Vup here you can look deep. Fadi Kattan is standing on the roof of his guest house in Bethlehem’s old town. Straight ahead the spire of the Church of the Nativity soars into the clear sky, the silver cross atop it gleaming like a jewel in the sun. To the left, unadorned pilgrim hotels are lined up, concrete blockbushes. Further away, Israeli settlements, in between a Palestinian refugee camp. Beyond, the sandy-yellow mountains of the Jordan Valley rise in the desert haze. “When I stand here,” says Kattan, “I see the Bethlehem that I want to show.”
Fadi Kattan, in his mid-40s, black hair, black glasses, black wool sweater, is Bethlehem’s best-known chef. He has been running his restaurant “Fawda” here for seven years, as well as a café and guest house. Everything has been closed since the outbreak of the pandemic. Since then, Kattan has been cooking on YouTube and Instagram, is now something of a food influencer in Palestine and is known far beyond the country’s borders. In May he will open a second restaurant in London.
“Come on, let’s go shopping at the market, I often did that with the tourists before Corona,” says Kattan. The Christian part of the old town of Bethlehem looks like a sleepy village in southern Italy. Narrow streets, white walls, cats dozing on windowsills. The district has been restored in recent years with donations from churches, but also from state institutions such as US Aid. Around 30,000 people still live in Bethlehem. For decades more and more of the city’s Christians have been emigrating abroad. On Star Street, where artisans once carved figures of Jesus and nativity scenes from olive wood, most of the iron gates in front of the shops now remain firmly barred.
An international life
Takeaways with plastic chairs line the streets surrounding the market. Chicken drumsticks swim in frying fat, sweaters, socks and baby rompers in bright colors and made of cheap materials are piled up on tables in front of shops. Freshly baked yeast knots with cardamom are left to cool in front of a baker, inside a man with floury hands pushes raw flatbread into the furnace. “Shrak,” says Kattan, “a traditional Palestinian bread,” and has four of the flatbreads wrapped up.
Fadi Kattan comes from a long-established Bethlehem family. His mother’s family lived in France for a while, his grandfather was born in Paris and returned to Palestine between the world wars. Father’s family lived in Japan and fled to Mumbai during World War II. Kattan’s father was born there, later he came back to Bethlehem, where Kattan was born and later went to Paris for his education. He has French citizenship, speaks English with a British accent and is friends with celebrity chefs such as Yotam Ottolenghi and Massimo Bottura. We continue to stroll through the market, Kattan jokes with the greengrocer and puts his arm on the fruit seller’s shoulder. “The delicatessen here has the best pickled aubergines,” he says and steps into the small shop. Pickled olives, pepperoni and onions float in wooden vats. In the display case in front of the counter there is cheese, both fresh and aged, made from goat’s, sheep’s and cow’s milk. Kattan goes to the vats, takes out two mugs, one he fills with pickled mini eggplants filled with walnuts, the other with olives filled with hot spices. He takes Labaneh, a salty cream cheese, from the display case and cuts off a large piece of mature, milder goat’s cheese. He puts the fresh flatbreads on a wooden board and spreads the cream cheese on one, along with the fruity aubergines. The mature cheese is placed on the other, along with the olives. Then he says: “Here, try it. This is what Palestine tastes like.”