To the Bekaa Valley

A peasant woman making saj at a restaurant along the Bardouni River in Zahle, Lebanon. Photo by David Lansing.

Late in the morning, we hired a car to take us to Baalbeck to look at the Roman ruins. The road wound east, towards Damascus. As we passed through the little towns in the Bekaa Valley, you couldn’t help but notice the obnoxious yellow flags of Hezbollah centered by a clenched fist holding up an automatic weapon. Baalbek is the strategic headquarters of Hezbollah which may explain why, despite having perhaps the most magnificent Roman temples outside of Italy, it gets few tourists.

Before we got to Baalbeck, we stopped at Zahle, a pretty little town known for its open-air restaurants strung along a shady stretch of the Bardouni River. The eateries, known collectively as Cafes du Bardouni, are famous in Lebanon for their mezze.

We walked up a narrow path following the path of the Bardouni, which is more like a creek than a river. Waiters holding up menus in front of our faces invited us to come in and try “the best” Lebanese mezze in Zahle. At one restaurant, an old peasant woman, wearing the traditional abaya, sat near the entrance beneath the shade of a tree making marqouq, or saj, the very thin, unleavened peasant bread that is cooked on a domed griddle set over a coal or wood fire.

A handful of people, including myself, stood around watching her methodically pat out the dough, flip it expertly atop the saj griddle, and, after a minute or two, deftly fold it into quarters and put on a flat pan where a waiting waiters quickly snatched it up and took it to the tables.

The old woman seemed totally oblivious to all the restaurant activity around her; I’m quite certain that although I was standing only a few feet away from her, taking pictures of her making the bread, she did not see me. It was like she was deeply lost in her own thoughts, her own meditations. Her hands and arms knew exactly what to do to make this ancient bread leaving her mind free to go where it wanted.

Tags: , , ,

2 comments

  1. Candice’s avatar

    I am 3rd generation Lebanese on both sides of my parental origin. We live, breath and eat food. This thin bread is something we regularly eat with meals. It has become a lost art here in the US. We actually have to buy it from some older woman in a different state. Who know what will happen when she is gone….??

    One of my very first memories in life is when I was around 2 or 3 years old and I was sitting watching my great grandmother make this bread out in her garage on this silver dome onto of her gas stove. She would tear off a warm fresh piece of bread and slather it with butter and hand it to me to eat. Oh that memory is stained into my food lovers brain for eternity!

    Thank you for posting this photo and all the others of my native homeland!

  2. Candice’s avatar

    I am 3rd generation Lebanese on both sides of my parental origin. We live, breath and eat food. This thin bread is something we regularly eat with meals. It has become a lost art here in the US. We actually have to buy it from some older woman in a different state. Who know what will happen when she is gone….??

    One of my very first memories in life is when I was around 2 or 3 years old and I was sitting watching my great grandmother make this bread out in her garage on this silver dome ontop of her gas stove. She would tear off a warm fresh piece of bread and slather it with butter and hand it to me to eat. Oh that memory is stained into my food lovers brain for eternity!

    Thank you for posting this photo and all the others of my native homeland!

Comments are now closed.