Jordanian Cuisine

If one dish can sum up an entire country, it is mansaf. Jordanian cooking is Bedouin at its root: lamb, dried dairy and rice — three things a desert environment supplies and stores well.

Mansaf is more than a dish

Mansaf is a complete hospitality ritual with its own rules: served on one large communal tray, eaten standing with the right hand, with the head of the lamb placed before the most honoured guest. Refusing mansaf in Jordan is not simply refusing food.

Jameed

Jameed is dried salted yoghurt formed into hard white balls, and it gives mansaf its distinctive sourness. It's soaked and strained before cooking, and the difference between good and poor jameed shows immediately in the dish.

Zarb

Zarb is the Bedouin cooking method: a pit in the ground, embers at the bottom, meat and vegetables set above and buried under sand for hours. The result is meat falling off the bone with a smoky edge.

Nabulsi kunafa

Kunafa holds a special place in Jordan, the Nabulsi version above all — white Nabulsi cheese between two layers of fine pastry, eaten hot straight away.