BY ARLEN GARGAGLIANO
“Where is your real home?” This is a follow-up question I have been asked after announcing that my homes are in two very different places. Straddling different domiciles—in two distinct countries—is something to savor and relish, especially when the culinary component is considered.
“Sabah al khair!” I declare across the street. I’m jogging along near my house in New York, as I do every morning since I returned to the United States from Saudi Arabia in March. I move my niqab-like mask off of my face so that the woman walking on the other side of the street can recognize me. She’s wearing a hijab and an abaya, as she always does.
“Sabah al noor,” she smiles broadly and waves.
I’m speaking the language of my other home, while I’m in this home, and it feels good.
The idea of home being primarily a place of comfort, somewhere you feel both welcomed and at ease, is something that started to impress me in Riyadh. I’m of a generation that grew up repeating Wizard of Oz’s Dorothy’s ruby slipper utterance, “There’s no place like home.” However, I’ve made a slight change: now I say, there’s no place like homes.
Is it possible to have your home—at one time—in more than one place, in more than one country? How can this be? Well, there are certain constants that have to be present to make a place a home. These ingredients are the perfect blend of the intangible and the tangible: a level of self-comfort that comes from the “vibe” of a particular place, and then there’s another key component for me — food.
Food is solace. It has always been a crucial element in making different places my home. Growing up, my dad frequently said, “Food is love!” My mother embraced this adage and substantiated it through not only our nightly meals but also the numerous dinner parties, complete with an enticing array of appetizers and entrées, with a heavy Italian influence, thanks to my Sicilian-American father. The emphasis that my family placed on food still runs through my veins and now those of my children. I’ve found my familial respect for both food and hosting to be especially prevalent in Riyadh.
Living in Riyadh has given me the chance to play with previously unfamiliar ingredients. There I toyed with pomegranate syrup, black lemons, cumin seeds and the other kabsa spices, the magic of zaatar, and all different kinds of dates. Not long after my initial arrival in KSA, now close to three years ago, I was taken by a lovely family to the national festival: Al Janadriyah. This visit served as my orientation to Saudi cuisine. After that, I had the honor of being invited into several homes. From the custom of greeting guests with sweets, sampling different family’s interpretations of kabsa, harees and gursan, to enjoying Hasawi rice in Al Hufuf, my life in Saudi became a tremendously rich and delicious experience. As a result, a place that was initially so different to me quickly became my home.
At Janadriyah, I purchased a lot of spices, which I subsequently brought to my New York home. While I recounted the tales of my Riyadh-based life to my New York family and friends, I shared some of the dishes that I had learned using my new spice and ingredient repertoire.
And vice versa: when I returned to Riyadh, I started making my Saudi friends some of the dishes I grew up with—including my mother’s caponata, a Southern Italian roasted eggplant and tomato “salsa” that goes beautifully with all the wonderful breads I’ve had in the Kingdom.
This very well-received culinary crisscrossing cemented my identification of two homes.
If I were to put my homes into a Venn diagram in order to compare and contrast them, you’d note some obvious differences on the outside circles. After all, my two homes lie in very different countries. But in the center, the part that shows shared values, you’d see some constants: people I love, a sense of comfort, and the joy of passionately created and shared meals.
I feel fortunate to be in New York right now because I am with my family and friends. I continue to take great pleasure in developing our shelter-in-place menus which often include dishes I learned when I wasn’t here.
But I am deeply missing my other home.
“Bayti,” I yearn to say to any one of the young guards at the DQ who will ask my driver to roll down my window to announce my destination. The guard will smile at my mention of home. “Ahlan bik,” he will respond, and perhaps add an English, “welcome back,” as he waves me through.
