A DATE IN BAHRAIN
PART ONE

By Melissa van Maasdyk

My mother thought I’d be bored. Others worried about security issues or how I’d cope with the heat. “Will you have to wear a thingamy over your head,” a concerned colleague asked. But the unanimous cry from everyone who knows me well was, “How will you survive without alcohol?” Needless to say, I left London for Bahrain with more than a little trepidation. 

Two years on, I can honestly say that all concerns were unfounded and I’m very happy in my new home, a small country made up of 33 islands lapped by the warm Arabian Gulf, off the coast of Saudi Arabia (I mention its location because a friend of mine asked a travel agent where Bahrain was and the travel agent had to look it up).  Often mixed up in people’s minds with neighbouring oil giant Saudi Arabia, where strict Islamic law prevails, Bahrain is conversely a laidback and relatively liberal country. 

While the majority of the population here is Muslim, Islamic law is not enforced as it is in Saudi, so women don’t have to wear an abaya (a shapeless black gown worn over clothes to guard women’s beauty from men) or a hijab (a black head shawl that may or may not cover the face). I’m thus spared the discomfort of wearing a “thingamy” over my head, although I do find the anonymity it offers quite appealing, as did Michael Jackson, who lived here for a while and was spotted out in Seef Mall disguised in full abaya-hijab regalia (his entourage was a dead giveaway). 

I’ve also been told by a couple of Bahraini women who choose to wear an abaya for religious reasons that it takes a lot of stress out of getting dressed for work in the morning. And I imagine the hijab would be a saviour on bad-hair days. But I can wear what I want, except in the holy month of Ramadan, when even ex-pats are expected to cover their shoulders and knees and no one is permitted to eat or drink in public between sun-up and sun-down out of respect for those fasting. The pay-off is that shopping malls are open until after midnight and tents are set up in hotel gardens, offering lavish feasts of traditional foods and fresh juices to break the fast nightly.

I’ll drink to that

On the subject of drink, although alcohol is advised against by the Quran, along with narcotic drugs and gambling, because “in them is great sin, and some benefits for men, but the sin of them is greater than the benefit”, it is not entirely off the menu in Bahrain - cue a collective sigh of relief. But there are restrictions on where it can be served and bought. It’s not to be found on supermarket shelves, for example, but at two outlets. 

Yes two! In the whole country! Although legal, these are not advertised anywhere so you have to discover their location through word of mouth. And when you get there, there’s no sign outside indicating the importer’s name, but simply the words “The Shop” in very small letters, alongside a sign that says that Muslims are not allowed to enter (there’s a similar sign outside the pork section in the supermarket). 

So the whole experience of buying alcohol feels rather illicit and seedy. However, there’s nothing cheap, in any respect, about the goods on offer, so one doesn’t have to lower one’s standards as one does in Saudi, where alcohol is totally banned and ex-pats distil their own sugary home-made wine in their bathrooms to fuel wild parties behind compound walls (ironically, if not alcohol, it is possible to buy alcohol-making kits in the shops there). 

Happily for this oenophile, wine is also available in Bahrain’s five-star hotels, and at restaurants in certain districts licensed to serve it. This means there are buzzy hubs of nightlife in areas such as Juffair and Adliya, where numerous former villas have been converted into restaurants traversing the cuisines of the globe.

Favourites are Mirai (+973 1771 3113), offering Japanese-South American fusion along with saketini’s, Café Italia (+973 1774 4774) for modern Italian in a dramatic double-volume space, and Mezzaluna (+973 1774 2999), where sophisticated French fare is served up with live jazz in the converted courtyard of a traditional Arabian house. 

However there are also numerous lovely restaurants beyond the borders of the alcoholic zones, and I have surprised myself to discover that sometimes the food, view, ambience or combination of the above is enough. Really. This is a good thing as I have acquired a taste for some of the Middle Eastern specialities on offer in traditional restaurants around town, many of which don’t serve alcohol.

Glorious food

Not all Middle Eastern food is created equal, by the way. The cuisine most familiar to the rest of the world is Lebanese, typified by fabulous mezze, such as flat bread with dips like hummus and muttabal (similar to hummus but with the addition of smoky roasted aubergines), kibbeh (pine-nut-filled meatballs with a crispy bulgur-wheat crust), tabouleh (a zesty salad of bulgur wheat, mixed with finely chopped fresh herbs, tomatoes and lemon juice), vine leaves (dolmades to those more familiar with Greek) and sambousik (tiny fried pastries filled with white cheese or mince meat and pine nuts). 

Barely a week goes by that my husband and I don’t settle in for a mezze fix at places like French-flavoured patisserie Le Chocolat (1758 2259), which has an excellent Lebanese chef and tables bizarrely set overlooking a busy main road in Seef, Al Arisha (+973 1772 5414), where there’s live Arabic music from 9pm, or Layali Turkiye (+973 1729 5270), a cheap plastic-tables-and-chairs place serving tasty Turkish variations with sea views. 

In winter, we were also thrilled to discover a wonderful Iraqi restaurant called Melh Al Zaad (tel +973 17 311170), where the focus is on heavy mutton stews served up with gravy-soaked rice that offered much needed fuel to fight the bitter weather outside (more on that later). It was also here that I discovered the most delicious – and calorific - dessert I have ever tasted, a Jordanian speciality called kunafa, which is made of fried vermicelli noodles, filled with sweet cream and soaked in warm syrup. 

But perhaps my happiest culinary discovery has been Persian (or Iranian) food. One of the varied freelance jobs I’ve done since arriving on these shores (which have ranged from interviewing ambassadors for a local magazine to advertising copywriting and doing lifestyle and arts PR) was the launch of a modern-Persian restaurant called Yas-e Isfahani (+973 1758 1151) in Seef Mall - a job which came with a couple of tasty fringe benefits.

Because of Persia’s position on the spice route, at the crossroads between the ancient and medieval worlds, it became a melting pot, quite literally, of various exotic ingredients that passed through, as well as being the origin of many a now-familiar ingredient in global cuisine. Lemons, quinces, basil, saffron, pistachio nuts, walnuts and fava beans all started their global journey here, and are present in delectable dishes on Yas’s menu.

These include Caspian olive and walnut tapenade with hot flat bread or lamb and pistachio meatballs in a pomegranate sauce for starters, various kebabs and dishes such as hammour (Gulf grouper) in a bitter orange sauce with fava-bean and dill chelow (steamed rice with a crispy golden yoghurt crust) for mains, and to finish, velvety textured quince baked in pomegranate molasses or rose-scented baklava, best enjoyed with fragrant black tea served in small ornate glasses sprinkled with rose petals and mint – a new addiction.

Tea and thin cardamom flavoured Arabic coffee are very popular, and as a non-alcoholic alternative to pubs, fresh juice bars and coffee shops offering shisha (hookah pipes) abound, adding another dimension to nightlife here. In spring or autumn, when temperatures are conducive to sitting outside, there’s nothing better than settling on a terrace and sipping a fresh juice or puffing on a fruit or rose-flavoured shisha surrounded by locals attired in thobes and gutra (the flowing white robes and headscarves worn by men) playing with worry beads and dominoes or cards.

A number of coffee and shisha bars are for men only (not that I’ve ever seen a sign banning women from entering but there’s an unwritten one in the air that you can feel); others, like the delightfully ramshackled Layali Zaman, overlooking the sea on the Corniche, have a separate family area where men and women can mix, and several are just a free for all. 

These include the deliciously kitsch Veranda Café in Adliya, where entertainment is provided by Arabic music videos playing on large TVs dotted about, and Casa Blu, a low-lit atmospheric spot with velvet sofas, antique fringed lamps and gilt-framed paintings above a carpet shop in Umm Al Hassan (by the way, you should expect to drink copious cups of tea or coffee as you haggle for a carpet).

 There’s a lot of rivalry between Bahrain and Dubai in respect of tourism and business, but I believe that Bahrain wins hands down when it comes to local flavour as experienced in these atmospheric spots. The Las Vegas of the Middle East, Dubai is flash, fast and happening, great for a weekend break, but its high concentration of ex-pats and a ban on traditionally attired locals entering places serving alcohol means you sometimes feel like you’re in London or New York when you’re out on the town, whereas in Bahrain, there’s always a mix and never any doubt that you’re in the exotic Middle East.