Days before the start of Eid Al Fitr, Cairo’s patisseries began filling their displays with heaps of kahk — the crumbly biscuits with a variety of fillings that are Egypt's favourite dessert during the three-day celebration at the end of the holy month of Ramadan.
Made from a sweet dough whose main ingredients are flour, sugar, yeast, milk, ghee and sesame seeds, kahk is one of the more difficult dishes that young Egyptian women learn from their mothers.
The biscuits are customarily filled with either date caramel or a gel of starch and sugar called malban that is very similar to Turkish delight, and almost always dusted with powdered sugar as the final step.
“I made my first successful batch of kahk when I was 14 years old,” recalls Azza, 44, a mother of five who makes the biscuits for her family each year.
“Unlike a lot of the girls around me at the time, I learnt pretty quickly because every time I made a mistake, my mother would give me a smack,” she told The National.
“We didn’t have a lot of money growing up, so wasting any of the food in our house on a ruined batch would make my mother really angry.”
Historians say the recipe for kahk dates back to ancient Egypt, and making it continues to be an important rite of passage for many homemakers, especially those from the country's rural provinces
Although it is widely available at patisseries nationwide, Azza says that the rise in food prices this year, especially of flour and sugar, has made making the biscuits at home more prudent than ever.
“This year, buying ingredients which yield about 2 kilograms of home-made kahk is the same as buying 1 kilogram of ready-made kahk from the patisserie,” she said. “We make over 10kg of kahk each Eid, sometimes more. It’s customary to take it with us when we visit our relatives during the feast.”
She says the cost of the fillings has also risen significantly, which forced her to make them at home — something she had not done in the past.
“It doesn’t really bother me, since I make everything at home anyway, even my bread. But I am from Fayoum, where this is the norm. For a lot of women living in Cairo, who weren’t taught how to make such things at home, the rise in prices has proved a much bigger problem.”
Making large batches of kahk is a long and arduous process, Azza says, and yet she looks forward to it because the preparation brings Egyptian women together in a social ritual that many find healing.
“When we were kids, my mother would host many women from our village in our home and we would all make the kahk together,” said Noura, 41, Azza’s sister. “Each woman would bring with her whatever ingredients she had. Some of them didn’t have much to bring. We would all sit in a circle and share stories. The women would air grievances or complain about their husbands and at the end of the night each woman would leave with kahk to take home to her family.”
Despite its importance to so many Egyptian women, making kahk at home has been on the decline because the younger generations do not want to learn how, says Azza.
“When I was a young girl, a woman’s entire value was derived from her ability to make a variety of dishes at home,” Noura recalled. “I remember my mother-in-law getting really angry with my brother-in-law’s wife because she had not been taught how to make even simple dishes at home. I remember feeling very ashamed for her, and not wanting to ever be in her situation.
“It's different now. My daughters don’t have the same anxieties as I once did. I think they’re too preoccupied with social media. They won’t even eat it most of the time because it has too many calories.”
However, she believes kahk will remain an essential part of Egyptian culture, whether it is made at home or not.
“Kahk is kahk. It’s a part of Egypt and one of our most important national dishes,” she said.
“And even though they don’t like to make it themselves, my daughters still join our gathering during Eid every year to watch us make the kahk. They laugh and share stories too. And to me, that’s all that matters.”
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
|
1.
|
United States
|
|
2.
|
China
|
|
3.
|
UAE
|
|
4.
|
Japan
|
|
5
|
Norway
|
|
6.
|
Canada
|
|
7.
|
Singapore
|
|
8.
|
Australia
|
|
9.
|
Saudi Arabia
|
|
10.
|
South Korea
|
Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
The Bio
Favourite vegetable: “I really like the taste of the beetroot, the potatoes and the eggplant we are producing.”
Holiday destination: “I like Paris very much, it’s a city very close to my heart.”
Book: “Das Kapital, by Karl Marx. I am not a communist, but there are a lot of lessons for the capitalist system, if you let it get out of control, and humanity.”
Musician: “I like very much Fairuz, the Lebanese singer, and the other is Umm Kulthum. Fairuz is for listening to in the morning, Umm Kulthum for the night.”
The specs
Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel
Power: 579hp
Torque: 859Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh825,900
On sale: Now
Major honours
ARSENAL
BARCELONA
- La Liga - 2013
- Copa del Rey - 2012
- Fifa Club World Cup - 2011
CHELSEA
- Premier League - 2015, 2017
- FA Cup - 2018
- League Cup - 2015
SPAIN
- World Cup - 2010
- European Championship - 2008, 2012
The specs: 2018 Nissan Patrol Nismo
Price: base / as tested: Dh382,000
Engine: 5.6-litre V8
Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 428hp @ 5,800rpm
Torque: 560Nm @ 3,600rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 12.7L / 100km
More from Janine di Giovanni
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
Ferrari 12Cilindri specs
Engine: naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12
Power: 819hp
Torque: 678Nm at 7,250rpm
Price: From Dh1,700,000
Available: Now
more from Janine di Giovanni
The%20Iron%20Claw
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Sean%20Durkin%C2%A0%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Zac%20Efron%2C%20Jeremy%20Allen%20White%2C%20Harris%20Dickinson%2C%20Maura%20Tierney%2C%20Holt%20McCallany%2C%20Lily%20James%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%204%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Total eligible population
About 57.5 million people
51.1 million received a jab
6.4 million have not
Where are the unvaccinated?
England 11%
Scotland 9%
Wales 10%
Northern Ireland 14%
Sting & Shaggy
44/876
(Interscope)
The%20specs
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EEngine%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%201.8-litre%204-cyl%20turbo%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EPower%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E190hp%20at%205%2C200rpm%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETorque%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20320Nm%20from%201%2C800-5%2C000rpm%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETransmission%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ESeven-speed%20dual-clutch%20auto%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFuel%20consumption%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%206.7L%2F100km%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EPrice%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20From%20Dh111%2C195%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EOn%20sale%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ENow%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
The biog
Family: He is the youngest of five brothers, of whom two are dentists.
Celebrities he worked on: Fabio Canavaro, Lojain Omran, RedOne, Saber Al Rabai.
Where he works: Liberty Dental Clinic
Kathryn Hawkes of House of Hawkes on being a good guest (because we’ve all had bad ones)
- Arrive with a thank you gift, or make sure you have one for your host by the time you leave.
- Offer to buy groceries, cook them a meal or take your hosts out for dinner.
- Help out around the house.
- Entertain yourself so that your hosts don’t feel that they constantly need to.
- Leave no trace of your stay – if you’ve borrowed a book, return it to where you found it.
- Offer to strip the bed before you go.
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Profile
Co-founders of the company: Vilhelm Hedberg and Ravi Bhusari
Launch year: In 2016 ekar launched and signed an agreement with Etihad Airways in Abu Dhabi. In January 2017 ekar launched in Dubai in a partnership with the RTA.
Number of employees: Over 50
Financing stage: Series B currently being finalised
Investors: Series A - Audacia Capital
Sector of operation: Transport
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
ELIO
Starring: Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldana, Brad Garrett
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, Adrian Molina
Rating: 4/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Sarfira
Director: Sudha Kongara Prasad
Starring: Akshay Kumar, Radhika Madan, Paresh Rawal
Rating: 2/5
