Dubai Thanksgiving Part I: The Shopping

Soon after the festivities of October 31 had passed, my internal holiday clock commenced the countdown to Thanksgiving. As someone who looks for any excuse to cook food I would normally never make for my own consumption, I don’t think there was any doubt in my mind that despite the fact that I’m living in a country that does not recognize Thanksgiving as a holiday, and among an expat community that does also not celebrate Thanksgiving, that I would make a Thanksgiving feast. So, the one other American girl in the office and I decided we would join forces and show some of our new friends what the American tradition is all about.

About a week before the big day we planned and divided up the menu. I volunteered to be in charge of desserts (which ended up consisting of two variations of pumpkin pie, apple pie, and pecan cookie bars), sweet potato gratin, stuffing, and dinner rolls. My cooking partner volunteered to be in charge of the turkey (and gravy), cranberry sauce, and butternut squash soup. An enthusiastic British coworker offered to bring the mashed potatoes, and we figured given the prevalence of bangers and mash in the UK, we would let him contribute.

Earlier this week I meticulously made up a list of all the ingredients and various cooking items I needed and set out to Lulu Hypermarket in the Karama area of Dubai. Karama is a neighborhood in Dubai known for its large South Asian population (and thus its numerous delicious South Asian restaurants) and for being the place to go to get a “genuine fake” bag. I had been there the week before with a co-worker, and she had introduced me to Lulu. I was fascinated by the store – not only did it have a massive amount of inventory – from appliances to kitchen supplies to linens and groceries – but it also stocked hundreds of foodstuffs that are probably commonplace in an Indian or Pakistani kitchen, but that I would have no idea what to do with. In any case, I decided it would be a good place to start my Thanksgiving shopping because it would allow me to pick up some of the pans I still needed as well as knock off most of the things off my ingredient list, all at a cheaper price.

So, I set off on a Tuesday evening after work. The traffic was terrible, so I took a quick look to make sure Lulu was in walking distance of the Metro, and set off on my way. As I exited the Karama station, I was immediately bombarded with choruses of,  “Hello madam, bag? Gucci, Prada, very good price! Yes yes, please this way.” With repeated “No thank you” s and the occasional smile, I purposefully set off, hoping that if I looked like I knew where I was going, I would get fewer salesmen chasing after me. Now, you may have previous noted that I took a “quick” look to make sure Lulu was in walking distance. Apparently I should have had a longer look, because it soon became clear that I did not in fact know exactly where I was going. I eventually conceded this fact to myself and asked for directions. I seemed to get slightly conflicting answers from different people, but chalked the conflicting rights and lefts up to language issues and eventually saw “Lulu” in green neon, and headed toward it. It looked a bit different than what I remembered, but I figured perhaps this was a different entrance from the one I had previously entered, and forged ahead, relived I had finally reached my destination. Upon entering the store, however, it became clear that this was not where I had been before. You see, I was unaware that in the same neighborhood there is apparently both a LuLu Shopping Center (with multiple "LuLu" stores and a LuLu Hypermarket. I won’t bore you with all the details, but after more wandering, lots of curious looks, several unsuccessful direction queries, and a few moments of doubt as to whether getting lost in unfamiliar neighborhood was really worth saving a few bucks later, I was able to backtrack the trail of people carrying Lulu Hypermarket shopping bags to my intended destination. Relieved that I had finally found it, I grabbed a cart, pulled out my shopping list, and started on my way.

All and all, I was able to knock many things off the list by going to Lulu. However, there were still a number of things they did not have: 

• Cranberries
• Fresh thyme and fresh sage
• Sweet Italian sausage and bacon (they didn't have a pork room - more on this phenomenon at a later point)
• Sweet potatoes (well, they technically had something labeled sweet potatoes, but I was not convinced that what they called a sweet potato and what I called a sweet potato were actually the same thing...)
• Graham crackers 
• Disposable aluminum pie tins (I had already been to several sores looking for these, so this was particularly disappointing)
• A large aluminum roasting pan for the turkey
• Butternut squash 
• Non-shelf stable whipping cream
• Ground cloves or nutmeg  

Surprisingly, they did have frozen turkeys, but I had seen bigger ones elsewhere, so I decided to hold off.

The next day I headed to Waitrose in the Dubai Mall, largely considered one of the best (read: fanciest) grocery stores in Dubai. It’s definitely geared to the expat population – and you pay the according premium – but you can find things there that you can’t elsewhere. Massive, American-sized Jennie-O Turkeys for example (important when you have an invite list that by this point had swelled to somewhere between 17-20). But I have to say, Waitrose still let me down, as I left without:

•  Sweet Italian sausage (though they did have sausage more generally)
• Ground cloves
• Cranberries
•  Graham crackers 

Now, ultimately I only needed a ¼ tsp of ground cloves for one of the pumpkin pies, so that wasn’t a deal breaker. I was surprised by the lack of sweet Italian sausage, simply because it’s so widely available in the states. They did, however, have varieties of what I can only assume must be standard sausage fare in the UK that I had never seen (Lancaster sausage? Irish sausage? Canterbury sausage? Toulouse sausage? What are these things?) 

The absence of graham crackers was definitely a surprise. Upon further discussion at the office with my British colleagues, apparently what I thought was a childhood staple is in fact, very much an American thing. My co-workers didn’t even know what a graham cracker was.

The lack of cranberries was definitely the biggest problem – I had hoped they would at least have some frozen, and its hard to make cranberry sauce without the cranberry. One coworker suggested we put craisins, cranberry juice, and some apples in a blender and call it a day, which was - well - creative thinking I suppose, but not exactly what we had our palates primed for. 

We had resigned ourselves to buying canned cranberry sauce (which was available at Waitrose) when, in a last-ditch effort, my co-cook visited the grocery store that recently opened in our office complex. Incredibly, they had fresh cranberries. Thanksgiving could go on.

Stay tuned for part 2: the cooking!