{"id":3821,"date":"2006-09-27T19:02:31","date_gmt":"2006-09-28T00:02:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com?p=3821"},"modified":"2006-09-27T20:45:27","modified_gmt":"2006-09-28T01:45:27","slug":"is_it_time_to_b","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/2006\/09\/27\/is_it_time_to_b\/","title":{"rendered":"Is it time to break fast yet?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saturday marked the beginning of the holy month of Ramadan<\/a>, a month of daytime fasting for Muslims around the world. From sunrise to sunset Muslims abstain from eating or drinking, including chewing gum or cigarettes. It’s a month of self-control and self-reflection as well as a month of ‘being extra nice’ and staying away from all things haraam<\/a><\/em>. But the nicest thing I remember from the month of Ramadan, is of course, the food.<\/a><\/p>\n\n

It’s customary to break the fast together at sundown with a meal called iftaar<\/a>. Tables are laden with dates, fruits, nuts; the hosts prepare their most elaborate dishes, such as biryani, homemade couscous or a leg of lamb… \n

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My mother would vie to be one of the first to host the Saturday iftaar. She would say that there is great blessing in feeding a person who is fasting. She would toil singlehandedly in our kitchen for days to prepare a meal that would feed at least 100 people. For women like my mother, an immigrant from India, a potluck was unthinkable, counter to everything she had been taught about hospitality.<\/p>\n

Most of the people from our center were from Hyderabad, India, and the weekly meals were remarkably similar. First, we would break our fast with appetizers: samosas, channa daal, dahi bades, fruit chaat, rosewater milk, and of course the requisite date (with pits). After the sunset prayer and with a sated stomach, we would dive <\/font><\/font>into the<\/font> biryani, curries and kebabs. We’d top off our meal with<\/font> kheer, a rice pudding-like dish, and chai<\/font>.[link<\/a>] <\/a><\/blockquote>\n\n

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p>Growing up in my parents house we had a similar spread with an additional spattering of pakoras, muri, juices, and fried eggplant<\/font>. When we lived in Saudi Arabia, a country of scheduled nap times and stores open from 6pm to 4am during Ramadan, the food spread was even more spectacular at iftaar time — the small shacks would fill the streets with aromas of fresh bread, sharmas and other savories<\/font>. But now, since living on my own, making an iftar feast for myself always seemed rather pointless. Not to mention that I can’t really cook. Iftar this week has been dates, water, and whatever cereal is in the cupboard.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>Last night while grumpily eating my cereal, I vowed to break fast with at least one ‘traditional’ item for the rest of Ramadan — I have even toyed with the idea of having an iftaar potluck for my friends. Luckily there are plenty of websites out there to help me out with recipes: Iranian Iftar<\/a>, Arab Iftar<\/a>, and of course, Desi Iftar<\/a>. Drooling yet? I am and I’m heading to the kitchen with these recipes in hand for tonight’s iftar. To all that are fasting, Ramadan Mubarak!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Saturday marked the beginning of the holy month of Ramadan, a month of daytime fasting for Muslims around the world. From sunrise to sunset Muslims abstain from eating or drinking, including chewing gum or cigarettes. It’s a month of self-control … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19,14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3821"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3821\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}