Musakhan and Maqluba
مسخن ومقلوبة
Two emblematic dishes of the Palestinian table: sumac-and-onion chicken over taboon bread, and the 'upside-down' rice pot.
Musakhan is often called Palestine’s national dish. It layers roasted chicken, onions softened in olive oil, and a generous dusting of sumac over taboon bread, which absorbs the oil and juices. The dish is a celebration of the olive harvest itself — it is made with the new season’s oil — and its name, meaning “heated,” refers to the warming of the bread in the oil and onions. Cooking and sharing musakhan is a marker of hospitality and home.
Maqluba, meaning “upside-down,” is a one-pot dish of rice, fried vegetables — eggplant and cauliflower are classic — and meat or chicken, cooked in layers and then dramatically flipped onto a serving platter so the pot’s contents stand like a cake. The moment of inversion, in front of gathered family or guests, is the dish’s theater.
Both dishes are communal by design: food made to be eaten from a shared platter, with the hands, among family. In the diaspora, they are among the most-cooked dishes of memory — recipes carried across borders like the house keys of 1948.