Eating my way through Egypt

 

It is wonderfully easy to get through my Egypt adventure

as a vegetarian.

And the mango drinks are the best!

Never pass up a fresh mango juice.

Starting with pastries and a freshly made omelet from the breakfast buffet 

at the Pharaohs Hotel. The coffee was okay, throughout, nothing too special. 

Egyptians drink more tea than coffee.

The hibiscus teas are nice.

I think this was a Turkish coffee and a mango juice.

From a little cafe in the Khan el-Kahlili bazaar.

Our little group had braved the maze of trinket sellers and

had stopped for a quick refresher before leaving the bazaar.

This coffee was good. And had some grounds in it, which I

tried not to drink. It was a very robust cup of coffee.

Mangoes were in season, so all of the mango juices were

fresh and tasty.

A sort of peasant pie.

Mine had veggies and some cheese.

Pretty good. I added some hot sauce for a bit of extra flavour.

I wasn't particularly hungry for this meal, so I ended up taking half of

it to go and ate it for dinner on the train, as the offered

train meal was not very satisfying.

We were taken to a restaurant in Cairo that offers one thing on the menu.

Koshary, the national dish.

Those are lentils and chickpeas on top.

It is totally vegetarian.

The rest of the ingredients are pasta, vermicelli, and fried rice.

Packet of crispy onions to put on top.

After pouring the tomato sauce on the whole dish.

Give it a stir and dig in!

Pretty filling. Reasonably tasty.

And, as the ingredients are cheap and easy to find, I can

understand why this appeals to the average citizen.

You can also dress it up with garlic oil and chili sauce.

An example of the train breakfast.

A lot of bread.

We noticed this was a theme across Egypt.

Bread was everywhere. I saw a child load up their

breakfast plate with a stack of bread rolls at another breakfast buffet in Luxor.

Canned iced coffee was fortunately easy to find, to

appease my caffeine demons. 

Mr. Brown Iced Coffee!

Plus a fresh mango drink.

Gotta stay hydrated!

Food and drink was, overall, inexpensive.

Some of our food was built into the tour, but even when I

had to find and pay for food myself it was very affordable.

One of my favorite meals.

Legume Tajin.

So delicious, served with a side of rice.

Tajin is baked inside this ceramic dish and served fresh

from the oven. It's nicely seasoned and I really enjoyed it.

Falafels, bread, dish of pickled veggies, and 

cheese sambuseks. Sambuseks are kind of a 

cross between a sambusa and an empanada.

Sorry for the weird angle.

I was trying to be discreet.

This was the meal we had at the Nubian village.

We took a ferry boat across the Nile onto Elephantine Island to

visit a family in the village.

We were given a walking tour of the village, and our host

showed us his irrigation system.

At his home, we enjoyed this delicious meal.

I didn't have any of the chicken, but the rest was veggie friendly.

The moussaka was so good. I'm not too fond of eggplant, but

this recipe was wonderful.

I really liked the salad too, an interest assortment of

veggies and greens.

The special green soup is an acquired taste, I think,

as it was a specific kind of spinach.

For dessert a spanakopita style pastry, with mint tea.

I love foreign snacks.

This was included in one of the train meals.

Google Lens offered a translation.

Seasoned Cheese

This meal wasn't so great.

I should have ordered the tajin again.

The spinach strudel was way too salty I couldn't finish it.

Not sure if it was supposed to be that salty, or the chef

got carried away with the salt shaker.

Later that night, while exploring the Aswan bazaar, I suggested that

we not eat at the hotel again, and visit one of the restaurants

our guide suggested to us.

We got so much food.

And, converted to US dollars, it was cheap.

Served family style, essentially, everyone ordered what they

wanted and the server kept bringing out dishes, including a dessert.

My contribution to the table was a "mixed vegetable".

Ended up being something like a rice-stuffed grape leaf.

My bill came to 500 Egyptian Pounds, or $10. 

Leaving Aswan, we boarded our felucca to set sail down the Nile towards Luxor.

Our skillful Nubian felucca captains were also the cooks, and once we were

able to park on the shore several miles down, we were treated to

a wonderful meal.

Nubian sun bread, veggies and cheese, beans, hummus and falafels.

I believe there was a dish of chicken too, but obviously I wasn't too interested in that.

This trip was largely alcohol free, but we were given the option

to buy some beers for our boat trip.

I chose one each of the local brews on the menu.

Plus some water to refill my water bottle.

Did I mention that we had to buy bottled water everywhere?

Travelers are advised to not drink the local water, so we had

to buy it ourselves. Fortunately, it wasn't expensive.

And neither was the beer. Like I said, food is fairly affordable for visitors.

This is not Stella Artois, but a local Stella.

A nice lager.

And Sakara, named for the ancient Saqqara region near Cairo.

Home of Djoser's Step Pyramid (more on that later).

You can even see the Step Pyramid on the beer label!

Sipping on local beer as we drifted downstream,

listening to the Muslim call to prayer ring out from villages on each side of the River Nile.

A surreal and wonderful experience.

The evening meal.

Seasoned potatoes and carrots, beans, rice. And another plate of chicken.

The roof was too low on the boat for a table, so we

ate our meals from the cushioned floor.

Tablecloth spread out to keep the cushion clean from spills.

Hotel coffee in Luxor.

I kept seeing that word: Misr 

All over the place on signs in the cities.

Turns out that Misr is the name for the Egyptian country in Arabic.

So native Egyptians call themselves Misrans.

Our guide mentioned this in passing on the felucca boat, and

then I started noticing it everywhere.

Incidentally, the ancient Egyptians called their empire Kemet.

It refers to the black fertile soil found along the River Nile.

And to the rest of the world, in the modern day, the nation is

officially the Arab Republic of Egypt.

I did not eat this.

One of the Australians ordered it at a rooftop restaurant

where we had dinner in Luxor.

It is a pigeon.

While he snacked on his pigeon,

I had another vegetable tajin dish that was very good.

One of the other Australians ordered a dish with camel meat.

Intrepid Travel likes to include local families in its itineraries.

Not only does this provide extra income to families, it fosters

goodwill and gives tourists a more honest view of life lived

by the people who live it every day.

This was part of our meal at a Luxor family's house.

A meat dish, plus a good selection of vegetarian friendly dishes.

We also got to meet the homeowners and their little son,

and after lunch, we were given a short tour of their kitchen and back garden, 

where they had a brick oven and lime trees.

Feed me, meow meow.