Did you see this? Anthony Bourdain on Armenian food



 Butter-basted Baby Sparrow

Somehow, this got past me. I thought I saw the episode of Anthony Bourdain’s Travel Channel show that featured Lebanon, but I must have wandered out of the room at the wrong time.

This video clip came our way from the ArmenianArchives YouTube channel. It shows the famous chef/writer/traveler eating at Onno, an Armenian restaurant in Beirut.
Much of this food is instantly familiar to me, although the names are a little hard to  recognize as relayed by Bourdain’s companion in what seems to be a British accent.


It’s always fun to see Armenian food get international attention, especially on a popular TV show. It all looks delicious.

One dish that wasn’t on Mom’s menu when I was growing up: butter-basted baby sparrows.
Of course, I immediately thought of Lucine Kasbarian’s book, The Greedy Sparrow, based on an Armenian folk tale. Obviously, this is a bird with special meaning in the Armenian culture — and, if you read the story, one that definitely deserves to be eaten.


I’ll pass, though. The rest of the meal looks good enough to satisfy me for a week.

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3 Comments

  1. Marash Girl May 30, 2011 at 3:45 pm

    Thanks for this post. It reminded my of my father's memory on eating sparrows in Marash. Go to my blog post for tomorrow at http://marashgirl.blogspot.com, "People were so hungry, they ate sparrows: The Armenian Genocide, 1915-1922"

    Reply
  2. Robyn May 30, 2011 at 5:37 pm

    Excellent; will do!

    Reply
  3. Tamar September 11, 2012 at 1:24 pm

    Thank you Douglas, ONNO is my father's restaurant
    visit our page on Facebook: ONNO Restaurant

    Reply

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