- The Israeli salad.
Is Israeli cuisine actually a thing?
(computer dial tones becomes upbeat hip-hop music)
Hey!
- Hi!
- Hello!
- Israel has music, Israel has culture,
Israel has more technological innovations
that an 80s sci-fi movie.
But most importantly, Israel has got it where it counts,
the food.
I'm gonna start with this,
then add a dash of this,
then maybe move on to one of these.
Let it be known, the best way to explore Israel
is through the food.
- Excuse me, you know all that Israeli food you're eating,
it isn't exactly Israeli.
- Of course it is, shawarma, schnitzel, hummus,
all Israeli staples.
I've had these in the shuk!
- Doesn't mean Israelis invented it.
And actually, there's no such thing as Israeli food.
- (gasps) I will not listen to your lies.
￢ﾙﾪ La La La La ￢ﾙﾪ
- Yeah, real mature.
- If I could pop in for a second.
- Please enlighten us.
- Anything to stop her maligning my magnificent masabacha.
- So, she's kinda right that this food
isn't exactly Israeli.
- (gasps) Boo! - But that's not a bad thing.
While Jews have been in Israel for thousands of years,
most Israelis are from immigrant families
who came in the last 150 years.
Those diverse ethnicities are mirrored
in authentic and myriad types of food
you can find throughout the country.
- Ethiopian, Yemen, Moroccan, Polish, French!
- And so much more!
- So is my hummus Israeli or not?
- Sorry, hummus, the Arabic word for chickpeas
and the primary ingredient of hummus,
dates back to the earliest recordings of a recipe
from Egypt in the 13th century.
Ever since, hummus has been a staple of communities
around the Mediterranean, both Jewish and non Jewish alike.
In the 1950's, when the Jews from that region
fled persecution and immigrated to Israel,
they brought their hummus recipes with them.
- Wait, what about shawarma,
my favorite Tony Stark-endorsed spit cooked lamb dish?
- Shawarma was invented in Turkey
during Ottoman rule in the 19th century.
- Shakshuka?
- That delicious dish of eggs and tomato sauce
served piping hot in a stove iron pan
sold in almost every Israeli restaurant across the states,
- Yeah, more Arabic than Israeli.
- What?
- The word shakshuka is derived from the Arabic word shakka
meaning mixture and originated as a tomato based stew
but Tunisian Jews were famous for making a unique egg-based
spicy shakshuka that they then brought to Isreal
when their communities fled Tunisia.
- Schnitzel, it doesn't get more Israeli than that.
Israelis devour more schnitzel
than Californians eat avocado, kale
and gluten-free dietary supplements combined.
- Oh, you mean those thinly-fried chicken cutlets
covered in breadcrumbs.
Ever been to Berlin?
- No!
- Basically, immigrants from central Europe
brought this chicken cutlet
which could easily be made on Friday
and eaten the next day on Shabbat.
- Stop it!
You're destroying my whole world.
- Just chill!
Cuisines take generations to evolve.
And the state of Israel hasn't even been around
for a hundred years.
- That means, the food Israelis eat come from recipes
passed down by Jewish families from all over the world.
We're not talking some Americanized tacos or orange chicken
but genuinely authentic diverse cuisine.
For generations, Jews have been in a diaspora,
living in countries all over the world.
When they immigrated back to their homeland,
the cuisine of those countries came with them.
The result is a smorgasbord of authentic delicacies
passed down from generation to generation.
- Yeah, that's why when you're in Israel,
you can get amazing food from all over the world
like Injera dishes brought by Ethiopian Jews
in the 1980s and 90s, or Moroccan fish
from the port city of Tangier.
So, instead of saying
"everything Israelis eat isn't Israeli,"
maybe it's more accurate to say,
"it's all Israeli"
because the melting pot of Israeli cuisine
reflects the diverse ethnicities
that make up the nation's culture.
- Couldn't have put it together myself.
- But hold on, there has to be something
new and specific to Israel,
the ways of the mouth, the SMS message of the stomach,
the Arrow 3 anti-ballistic missile system
of my upper GI tract
- I told you, you're never gonna find anything
uniquely Israeli.
- Hold up there Nancy naysayer.
There is one dish, something so succulent,
so eclectic, so artisanal,
it could only have come from the innovative Israeli culture.
- Do tell. - Do tell.
- Let me introduce you to the sabich,
the perfect blend of imported elements
innovated upon in that oh so Israeli way.
It's pita with fried eggplant and a hard boiled egg.
The story goes like this.
A Mizrahi Jew by the name of "Sabich" Tsvi
immigrated to Israel from Iraq in the early 1950s.
He got the idea to start up a food stand
after bus drivers who would stop there for lunch
complained that they wanted something more substantial
than what was being served.
Back in Baghdad, it was traditional for Iraqis
to eat a breakfast of brown hard boiled eggs on Shabbat.
So Sabich took that tradition and created
an entirely new dish that was both tasty and fulfilling.
Workers would go from asking Sabich for his unique sandwich
to simply asking for a sabich.
Now, sabich is served everywhere,
from London to America to Thailand
making it not just a staple in the country
but an Israeli trademark around the world.
- Immigrant imported like so many Israelis,
but a homegrown innovation spurred by the working class.
- I want to go to there.
- But even without the innovation, the food of Israel
represents the extensive and myriad ethnicities in Israel.
(upbeat music)
Immigrants from nations all over the world
coming together in an exciting and beautiful harmony.
Like Epcot, but with a better light rail.
(upbeat music)