“Faghat seyr mikonam.” For the adventurous eater venturing into Kabul’s street food scene, these three Dari words—which roughly translates to “I’m just looking”—are key. To stroll by Kabul’s food stalls is to run a gauntlet of vendors who step into your path and thrust samples at you. However, the reward for wading into this chaotic scene is diving into the varied cuisine of Afghanistan.
Follow guest contributor Scott Ruddick’s tour of the Kabul street food scene:
To the outside world, Kabul has become synonymous with the strife and conflict afflicting the whole of Afghanistan. Yet beyond the headlines, the capital city is a vibrant community of three million people with a thriving street food scene.
The influx of foreigners and money since the fall of the Taliban has gradually transformed the Kabul restaurant landscape. Enterprising street chefs, tabang- wallahs in the local parlance, serve up a variety of local cuisine.
Kabul Food Stall
Kabul’s food stalls are unassuming. They are often consisting of a little more than a tin roof held up by a rough-hewn wooden frame covering a cooking area. Electrical connections to refrigeration are nonexistent and supplies are kept in coolers, lugged back and forth from the staff’s homes every day.
The best stalls are found around Shahr-e Naw Park, a large green space in central Kabul popular with the locals for pick-up soccer matches and Friday bird fights. Clustered along the wide sidewalk, these vendors follow a universal street-food blueprint: each stall specializes in just one or two dishes, building a loyal following by offering a consistent, quality product at a reasonable price.
Mantu vendor and Kabob
Each dish costs between 50 and 100 afghanis ($1.25 and $2.50 USD). Busy times include lunch—the main meal in Afghanistan—when office workers and laborers are on the prowl for a cheap meal, and the late afternoon, when workers head home and stop to pick up takeout for their evening meal.
Kabul’s street food stalls offer both a cheaper alternative to more expensive sit-down restaurants and a respite from the heavy fare of traditional Afghan household cooking. A typical Afghan meal is centered on rice. Qabili Palau— basmati rice topped with chopped carrots, raisins, and pieces of meat—is often the centerpiece, served with flat bread. While a well-done palau is a wonderful meal, its sheer ubiquity eventually drives Afghanis and expats alike to seek out different fare. The tabang wallahs (street vendors) are only too pleased to fill this void in the Afghan diet.
Boloni Vendor
Kabob is the preferred takeout food for Kabul’s denizens, which means open-air kabob shops can be found in every part of the city. These kabobs consist of seasoned mutton, lamb, beef, or chicken skewered on rough iron spikes, then broiled over glowing charcoal. The meat is wrapped in naan—a leavened bread being slapped against the inner wall of a clay oven—which is, in turn, wrapped in old newspaper. The experienced kabob eater knows that the naan serves as both a plate and an accompaniment. The rough side of the bread is always placed facing up with the meat piled on top. Chunks of the bread are then ripped off and used to scoop up the meat. A typical mid-sized kabob stall will serve about 110 pounds of meat a week.
Boloni
Other tabang wallahs serve up steaming plates of delicately spiced ravioli. Indigenous to northern Afghanistan, mantu (stuffed with minced meat) and ashak (filled with leeks) are steamed over large, open-air pots and served with a tangy yogurt sauce.
Bolani, or stuffed pancakes filled with either shaved potato and onion (sabzi) or squash (kadu) are deep-fried in bubbling cauldrons of oil.
The carb-heavy Afghan burger, a recent Kabul concoction, is a favorite among city’s teenage boys. It is common to see groups of them gathered on street corners devouring the local speciality: a spiced ground beef patty with a smattering of onions, tomato, and lettuce, wrapped in a pita-like bread with generous handful of French fries jammed inside.
Shor nakhod or stewed chickpeas, are served on large plates with a vibrant mint sauce. Their flavorful dish works equally well as a snack or a standalone meal.
Doogh stall
Whatever your choice of entrée, wash it down with doogh, which is a carbonated yogurt drink seasoned with salt and mint.
A typical Afghan food stall will open in the late morning, and close around dusk, Sunday to Thursday. This schedule is reversed during the religious month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to dusk. During this 30-day period, the stalls will open for iftar, the fast-breaking meal that takes place at sunset, and close at around sunrise, when the last meal before the daily fast begins.
Minor updates and edits were made from the original article.
Featured photo © Iain Cochrane
Article Photos © Scott Ruddick
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Scott Ruddick is an international development specialist and a freelance writer who focuses on the developing world. Learn more about Scott on his website.