer is the falafel. It is chickpea mixed with some herbs & spice and fried.

A typical appetizer would look something like this. Salad with kebbeh, hommus and of course the most important item - kubus (Arabic bread). The version here is quite small. Some of their kubus can be as big as a respectable table cloth.

Another popular dish is yabrak which is rice + lamb meat wrapped in some leaves. Sometimes it is also served in soup:

Actually, taking an Arabic meal is more like having a BBQ as everything is either grilled or BBQ-ed. Whilst I wouldn't say their food tastes bad, but personally I feel they lack creativity with food. Perhaps they have very limited ingredients here. And if you can't live without fish, Syria will be a challenge to stay in. Fish is almost non-existent and whatever fish they have is not fresh. And the only way to cook fish here is to grill, you can forget about steam. And come to think of it, the Syrians don't seem to have been acquainted with prawns, crabs or oysters.

All in all, the best food I believe still has to be Malaysian food. Can't wait to savor all those nasi lemak, char kuay teow, chee cheong fun, roti canai, asam laksa, dim sum, pan mee.... gosh the list of Malaysian food is endless. Malaysia Boleh! Malaysia Truly Asia!