Brooklyn Food Adventure: Middle Eastern Food on Atlantic Avenue

In between Urban Outfitters and Trader Joe's, there's a street of Middle Eastern grocers, pastry shops, nut and candy stores and fantastic cafes. Sara did the research and we enjoyed a morning full of old favorites (the pastry with the stringy cheese in the middle on top of a sev-like sweet soaked in syrup that you microwave that I first had on my Other Side of Palestine tour) and new treats (Yemeni food pictured above).

The Yemen Cafe was worth our wait (we had great Turkish coffee and Arabic tea across the street first). Molten hot pots of beans and tomatoes simmering, the largest hunk of fresh baked bread (pictured above), a smear of babaghanoush and cup after cup of a dark black, sage and sweetened tea, yum.

Our adventure ended with pockets full of fresh pitas, pistachio halva, and some date cream with almonds. One shopkeeper told me to eat the halva with a banana (new to me), which I haven't gotten to try yet, but look forward to.

For now, the goods are on the table for some Turkish-like breakfast each day.

Next up: Arthur Avenue for Italian and Jackson Heights for Indian.

Sara may need to quit her day job and start leading tours!

Sesame (in its many forms)

Favorite sesame snacks in Israel include:

Sesame loop of bread with fluorescent za'atar for dipping all wrapped up in recycled newsprint. 5 NIS (about $2. Tourist price?)

Sesame roll with thicker dough, somewhere in between a kaiser and a bagel, slightly sweet like a simit.

Sesame-laden pita then covered in very tart za'atar and even when dropped on the souk floor it still tastes ok because the 5-second rule is legit. 2 NIS.

Halva halva halva. Mostly pistachio, but sometimes plain. Kosher. Non-kosher. Freshly made. 'Freshly made.' Sweating in a plastic bag when it's 96 in Tel Aviv or melting when it's over 100 in Tiberius, the way you can pull it into chunks and it melts in your mouth or sweetens your yogurt... yum.