A heatwave and a total fire ban might not be ideal conditions for a Syrian barbecue, but it only made the welcome warmer at a lunch for newly arrived asylum seekers and refugees in the western Sydney suburb of Auburn this week.
In the midst of heart-breaking news from the crisis in Aleppo, up to 100 people gathered in Auburn's Community Centre for Community Kitchen’s end-of-year feast, some from Syria, but also Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Myanmar, Egypt, Sri Lanka and more.
An initiative from not-for-profit humanitarian organisation Settlement Services International (SSI), Community Kitchen is a fortnightly social event that seeks to reduce isolation among asylum seekers by bringing the community together over a free shared meal.
“These people have left so much behind, there’s such a sense of loss, so when you come to a community space where you are welcome and there is familiar food on the table, there’s something quite heart-warming about that,” said Trina Soulos, SSI’s community engagement and capacity manager.
The menu changes, with asylum seekers given the opportunity to lead the kitchen and cook dishes from their cultural backgrounds. Other times, volunteers, religious leaders or community members might prepare the lunch, and on special occasions such as this, guest chefs will come to cook and pass on their skills.
Everyone is welcome at a Syrian barbecue
Behind the pans this week were sisters Sharon and Carol Salloum, cooking the beautiful Syrian food that has created a following at their Darlinghurst restaurant, Almond Bar.
When they heard that Syrian refugees would be arriving in Sydney, they got in touch with SSI’s Community Kitchen organisers and offered to cook a welcome meal.
“Our parents were born in Syria, they are each one of nine children and most of our aunties and uncles are still there,” said Sharon. “Why wouldn’t we do something to help?”
“This is the biggest fattoush I’ve ever made,” she laughed, hugging an enormous pot of the salad of bright green herbs and chopped tomatoes, waiting to be tossed with a sumac dressing and crunchy pieces of fried flatbread.
The fire ban might have brought the barbecue indoors to the stovetop and the oven, but this is the food eaten at Salloum family gatherings; traditional dishes that are a familiar comfort to Syrians who’ve left everything behind.
Carol (left) and Sharon Salloum cook up a feast for Community Kitchen. Source: Rachel Bartholomeusz
Along with the giant fattoush, there was fat and juicy kafta, grilled chicken marinated in marjoram, oregano, wild thyme, cumin, coriander and sweet paprika, a traditional potato salad the sisters grew up eating, mountains of flatbread and grilled corn rubbed in pomegranate butter.
“I think they’ll love it – it’s home,” said Sharon.
Together in the kitchen
Fattoush might not taste like home for Sajeda*, a 29-year-old Rohingya woman from Burma, but she loves it too. “I’m learning about so many different cultures,” she said.
Sajeda has six young children and speaks six languages: Rohingya, Urdu, Hindi, Bengali, Arabic and now, English. She is also an excellent cook.
She will be cooking an Australia Day feast for Community Kitchen, and the requests have been flooding in. Everyone loves her chicken korma, but there have also been calls for her biriyani, her signature beef curry (get the recipe ), and the wonderful salads of her homeland.
Sajeda says being part of Community Kitchen has introduced her to many new recipes. Source: Rachel Bartholomeusz
The fortnightly lunches are often themed around such celebrations, and so Tamil asylum seekers will cook curries for Tamil New Year festivities, Iranians cook jewelled rice for Nowruz (new year), and everyone takes part in the Eid celebrations at the end of Ramadan, and shares in the sweets of Diwali.
Of all the new recipes she’s picked up, it’s pizza that Sajeda’s family loves the most. Sajeda learned how to make it at Jamie’s Ministry of Food, the culinary training course made available to Community Kitchen clients. “I also learned how to make a roast chicken, but my country’s one is better,” she said, laughing.
Her young sons tell me their mum is a master chef, and invite me over to eat her cooking.
It's one of three dinner invites that I'll receive from a group of people who are new to this country and have lost so much.
Another invite comes from Akbar*, a keen gardener and cook from Iran. His specialty is ghormeh sabzi, a herb and lamb stew that is so good, everyone wants his recipe. "Come to my house tomorrow and I'll make you ghormeh sabzi,” he said, speaking through a translator.
He is on the roster to cook again in January, and he’s planning to make fesenjan, a chicken stew flavoured with walnuts and pomegranates. It’s a difficult dish to cook, he explains, because he has to achieve the perfect balance of sweet and bitter.
When he’s not cooking, Akbar likes to be in the centre’s community garden, dubbed the Friendship Garden. Many of the asylum seekers live in small apartments, and relish the chance to use this space to grow herbs, fruits and vegetables that they can use in their cooking.
Akbar grows tomatoes and cucumbers, herbs and flowers. While he can get all the ingredients he needs to make Persian food in Auburn, or from his garden crop, he says the lamb in Australia tastes different. Fellow Iranian Hamza agrees.
Hamza comes to the garden every day, even in the rain, to water these plants.
"I am the garden boss, this is my garden," he said, smiling.
He picked a cucumber, and pressed it into my hand.
Hamza tends the Friendship Garden every day. Source: Rachel Bartholomeusz
More than a meal
Trina Soulos says Community Kitchen feeds between 80 and 320 people every second Wednesday, heavily supported by a team of volunteers, the local community, fundraising, funding, and company sponsors such as Allianz, who paid for the barbecue – but it’s more than just food.
People offer whatever skills they have and it results in a party atmosphere. A Syrian DJ came to play music, and women danced. A local barber set up a stall giving haircuts free of charge. One of the asylum seekers, Mohanad, paints portraits, another paints faces and Sajeda had a queue of women waiting for her henna art. Outside, families played volleyball and doughnuts were tied onto string for children to eat, hands behind their backs.
The food is truly excellent, but it’s the feeling of being at a big Syrian family barbecue, of being welcome, that makes the fattoush taste even better.
* Surnames have been withheld to protect the identity of asylum seekers interviewed for this story.
