World Central Kitchen unites with chefs in Beirut to feed a city in crisis.
[Editor’s note: This is an expanded, updated version of a story that first appeared in our weekly Tasting Notes newsletter.]
Hot meals — including molokhia, a comforting stew of jute leaves simmered with chicken — often go to the elderly and the displaced. Hummus and grilled vegetables sandwiches find their way to firefighters, hospital workers and other first responders who need quick, handheld sustenance.
World Central Kitchen’s response to the Beirut catastrophe was swift. Engineering analysts have called the Aug. 4 detonation, which ignited 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate stored in the port area, one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history. Damages total an estimated $10 billion to $15 billion. Sam Bloch, the organization’s director of field operations, left for Lebanon the day after the blasts.
In Lebanon, political power is shared among sectarian groups that represent various religious affiliations, and citizens began demonstrating last October against long-standing government corruption and political dysfunction. The explosion at the port — with unanswered questions over why tons of ammonium nitrate, a chemical used for fertilizer and explosives for mining, was stored in the city center — is for many Lebanese citizens a horrific embodiment of the government’s ineptitude.“I’m furious.
“I’m a restaurateur in my restaurant and we don’t have anything to eat?” she said. “It was the first time I had tears in my eyes.”By week’s end, World Central Kitchen had contacted Kamakian. The organization is now paying her cooks to put out 2,600 meals a day. They’re making pastas, salads and sandwiches paired with peaches, plums or apples from orchards in the nearby mountains — whatever affordable provisions the restaurant’s suppliers can bring.
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