For years, Beirut was torn apart by a bitter civil war. Now activists are healing Lebanon’s wounds by sharing their rich culinary traditions Try a local’s pick of the best Lebanese recipes Ever driven down the wrong side of a three-lane motorway in the wrong direction? You almost certainly will if you use any of the main routes into central Beirut. It would seem that a population used to the daily threats of local violence or aerial bombardment couldn’t care less about risky driving. The Lebanese claim to be able to communicate with each other just using their car horns, and with rock and electronica thumping out of the bars that play host to a new and vibrant underground music scene – as well as traditional songs being belted out in cafés – the city is very, very noisy. The buildings range from the occasional pretty Arabian apartment block with French-style ironwork to hundreds of ugly white and pastel concrete buildings and spectacular modern developments, while gold mosques and big churches poke out wherever they can. The concrete is the result of the rapid rebuilding undertaken since 1990, when the long Lebanese civil war ended; the more sculptural modern architecture comes from recent attempts to rebuild the badly damaged downtown area. Neither style does much for Beirut’s declared desire to reclaim its status as the Paris of the Middle East, which it held before 1975, when the city stopped being the financial centre of the region and a major tourist destination because of the protracted conflict which began that year. Now no fewer than 18 different communities live here, and these can be subdivided along further political and religious lines; and, unlike many Middle Eastern cities, the dress code varies as much as the architecture – from tight and skimpy to fully veiled. Perhaps because of this huge mixture of cultures and communities, Beirut has always excelled at food, and now some Lebanese activists are trying to overcome the open wounds among its many factions by cooking and eating together (there has been little in the way of a large-scale formal reconciliation process since the conflict officially ended). Kamal Mouzawak, a one-time TV chef and former board member of the international Slow Food Movement, founded Beirut’s first farmers’ market in 2004, a radical place where producers from all communities – Palestinian, Muslim, Christian, Druze – come together once a week to sell their produce. Now Mouzawak has opened a co-operative-style restaurant, Tawlet, with the aim of promoting and preserving Lebanese food traditions, where a roster of producers from the market come and cook their community’s food for a day

Original Source A taste of Beirut