Mansaf

Due to security reasons with my son Jeremiah's ministry in Amman, Jordan, he has to keep his blog private. However, I thought that you readers might enjoy one of his stories.


Last Friday I was invited to attend a family gathering with the "H" family, as I often am. The traditional Jordanian meal Mansaf was the meal of choice. In Jordan, Mansaf is a pretty big deal (I knew this) so you can never say no. We arrived at the family farm on a mountain top about 1hr from Amman at about 10:30am and began busily preparing for the rest of the extended family to arrive. At about 1pm they began to trickle in, and by 3:30 there was over 60 people gathered for this family meal. Of course, I still am not used to eating so late in the afternoon, so I was STARVED!! Finally, at 3:30pm the women brought out 5 large trays, each round and about 2.5ft in in diameter. On each tray was piled a huge mound of rice and large chunks of lamb. Mansaf is traditionally eaten in a specific fashion; nowadays, usually only the young people and adults eat it in the traditional way. Older folks, children, and women usually use a plate and utensils...

Being that this was my first experience with Mansaf, of course I HAD to participate in the normal fashion. So I and 5 other guys gathered around a table with one of the trays on it and dug in. (We ate outside, and there were no chairs at the table.) So how to eat Mansaf: using only one hand, you grab a chunk of lamb and a bit of rice. Then you squeeze it, and mold it into a ball in your palm. Then, toss the whole thing into your mouth and enjoy. YUM! The rice and lamb are cooked together with spices, a creamy/oily broth, and almonds. This makes for a pretty decently sticky, wet, and messy experience, but it's fun.....mostly...

This would have been one of the better nights I have had here but for one small detail... In Jordan, the guest of honor is usually asked to join a particular table, as I was. On this table there is a special tray of Mansaf. In addition to everything previously mentioned there is one more little...shall we say..."garnish." On the top of the huge mound of rice and lamb is the head of the lamb. Complete. Skinned of course, but cooked completely with the rest of the meal and placed on the top. So the entire meal, I had this lambs head staring at me. And then, when I was almost getting used to that... the other guys decided that they had had enough rice and needed to move on to other.... "delicacies"... yes, the first thing to do is tear off the jaw bones...this gave easier access to the tongue, of course! As one of the guys said: "Be careful when cutting off the tongue; it is easy to get fat from right below, and that doesn't taste very good." As if the tongue did!! As the first guy finished tearing the jaw and tongue apart another jabbed his fingers into the eye sockets and fished out the eyeballs....mmm, tasty. He said it tasted "kinda rubbery, and mostly like fat." Well, shucks, that was almost enough for me to go get a lamb's eyeball for myself! I thought perhaps they were done, as the remains of the head were placed on the table and everyone resumed eating the Mansaf. One of the guys left briefly and returned...with a hammer! No, they were not done with the head....They had yet to get to the brain! A few swings of the hammer later, they were prying open the skull and scooping out the brain, perfectly cooked in one nasty, noodly-looking piece. I almost threw up, but held it together by closing my eyes and downing another glass of soda. By this point I had had enough Mansaf, and went to wash up.