Loading ...Conflict Kitchen or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Make Mahalabiya
Conflict Kitchen was the brainchild of co-founders and directors Jon Rubin and Dawn Weleski. The simple idea was to highlight the food and culture of nations often portrayed through a hostile, and thus dehumanizing, lens in the mainstream American media and among the Washington, D.C., class of politicians and pundits.
Located in Pittsburgh, the take-out eatery welcomes customers to a gastronomic journey with lunch served in wrappers inscribed with the voices of people from Cuba to Palestine, voices most Americans otherwise only encounter through a filter that is more often than not distorting rather than edifying. Conflict Kitchen focuses on a different country every few months. Each culinary focus includes not just food and personal perspectives, but events, national products such as, say, soap from Palestine, and a colorful design reflecting national patterns and style.
Since its founding, Conflict Kitchen has devoted menus to Venezuela, Afghanistan, North Korea and Iran. Its decision to focus on Palestine, however, provoked a backlash, which not only lead to donors rescinding their support and accusations of anti-Semitism, but even a death threat that temporarily forced the kitchen to close. Even Palestinian food was too much to bear for some local supporters of Israel.
Despite intimidation efforts, the kitchen is back in business with strong community support rallying around what is quickly becoming a Pittsburgh legend. Palestine Square recently spoke with Jon and Dawn about the inspiration for Conflict Kitchen, why they chose to focus on Palestine (the country of choice when the interview was conducted), the backlash and support, their trips to the West Bank, and the Kitchen’s future plans.
The whole idea of Conflict Kitchen (CK) is very powerful since sharing plates has a way of breaking down barriers between peoples. What made you think of such a culinary forum for educating people who are simply looking for a meal?
Conflict Kitchen was created in response to much of what we felt was lacking in our city of Pittsburgh and, for that matter, in most parts of the country. There is a distinct lack of understanding or empathy in American public life for people living in countries we deem as enemies. We coax the public with the smell and taste of our food, and then use that food as one of many storytelling devices to introduce our customers and our city to cultures and narratives that they had most likely never experienced before. In addition to hosting performances, events, discussions, and film festivals, all the food comes wrapped in and is served alongside printed interviews that we’ve conducted with people from the country on which we’re focusing. The staff are also hired because of their capacity to not only cook and serve the food but also to engage the public in discussions around our focus country. In essence, we are trying to create a space on the street that catalyzes political and cultural discussions that are often uncomfortable for Americans to have because they involve challenging the polarizing and simplified narratives that are constructed by much of the media and U.S. policy makers.
Have you been to Palestine to try much of the cuisine there?
Yes, we went in June 2014 and spent most of our time cooking dishes and eating a lot of amazing food in family kitchens throughout the West Bank and Nazareth. We like to go shopping as much as we can for the ingredients in local markets and get a sense of the daily customs around food production, distribution, and consumption. Many of the dishes that we ate during the trip are now on our menu.
Your wrappers include the perspective of Palestinians on politics and culture – how did you go about collecting personal narratives? The larger question would be, what kind of working relationship do you have with Palestinians in Palestine?
Many of the initial interviews happened during our trip to Palestine. Mostly we interview people as we cook and eat together – it’s really a very intimate way to exchange stories. We’ve maintained and expanded these relationships with folks in Palestine who have worked with us on school exchange programming, an interview publication with kids, and other initiatives. We also work very closely with members of the local Palestinian community here in Pittsburgh.
I haven’t tasted any of your dishes, but judging from the photos it does look authentically Palestinian, are you self-taught or did you have a helping hand in crafting the menu?
Our chef, Robert Sayre, went to culinary school and has worked with food for twenty years. He travels with us when we visit the countries we focus on, and he develops our recipes with home chefs in each country. We also worked with the local Palestinian community here in Pittsburgh to taste test all the dishes before we add them to the menu. He’s always adjusting the recipes, and of course everyone’s mother comes and tells him he is doing it slightly wrong.
There really is no one recipe for anything and, in this way, the word “authentic” can be problematic. Culture and food are based on personal experience and that inherently creates a unique sense of taste. We are always conscious that cooking, much like music, is all about interpretation and variations on a theme, and what we present to the public is filtered through our local ingredients and slightly changed through our local palette. This is one of the wonderful aspects of cooking and can serve as a metaphor for how culture is fluid, borderless, and shared. It’s also important to recognize, especially with Israel’s branding of historically Palestinian culture, how food can be colonized and used as a tool for erasing histories and identities.