Street food, fine dining and local cooking – a culinary journey through Jordan

Like so many of our meals in Jordan, the food keeps coming. Creamy hummus in pools of olive oil, fresh tabbouleh salad topped with parsley, fluffy bread still puffed up from the oven, tender cuts of lamb marinated in spices, and tomato stewed with herbs and mince topped with pine nuts. All finished with semolina cake soaked in syrup, and accompanied by cold limonana – a slushy minty concoction often considered Jordan’s national drink.

We’re at the enchanting Haret Jdoudna restaurant in the town of Madaba, a short drive from Jordan’s capital Amman. Situated in a 19th-century house, the restaurant is set up like a traditional Jordanian village with the dining area at the centre, surrounded by a handicrafts market with mosaic wall hangings and handmade wooden furniture, as well an area for entertainment including a fireplace, where guests can listen to music with a cup of steaming mint tea.

Madaba is known for its mosaics that date back hundreds of years (including the oldest map of the Holy Land in the Church of St George), as well as being home to Mount Nebo, where Moses looked out across the holy land before his death. But it also boasts some of the best food in Jordan.

While the spread at Haret Jdoudna is impressive, at Shaheen Restaurant the food is somewhat simpler. The falafel is cooked in front of your eyes, with the chefs dropping the balls into the oil and bringing it out hot, with a crispy outside and served in soft pita with herbs and fresh salad.

This is the joy of the food in Jordan: Whether you’re eating at a local restaurant, grabbing some street food, enjoying some simple dishes at home, or eating out in a five-star hotel, you can be sure that you’ll have an excellent dining experience.

Not many people know exactly what Jordan cuisine entails – and indeed it can be hard to define. There are certainly many similarities to the cuisine of other Middle Eastern countries, you’ll find plenty of herbs and spices as well as influences from Mediterranean and North African cuisines. Meals can be quite meat-heavy (lamb and goat are a favourite), but it’s also an excellent cuisine for vegetarians with seemingly endless fresh salads, dips and vegetable dishes.

You won’t find a dish like mansaf anywhere else but Jordan – and it really ought to be experienced in the home of a local like we did when we visited Petra View Flat in Petra where Basima was cooking with her family. As we came into Basima’s kitchen her grandchildren were helping her prepare the dish, which consists of lamb cooked for several hours until it is tender served on a bed of rice and wafer thin Jordanian bread. The whole dish is covered in fermented yogurt made from goat’s milk, and is traditionally eaten with your hands.

The second dish Basima makes when we arrive for lunch is maqluba, which literally means ‘upside down’. This is because the maqluba (which is chicken, rice and vegetables, made in herbs and spices) is made in a dish which is then tipped over to be served. And once again, dessert is the sticky semolina cake we enjoyed in Madaba, known as Hareeseh. Guests and family gather around the table to share the meal, while Basima’s sister Fatima tells us tales of the family’s history in Petra and repeatedly fills our plates.

In the capital Amman, our experience eating out is a very different affair. On a Friday evening we explore the bright lights of Abdali Boulevard, where restaurants serve everything from traditional Jordanian fare to international dishes. Perhaps most interesting of all, it’s on the Boulevard that we discover the JR Wine Experience, which is my first taste of Jordanian wine. A sunny, dry climate along with mineral rich volcanic soil at an altitude of 840m means that Jordan’s Basalt Desert in the northeast produces some surprisingly excellent vines. During our time at JR Wine Experience, we sip on a Tempranillo, Zinfandel and Viognier, among others.

When it comes to eating out in Amman, you can’t miss Rainbow Street. We eat at the light-filled Sufra which puts a modern twist on traditional Jordanian fare with mezze-style dining. But there’s plenty of choice along this street, which is one of the oldest in Jordan, with charming little eateries and mingling among art galleries and laid-back cafes.

One thing you’ll notice in Jordan is the striking diversity of landscape. Just a few hours’s drive from the capital, we found ourselves in the Dana Biosphere Reserve, a vast desertscape where ancient trails wind through the rugged golden mountains and Bedouin tribes live the traditional nomadic life. It’s here while staying at the off-grid Feynan Ecolodge that Mohammad and his family roast Arabic coffee for us and show us the traditional method of cooking bread under ashes. It’s also while out in the desert with Bedouins that you can experience a type of barbecue called zarb, which is meat cooked for several hours under the desert sands. But it’s a rather more simple meal for us. While we sip the freshly roasted coffee, Mohammad tears off chunks of warm bread that he dips in fresh goat’s butter. It’s uncomplicated and unfussy, and possibly the best we’ve had in Jordan.

Explore Worldwide offer a 7-night Walking Jordan’s Spice Trails walking holiday that includes two-days walking in ancient Petra, a hike through the desert sands of Wadi Rum and a reset in the Dead Sea, with the chance to indulge with mud treatments. There are walks of between 2-7 hours on four of the days, along desert trails, in soft sand and on rocky mountain paths.