Addition of Eastern European and Iraqi dishes[edit]

User Davidroth has repeatedly added dishes from Eastern Europe and Iraq into this article: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Levantine_cuisine&diff=1162673192&oldid=1162442726

This article is about the traditional Levantine cuisine that originates from the Levant and are historically eaten there, not imported foreign dishes that are popular in Israel. In that case we could ad pizza and hamburgers to the list. Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 17:25, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. Although "traditional" is a slippery term (cf. my essay), I think the intent is pretty clear here. Israel is certainly in the Levant, but the food in Israel includes foods from the Levant, foods from North Africa, foods from Central Europe, and for that matter, foods from North America (KFC), etc. In the same way that we wouldn't say that sushi and kimchi and shwarma are part of "traditional American cuisine" (though by now french fries are), even though they're widely available in north America, it doesn't makes sense to call challah and hamin Levantine cuisine. --Macrakis (talk) 18:51, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree. It's not about something being "widely available", but whether if it is part of the traditional cuisine of a (particular segment) of the population in the Levant - which Jews clearly are. The fact that challah may have originally come from Europe is hardly what matters here: Sambusac is originally of Indian origin, Lentil soup originates in Greece and even "Arabic coffee"came from Ethiopia - all of those are rightly in this article because they are part of the traditional cuisine of the local population, regardless of origin. Red Slapper (talk) 20:36, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
"but whether if it is part of the traditional cuisine of a (particular segment) of the population in the Levant" moved in eastern Europeans and Iraqis doesn't mean their cuisine is suddenly levantine. Their dishes are still eastern european and iraqi. If japanese people move to Jordan it doesn't mean sushi is Arab food. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 22:09, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Red Slapper, can you find any reliable sources for the claim that challah and hamin are Levantine cuisine? --Macrakis (talk) 23:06, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I haven't looked, but i could ask you the same thing about the examples I posted above. Red Slapper (talk) 23:51, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Anyway, here's one example - a reliable source describing Komarovsky, an Israeli bread baker who "helped usher in the age of Levantine cuisine", and uses his Challas as an example. Red Slapper (talk) 00:02, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
and another Red Slapper (talk) 00:03, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
and one more. Will that do? Red Slapper (talk) 00:17, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The Savieur and Forward sources doesn't say Challah is Levantine. Quite the opposite, they confirm that it was imported from Eastern Europe: "Challah has a natural home at Chabad, as this Hassidic movement’s leaders were originally from Belarus, and the ritual bread emigrated with the Jewish people to the U.S., Israel" So you can ad it at Eastern European cuisine article. The Haaretz source is inaccessible, please provide quote. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 00:29, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Savieur says a chef who specializes in Levantine cuisine in Israel makes Challas. the Forward says "The challahs dipped in salt ... was sensational, a bold alchemy of the Levant and Maharashtra". I've already addressed your nonsense about the "origin" issue, above. Or are you going to remove Arabic coffee from the article, because it originates in Ethiopia? Red Slapper (talk) 00:56, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Just having the word "Levant" in a sentence does not suddenly convey the attribute. Tex-Mex is a blend of Texan and traditional Mexican cooking, but that does not mean it falls under the latter; it is simply considered a part of US cuisine. Iskandar323 (talk) 02:02, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
moved in eastern Europeans and Iraqis doesn't mean their cuisine is suddenly levantine- I believe is the crux of this debate - you aren't really objecting this on policy grounds, but rather trying to score political points - you see Jewish Israelis as "moved in eastern Europeans and Iraqis", not as part of the Levant. It's despicable and has no place in an encyclopedia. Red Slapper (talk) 23:55, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed with SD: the two sources you cite do not say that challah etc. are Levantine. It is beyond WP:SYNTH to say that they do.
None of us have said that Jewish Israelis do not live in the Levant. We have simply said that European Jewish cuisine is not reasonably described as "Levantine cuisine". There are millions of Turks in Germany; does that make börek "traditional German food"? On the other hand, döner kebap sandwiches (though not döner kebap served on a plate) were apparently invented in Germany, and are an examples of modern German-Turkish fusion food. Still, they are not "traditional German food".
Kindly assume good faith. You will see from my editing history that I have a strong interest in food history. Claiming that I (or others) are "despicably" trying to "score political points" is an uncalled-for personal attack and inappropriate. --Macrakis (talk) 18:52, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
My comment regarding political point scoring was not directed at you, but at the other editor who stated that Israeli Jews are "moved in eastern Europeans and Iraqis".
Please reread my post above, explaining the difference between "widely available' (which is not the criterion I'm using ), and "part of traditional cuisine", whcih is clearly what Challah and hamin are. Let me know what's not clear to you about this distinction Red Slapper (talk) 19:23, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Challah and hamin are clearly part of the traditional cuisine of European Jews. That does not make them a part of "traditional Levantine cuisine", even if there are millions of European Jews who live in the Levant, just as baklava and kimchi are not part of "traditional American cuisine" although there are millions of Greeks and Koreans living in America, and börek is not part of traditional German cuisine although there are millions of Turks living in Germany. I'm not sure how I could be more clear. --Macrakis (talk) 20:39, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
So Israeli Jews living in Israel are like Koreans living in America? That is an offensive political POV that doesn't really require a response. Red Slapper (talk) 20:51, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Millions of Jews settled in Palestine for good reason, and created Israel. What does that have to do with whether the dishes they brought from their home countries are Levantine? And where is the "offensive political POV"? --Macrakis (talk) 21:04, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The offensive political POV is that Israeli Jews, an overwhelming majority in their modern nation-state reconstituted in their ancestral homeland are somehow similar to Korean immigrants to the US. If you don't see how that is a ridiculous comparison, or how it is offensive, I can't really help you, and this discussion is probably over. Red Slapper (talk) 21:12, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, of course Israeli Jews are the majority in Israel, and yes, their ancestors lived there many centuries ago. What does this have to do with "Levantine cuisine"? Why are you trying so hard to politicize this discussion? --Macrakis (talk) 21:41, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It wasn't me who politicized this discussion. I refer you again to the comment above - "moved in eastern Europeans and Iraqis doesn't mean their cuisine is suddenly levantine" - see who made it. And further see how they tried to remove even dishes that originated in Israel (ptitim, mixed Jerusalem grill), or dishes that originated in Iraq by Jews but not those that originated in Egypt or Ethiopia.
This whole line of argument seems to stem from an assumption that Israel is not really part of the Levant. If it is part of the Levant, and its population's traditional cuisine includes challa and hamin, then obvisouly those are Levantine dishes. Red Slapper (talk) 21:50, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Let's talk about ptitim for a second. It is a modern Israeli food, but is it a "traditional Jewish food"? I don't think so. I also don't think it's a "traditional Levantine food". --Macrakis (talk) 23:00, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Let's talk about hamin for a second. Is hamin a traditional Jewish food? Is it part of the cuisine of the majority of Israel? How can it then be excluded? Red Slapper (talk) 23:06, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Jewish cuisine and Israeli cuisine are separate articles. Dishes in those cuisines are not automatically "traditional Levantine cuisine"; this is just making a mess of distinct subjects. Iskandar323 (talk) 02:17, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly, these are imported eastern european and iraqi dishes that Israelis consider "Israeli", so they belong in the Israeli cuisine article, not Levantine cuisine as they are not in any way levantine. All the Arab dishes in the list are deep rooted and well known by all Levantine people, Syrians, Lebanese, Jordanians and Palestinians. If you asked a Jordanian what "challah" is , he would have no idea what you are talking about. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 06:00, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
And similarly, Arab Cuisine or Lebanese Cuisine are separate articles. If you want to talk about the cuisine of a very large and loosely defined geographic region like the Levant, then the article needs to cover every cuisine in the region Red Slapper (talk) 12:02, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Arab and Lebanese cuisine are traditional levantine cuisine. Eastern European and Iraqi dishes are not levantine dishes.--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 18:20, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm done talking to POV-pushing nationalists who want to score political points. Red Slapper (talk) 18:23, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Now let's go back to ptitim, and compare with another example - Butter chicken - is this dish part of Indian Cuisine? I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone who claims otherwise. Indeed, it is featured in the picture gallery of Indian cuisine, and categorized under that category. Yet it was invented in the 1950s, just like ptitim. So clearly the longevity of a dish is not something we commonly use when categorizing dishes by region. What I am getting at, and the reason I am saying that this is motivated by politics, is that there is a calculated attempt to exclude all foods that make up the cuisine of Israeli Jews from this article, under multiple, changing pretexts: If a dish originated in Israel (like ptitim), it is by defintion no more than 75 years old, and is thus excluded under the pretext of "not traditional"; and if it is older (and thus by defintion originates outside of Israel) it is excluded under the pretext of 'brought in from the outside' - 'heads I win, tails you lose'. Red Slapper (talk) 00:11, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Butter chicken was created by Hindus in India and is well known in india. Ptitim was created by non-levantines in a region they moved in to. It is not a Levantine dish. No Levantines eat it or even know what it is. Only israelis eat it and only they know what it is. There is an article where Ptitim belongs, the Israeli cuisine article. Not here.--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 06:13, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Ptitim was created by non-levantines in a region they moved in to. Thanks for confirming what I suggested above - that this entire argument is based on the premise that the inhabitants of one of the main countries of the Levant are not Levantine. An offensive political point of view that has no place in a serious encyclopedia. Red Slapper (talk) 11:38, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This page literally starts by stating that it is about traditional Levantine cuisine, which makes it pretty clear that it is not about contemporary fusion cuisine or recent imports into the Levant region. If some editors are abiding by this and others are simply saying it is "anything eaten in the Levant" then the discussion is taking place with people at cross purposes. Iskandar323 (talk) 02:12, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps the page could have a section added on contemporary and/or fusion cuisine to resolve this dissonance. Iskandar323 (talk) 02:24, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think that could work - add a "contemporary"s section to it, and put Ptitim and Jerusalem Mixed grill there. Red Slapper (talk) 12:03, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have sources that say Ptitim and Jerusalem Mixed Grill are contemporary levantine dishes?--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 18:14, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Not a single one of those sources say that Challah is a levantine dish. The first talks about Syrian Jews didn't eat cahllah in the past, but now they do... and? The second source, could you please ad the quote that challah is levantine? The blog reviews are not reliable sources for anything and I don't see how any of them confirm that Challah is levantine. The Levantine Table books full title is: "Vibrant and aromatic recipes from the Middle East and beyond", How does this source confirm that Challah is levantine? --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 18:31, 10 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry I should have clarified: I don't think these are clinchers. They're data points I thought others might find useful to look at. But what you call "blog reviews" are reviews in reputable publications (Conde Nast Traveller, Jewish Chronicle) although obviously not scholarly sources. BobFromBrockley (talk) 00:06, 11 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Scholarly sources become a bit thin on the ground in food history. Challah is certainly a bread with an interesting history both in the Levant and among the diaspora communities [1]. The main problem with this page is that it remains conflicted over what it is actually describing. Though not a reliable sources this page makes what I think is a key observation. When you define a cuisine you are really looking for those classic dishes that are not just traditional but "shared plates" across the geographies that the cuisine is associated with. Challah might be traditional within and outside of the Levant, but it is obviously also a bread tradition highly distinct to Jewish cuisine and communities. I wonder if there is a distinction to be drawn between "shared" items with Levantine cuisine that are consumed widely across Levantine communities with little cultural specificity and items that are part of a cuisine shared only within a community or geography that represents a subsection of the Levantine community or the Levant. Iskandar323 (talk) 07:27, 11 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I just came across this discussion, and I am shocked to see some eastern European dishes claimed to be Levantine. As user Iskandar and others have pointed out, the use of a specific dish by a specific group in a specific region does not make a dish Levantine. Levantine cuisine to me means that people every part of the Levant eat that. Examples include hummus, falafel, baba ghannouj, etc. Cheers, Amr ibn Kulthoumعمرو بن كلثوم (talk) 19:52, 19 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Dovidroths removal of Dubious tags

Dovidroth, you removed several dubious tags saying: "Rv false, misleading edit summary that reverted Iskandar's compromise. Per agreement in talk page". The tags does not revert anything, Iskandars edit is untouched. You also say: "Iskandar's compromise. Per agreement in talk page", if you looked at the discussion at the talkpage I asked "Do you have sources that say Ptitim and Jerusalem Mixed Grill are contemporary levantine dishes?-" and not one single reply or source was provided that they are "Contemporary levantine". So how is this an "agreement" or "compromise" ? You also removed the tags from other Eastern European and Iraqi dishes that has nothing to do with the "Contemporary" section. So you incorrectly removed the tags based on several inaccurate claims. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 18:46, 10 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Dovidroth, you have once again removed the dubious tags without addressing the issue:[2]. Could you show the "compromise" at this talkpage you are talking about where these European dishes should be in this article about Levantine cuisine? --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 06:38, 22 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Cholent/Harisa[edit]

Cholent, by all accounts on its page, appears to have evolved among the diaspora from harisa, something which is obviously an extant dish, though harisa is so universal in Middle East cuisine, it is unclear if there is anything even distinctively Levantine about that either. I suppose mashing barley or wheat together with a bit of meat isn't exactly rocket science. Iskandar323 (talk) 08:04, 11 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think any of the dishes listed here are 'rocket science', and many have equivalents in other cuisines. If this article is to be only about dishes that are unique to the Levant, w/o any similar dishes elsewhere, there wouldn't be much left of it. Red Slapper (talk) 19:29, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That was just an off-the-cuff remark. The point was that harisa appears to be the Levant dish; cholent an Iberian derivation of the former ... but nothing I can see links cholent itself to the Levant. Iskandar323 (talk) 06:10, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Cholent is a traditional Jewish food and it is part of the cuisine of the majority of Israel. Israel is in the Levant. See the connection? Red Slapper (talk) 11:59, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Just because it has become popular in a country in the Levant does not make it part of Levantine cuisine. I'm sure pizza and burgers are popular in Israel; that doesn't make those Levantine cuisine. This isn't a list of stuff people eat in the region. You'll need to source this, because what I can see in the sources is: "Cholent is one of the best-known Central and Eastern European (ie, Ashkenazi) Jewish dishes associated with the weekly holiday of Sabbath" [3]; "cholent, the Sabbath meal of Eastern European Jews" [4]. Iskandar323 (talk) 12:19, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I've addressed that fallacious reasoning above, in my responses to Macrakis. . Feel free to reread. Red Slapper (talk) 13:34, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Let's stay civil. I've read the above, and I agree with you with respect to challah, for instance (even though the bread has clearly been heavily influenced by European bread traditions), due to the plausible connection with a more ancestral bread of the same name consumed in the region. The same does not apply to cholent, which by all accounts (and by accounts I means sources, not the deductive reasoning of editors), is a Central and Eastern European dish. Unless you are able to provide sourcing to contrary, I will be removing that entry based on it being plainly unverifiable information, per our core content policy of WP:V. If there are no sources to the contrary of the above, there is no case to be had here. Iskandar323 (talk) 14:05, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
We've been through this "origins" stuff before. Coffee did not originate in the Levant, Shawarma is a Turkish dish, etc... But just to put your mind at ease -[5]. Red Slapper (talk) 14:30, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
We follow what reliable sources say. Several people have asked several times for sources saying that these eastern European dishes are "levantine" and not a single one has been provided.--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 05:56, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Several sources have been provided, including academic ones. Red Slapper (talk) 12:56, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Several users looked at the links you provided above and they all came to the conclusion that they do not say that the eastern European and Iraqi dishes are levantine. So sources for this claim is still missing.--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 17:57, 19 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You can ignore the explicit language in the sources I provided (e.g ""The challahs dipped in salt ... was sensational, a bold alchemy of the Levant and Maharashtra"") , but that does not make for a convincing arguemnt. Red Slapper (talk) 18:14, 19 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Amazing selective quotation. The full sentence from that source is: "The challahs dipped in salt and blessed over with ‘Hamotzi’ were baked by “Moshe, an Iraqi Jew who has had a chain of restaurants in Mumbai,” Sopher further wrote. The food was sensational, a bold alchemy of the Levant and Maharashtra ", So she had food at his restaurant and some of it according to the author was levantine, this does not mean that Challah is levantine. Infact the source says the exact opposite right after: "“The name “hallah” was given to a bread in South Germany in the Middle Ages, when it was adopted by the Jews for the Sabbath,” writes Claudia Roden in “The Book of Jewish Foods. “John Cooper (‘Eat and Be Satisfied’) notes that the first mention of the bread was in the fifteen century, that the term was coined in Austria….The bread became the Jewish ritual bread of Germany, Austria and Bohemia and was taken to Poland, Eastern Europe and Russia when the Jews migrated east.”"Challah has a natural home at Chabad, as this Hassidic movement’s leaders were originally from Belarus, and the ritual bread emigrated with the Jewish people to the U.S., Israel and the West." So your source says the exact opposite of what you claim, that's its a European bread that was imported to Israel.--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 06:32, 22 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Coffee is a bean; if you mean Arabic coffee, as in the preparation, I already removed it as not Levant specific. Shawarma is not Turkish, but Ottoman, and hence it's prevalence across the formerly Ottoman Levant. I can't access the orthodox religious website, but I fail to see how that is likely to be a reliable source for anything related to food history. I provided links to DeGruyter and Jstor; scholarly sources - unless you have something similar that counters these sources with equivalent reliability and independence, i.e. not a religious website writing about how important a religiously connected foodstuff is to them, then I am certainly not at ease. Iskandar323 (talk) 15:44, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Good thing we have an encyclopedia where we can read things like "shawarma ...appeared in the 19th-century Ottoman Empire, in what is now Turkey." If you don't want to read my source, you can read the same thing in Freekeh: "Freekeh is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible under the term qalûy (Biblical Hebrew: קָל֤וּי‎, scorched or roasted) or carmel (Biblical Hebrew: כַּרְמֶל‎), indicating it was used in ancient Israelite cuisine." Red Slapper (talk) 15:58, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Reliable source: "Shawarma is a popular Levantine Arab specialty." Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East & North Africa: D-K, p 840. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 06:05, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
No one is doubting that Shawarma is a Levantine dish - that's exactly the point: it is a Levantine dish despite not originating in the Levant. The origin of dishes is simply not relevant to their being Levantine dishes today. Red Slapper (talk) 13:03, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, a lot of Arabic food is relatively pan-Ottoman. This isn't news. All of the Levant was just the backyard of the empire at the time, so anything from Turkey would have spread swiftly. Turkey has at times even been included in definitions of the Levant due to the proximity and overlap. It's probably an interestin history, but today academic sources say things like: "Harry Eli Kashdan carefully traces the globalization of popular Levantine street foods like falafel and shawarma, including the slippage between Levantine and Mediterranean culinary",[6] so it makes the cut. What your sudden interest in freekeh is, I don't know, but that's coarsely ground green durum wheat, an ingredient. I don't see how it is pertinent here. Are you confusing freekeh with harisa, which is just normal cracked wheat and the actual dish said to be the antecedent to cholent? Iskandar323 (talk) 18:13, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I have no doubt that stuff that originated in Turkey (which is not an Arab country, BTW) spread through the Levant. My point is that the origin of Shawarma is not the Levant - but it is clearly a Levantine food, despite the non-Levantine origin. Freekeh, as the sources say, is the precursor to Egyptian hamin, Ferik. Red Slapper (talk) 18:49, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There are sources linking Shawarma to Levantine cuisine, so it stays. Simple as that. Simple as these other entries would be if you could source them. Freekeh is freekeh, which is green durum wheat. I have not seen a source linking this to hamin, which is meat and cracked, not green durum wheat berries. You're confusing things. Gil Marks, who is an expert of Jewish cuisine, links hamin back to harisa (a porridge). He explains, in quite some detail, how Sephardic Jews in Iberia added chickpeas or beans to harisa for the first time, evolving it into hamin. Iskandar323 (talk) 06:06, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I've provided you a source that says Freekeh is the precursor to Egyptian hamin. Red Slapper (talk) 12:58, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, what is your point here? This page isn't about Egyptian food, and neither Ferik or Freekeh or Hamin are the same thing as cholent, which is what this current talk page discussion thread is about. The same website (so speaking in terms of your sources), states, on its page about cholent: "Cholent’s origins are from the Middle East. From there it spread to North Africa, and by the 9th century, it was already found in Spain. In time, it made its way to Eastern Europe. Ashkenazi-style cholent was first mentioned in 1180, in the writings of Rabbi Yitzhak of Vienna." Now this is very bad writing, but you will note that it doesn't state that cholent itself is from the Middle East, but that cholent's "origins" are from the Middle East. Now this is harisa, which spread across North Africa, became hamin in Spain, before becoming, yes, Ashkenazi cholent in Western Europe. Just read the entry by Gil Marks! Iskandar323 (talk) 13:25, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Hamin is pretty much the same thing as Cholent - [7], if you don't really know what the dishe are, perhaps you should not be writing about them Red Slapper (talk) 14:40, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
And if that's the level of the points you are making now, perhaps you should just stop. Yes, cholent and hamin are similar, including the fact that both originated in Europe, which is the key point that is relevant here. Harisa is the original Middle Eastern and Levantine progenitor of both the other dishes, and thus the only rightful entry here. Iskandar323 (talk) 07:46, 20 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I am not going into the "origin" issues again, Read my responses above, or stop your double standards and make an argument for removal of Shwarama etc... Red Slapper (talk) 11:57, 20 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There are no double standards: there are sources that assert that a specific dish is Levantine or there are no such sources. You have provided no such sources. Iskandar323 (talk) 12:21, 20 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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