MORE ABOUT DÖNERS, SHAWARMAS, AND "TIENDAS DE PRODUCTOS ÁRABES". Ottoman heritage in the food of the city - 2nd part
Essay in ten installments (+ recipes, delicious places, and other tips).
(This text is a continuation of a previous post. To start from the beginning…
From the first vestiges of horizontal döner kebabs in Istanbul miniature paintings from 1616 (see last week's entry) up to the end of the 18th century —when döner kebabs, and kebab houses, in general, were already considered an Ottoman culinary hallmark, according to travel diaries— the history of this grilling technique is relatively clear and traceable, but once it begins to cross borders —first, between the provinces of the empire, and then to other countries and continents— and to adapt it and translate it into other cultures and languages, the thread is lost, and we no longer know which came first, the gyro or the taco árabe or the chicken or the egg.
Let's go back to Berlin for a moment but in the present time... It's the beginning of spring and you are walking through Görli Park, in Kreutzberg —just a few blocks from where your favorite market, the Turkish Market, is installed. You are looking for a semi-shady spot to spread out your blanket and start reading, when—suddenly—your little Sunday ritual is abruptly interrupted by an intoxicating smell wafting through the trees, from what appears to be an adjoining family picnic… It's a weekend mangal, there is chicken and lamb shish kebabs, koftas, grilled vegetables, bread and all kinds of meze. Say goodbye to your reading plans, because you know that from now on you won't be able to concentrate on anything else —my recommendation is that you move to the Schöneberg neighborhood and go to Habibi on Nollendorfplatz which, ironically, is not a doner kebab but a shawarma, but it's our favorite. And, well, not in this precise historical time, but it is in this first translation of the Turkish "döner" into the Arabic "shawarma" (both literal translations of “spinning”) that the historical trajectory of this dish began to disperse, to enrich itself from other cultures, and mutate into new foods.
Thinking back to this experience in the park, it's not hard to imagine how that juicy smell of charcoal-spiced meat captivated Berliners 50 years ago. At first, the love for the döner kebab was reduced to the recently established Turkish community —which had emigrated to Germany by labor agreement— but little by little, its exquisite smell attracted other audiences, until it permeated all layers of German society, which now claims it as a local invention. And it is understandable, the döner kebab is not only one of the brightest and richest ways of grilling and eating meat that exists —beyond its different adaptations— it is also a noble, accessible, substantial food; it has that logic of care and sustenance on-the-go that good street food offers, the kind that restores.
However, almost half a century before Germany claimed the authorship of the döner kebab, in Greece, it was already known as gyro (another literal translation of "spinning"), where it had emigrated —in an earlier exodus— after the First World War, and —also— it was soon to become taco oriental or taco árabe in Puebla, towards the beginning of the 1930s —the first way of serving this dish, that we have a record of in México. The second, and, perhaps, the most radical, elusive, unconsciously assumed as local and adored (at least in Chilango territory, and, I think, that, in all of México, because, although it is said that people are not very fond of us out in the country, they certainly feast on our tacos) form of tropicalization of this dish in México is the taco al pastor. Now, it should be pointed out that to Mexico, the döner kebab did not arrive as a döner kebab, but as a shawarma, because —although people from various regions of the Near East emigrated to Mexico, from the end of the 19th Century to the beginning of the 20th— the main point of departure of this migration was not Turkey, but Lebanon.
So, before going into details about whether the pastor is a direct descendant of the taco árabe, or, if these, in turn, are descendants of the shawarma, let's take a first dive into the temporal abyss of Chilango gastronomy, with this brief parenthesis/tribute to other beautiful culinary businesses that where created in México thanks to this migration: the tiendas de productos árabes. Here are the two oldest surviving stores of this kind in the historic center, both started as bakeries...
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