All Things Arabi
Every possible food you can imagine comes in two different qualities, commercial and Arabi. It took me a while to figure out what that meant, Arabi. I knew from my Pimsleur language classes that Arabi meant Arabic (and that was about all they were good for as they were teaching me Syrian Arabic, not Tunisian). It was especially confusing to hear it said with such pride "This egg is Arabi!" when I had already learned that Tunisians are not exactly arabs. When our friends would point to harissa (hotpepper paste) in the market they would tell us, you know it's arabi because it has seeds in it, see? So I began to think that Arabi meant homemade. That's not quite right though, as eggs and vegetables can be arabe, and those are certainly not homemade.Now I'm starting to think it means farm-fresh or farmer's market quality. In other words, that it means real and not mass produced. There are moments though when I'm still not sure, like today at lunch. The housekeeper, who usually cooks lunch for a small payment of 1.500 TND per day, was sick today and so no lunch was prepared. We all went out for fast food. Let me describe fast food Tunisian style. I order pizza. There is only one kind in the winter and that's neptune - fresh chopped tomatos and herbs with tuna, olives, capers and mozzerella cheese. It takes 10 minutes for the young man to roll the dough, chop the tomatos and add spices, toast the bread, add the fixings and cook it for about two minutes. Then he drops it in a box and passes it my way. "Wow," I say, "that's Arabi!" Everybody laughs. "That's not Arabi, that's fast food! Can't you tell the difference?" Apparently I can't, can you?
posted by tiaraletourneau @ 5:26 p.m.
3 Comments:
Isn't that funny! The pizza sounds delish! I wish our fast food was that healty.
Reminds me of a similar cultural differences:
UK vs. Canadian
crisps = chips
chips = fries
biscuits = cookies
scone = buscuits
sweets = candies
cheers!
It sounds to me like it might mean "made/grown/produced in a traditional manner", which is similar to your guess of "farm fresh/quality" except that it adds the stipulation that the food must be traditional. Thus pizza, a relativesly recent western import, would not qualify, no matter how organic the production process.
That's my guess :)
Arabi means
For vegetables eggs.....non commercial or fresh from the farms.
a commercial egg comes from the white chicken, an arbi one comes from the coloured one
for any other things it meand home made...like bread, pastries...etc
hope this help
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