Av Avigayil Kadesh

 

Hvor et det nye, hotteste stedet hvor en turist kan få en smak av Jerusalem? Hint: Det er ikke et museum, et hellig sted eller en arkeologisk utgraving. Det er Machane Yehuda ("Juda's leir"), det største og travleste utendørsmarkedet i Israel.

 

Opened in 1928, Machane Yehuda encompasses a maze of downtown lanes bearing names such as Apple, Peach, Plum, Berry and Almond -- just a few of the many foodstuffs you can buy there.

The shuk (rhymes with “cook”), as it’s better known, has always been a favorite of visitors for its colorful, pungent, open-air atmosphere where Jews and Arabs bargain-hunt side by side amid the cries of merchants hawking everything from haloumi cheese and herring to chicken hearts and halva.

 

Machane Yehuda ble åpnet i 1928, og består av en laburint av bygater som har navn som Eple, Fersken, Plomme, Bær og Mandel - dette er bare en liten del av matvarene man kan få kjøpt her. Ha'Shuk, som markedet er bedre kjent som, har alltid vært et favorittsted for besøkende på grunn av sin fargerike, pikante friluftsatmosfære, hvor jøder og arabere har prutet side om side akkompagnert av rop fra kjøpmenn som reklamerer for alt fra halumi-ost og sild til kyllinghjerter og halva.

 

Lately, however, culinary tours of Machane Yehuda are all the rage as Jerusalem has invested in upgrading the infrastructure of the shuk, and high-end arts shops and trendy eateries find a place among generations-old produce stalls.

 

 

The stories behind those venerable family businesses provide the backdrop for a new series offered by More Gastronomy and Tourism, says co-founder Reuven Pilo. He and his wife, Mor, joined with fellow Jerusalem native Michael Weiss of the Go Jerusalem Internet tourism portal to establish a whole menu of tour choices in the market.

 

“We found ourselves looking for something with added value to do in Jerusalem,” says Pilo, a former chef and now purveyor of culinary tours of Israel.

 

“Many tourist companies bring visitors to museums, archeological parks, the Kotel [Western Wall] -- but they don’t bring them to the people of Jerusalem. And if you’re taking about Jerusalem you’re talking about a melting pot of ethnic communities. All those other sites are important, but we think that the business we developed brings you to the real Jerusalem -- the people, the food, the customs.”

 

For the first time ever, the partners got the shuk’s vendors (some of whom were entirely unfamiliar with the Internet) listed on a modern website that also provides entrée to tours focusing on niches – patisserie or wine and cheese, for example. During one excursion, participants buy fresh, exotic ingredients for a gourmet cooking workshop afterward.

 

 

With More, you can opt to tour the marketplace with a licensed guide or with a professional chef. If you prefer to browse on your own and at your own pace, a NIS 99 (about USD 26) Shuk Bites ticket provides you with a map and a punch-card of vouchers to try a variety of products. Whichever way you go, the site promises you’ll have “character-drenched vendor interaction.”

 

Ticket to the self-guided Shuk Bites tour

 

“Just come with the ticket and enjoy the best bites the shuk can offer, from boutique cheeses to genuine burekas and organic tehina, to health drinks by [the Yemenite ‘medicine man’] Uzi Eli – it’s like coming to a show,” says Weiss.

 

Little wonder that the partners perceived high demand from individuals and groups regarding the Machane Yehuda market, Weiss continues. “It represents the most colorful, rich, spicy, interesting market in Israel, and since it’s been redeveloped in the last five to six years, it’s become a big magnet for those coming to Jerusalem from abroad and from other areas in Israel just to see the market.

 

“We noticed it was not being presented in the right manner, and filled this gap with a one-stop portal launched in November, providing detailed information about the market, its streets, shops and bus stops. It’s not just another commercial shopping site. You can learn about the personal stories of the stall owners and what Machane Yehuda represents to them. The shop owners love it -- it’s rebranding the market in a more sophisticated way.”

 

 

The Machane Yehuda market anchors a downtown neighborhood of the same name established in 1887 by a bank manager, a metal worker and a railway worker. The latter named it after his recently deceased brother Yehuda.

 

Over the years, it started getting pretty shabby until Eli Mizrahi, then president of the shuk’s merchant association, got the Jerusalem municipality to cooperate in upgrading the pavements and lighting, and installing security cameras and awnings.

 

Since then, several cultural events have taken root in Machane Yehuda. It started with jazz concerts in the summers, and now every Monday night in July the shuk comes alive with the Balabasta Festival -- an eclectic mix of unusual temporary sculptures, jugglers, clowns, Capoeira and waltzing as bands play music on the cobblestones and rooftops.

 

Recently, a city-sponsored urban art initiative dubbed Tabula Rasa spiced up the Iraqi section of the bazaar with works by painters, sculptors, photographers, graphic artists and even some of the stall owners.

 

Mayor Nir Barkat, who participated in the projects as well, said at the opening that Tabula Rasa “adds color; it adds spirit to the changes that are happening here.”

 

 

Though the majority of the stalls in Machane Yehuda are still owned by the same families who’ve manned them for generations, newer businesses have moved in. Another modern touch is the opening of the long-awaited light rail, which began operating on the Jaffa Road side of the shuk in October 2011.

 

The market also got an infusion of young foreign tourists when the Abraham Hostel opened in 2010 on Jaffa Road just a few blocks away. The hostel offers off-the-beaten-track tours of Jerusalem, including a Market Cooking Tour on Sunday and Thursday afternoons for hostel guests and others.

 

“We begin with an interactive and historical tour of the Machane Yehuda market with a local guide, who will navigate you through the hustle and the bustle of the marketplace, showing you the interesting sites and hidden treasures between the market stalls. At the end of the tour, you pick up fresh food from the market, and bring it back to the Abraham Hostel kitchen for ... a hands-on lesson in cooking a traditional, vegetarian Middle Eastern meal. You will help clean, fry, boil, bake, cook, chop, slice and stir the ingredients, with the guidance of our in-house chef,” the site explains.

“It was always a dream of mine to have such an experience in the shuk,” says Gal Mor, 34, Abraham Hostel’s co-founder and an experienced tour director.

 

“We meet at the hostel, head to the market and explore its background history and the culture of the different types of foods available there. We shop and interact with vendors, then come back to the hostel and cook a big feast of local cuisine – including dishes such as kubbeh [Moroccan meat dumplings], kebab, majadara [rice and lentils], tabbouleh [bulgur and mint salad], babaganoush [eggplant salad], accompanied by some local arak [an anise liqueur] and great Israeli music.”

 

Mor says the shopkeepers are happy about these tours, launched in the second half of 2011. “Our customers go back again and buy groceries and hang out in the eateries of the market. It’s part of our social agenda to promote local businesses.”

 

 

Ruth Yudekovitz runs her Shuk and Cook tours of Machane Yehuda like a treasure hunt. She begins with a brief introduction on the history of the shuk and the many Jewish ethnic groups whose spices and delicacies they will encounter as they hear Hebrew, Russian, Yiddish and Arabic spoken in the shuk. Then she divides her clients into groups of two or three.

 

“I give them each a cart, a shopping list, a map and money. They go buy the things on the list, which is in Hebrew with transliterated English,” says Yudekovitz, a native New Yorker and 30-year resident of Jerusalem. “I give them little challenges on the way, like identifying what game is being played in the corner of the Iraqi [sector of the] shuk.” (Answer: backgammon, commonly known as sheshbesh.)

 

“Afterwards I meet them and they come back to cook a meal in my house in Abu Tor,” a gentrified downtown neighborhood not far from Machane Yehuda. She had the kitchen redone a few years ago specifically to accommodate her culinary tour groups. Yudekovitz long dreamed of opening a restaurant in the North, but decided to remain in Jerusalem and combine her passions for the shuk and cooking.

 

“I like to emphasize the idea of the plenty of the land and how wonderful it is that produce is still available here by season. I introduce them to things less familiar, like kohlrabi and mangold. Instead of stuffed grape leaves, we might make stuffed mangold leaves with cranberries or red rice. It’s a somewhat traditional Middle Eastern menu with a modern slant.”

“Middle Eastern with a modern slant” is a good way to describe the marketplace in general, Reuven Pilo would agree.

 

“The merchants here are very old-fashioned, but when I look at what Machane Yehuda has become in the last five years, I see it changing in front of my eyes,” says Pilo. “Together with the fruits and vegetables, butchers, bakeries and spice shops, you have Aroma [a chain café], jewelry shops, clothing boutiques, Ahava [Dead Sea cosmetics], frozen yogurt and famous restaurants. People have started to understand the potential in the market.”

 

Recently, Pilo and Weiss crafted a special shuk tour for a Birthright Israel group comprised of 100 Americans in the culinary field, including chefs and food bloggers. They took them to the various ethnic neighborhoods of Machane Yehuda and neighboring Nahlaot, then to the market where they sampled a buffet with foods such as kubbeh, stuffed grape leaves, homemade s’chug (seasoned hot chili paste), freshly ground tehina and Jerusalem pickles.