Fatafeat

Fatafeat is the Middle East's cooking channel, featuring shows from the Food Network, but also homegrown Arabian cooking from across the Arab world. The company also has a monthly magazine with beautiful photography and recipes, and is available both in Arabic and thankfully also in English.

Great place to learn new Ramadan recipes to impress the whole family, you can see the videos from here: Fatafeat Youtube Channel or pick up a copy of their magazine.

Ramadan Delights

Include dates, figs, apricots, nuts, tamarind drink, carob drink, coconut, prunes, etc. etc. See also Ramadan Goodie Bags and Khoshev and Yummy Drinks

Ramadan Goodie Bags

Often, people will give bags of food as donations or gifts during the month of Ramadan, to friends, family, employees, co-workers, the butcher and the baker and those we interact with on a daily basis, and most importantly giving charity to the poor.

Bags range from exquisite gift baskets to simple plastic bags filled with essential foodstuffs, typically a bottle of oil, rice, sugar, pasta, tomato paste, tea, and the ramadan delights dates, raisins, coconut, etc.

Children's Fanoos (Lantern)

Each year during Ramadan, kids get given toy lanterns. They have loud music and bright alternating lights. Fabulous fun.

Ramadan Fanoos (Lanterns)

In Egypt, Ramadan is a festival of lights, with lanterns of all sizes and shapes being lit during this holy month. The tradition apparently dates back to 968 when the people would celebrate the arrival of the Caliph. For more on the history of the tradition see this article on The Ramadan Lantern. Today, in Egypt lights are strung from homes and apartment buildings not just in the form of lanterns, but also long strings of LEDS (see my post on Ramadan Lights).

Khoshev

This is one of my favorite fabulous things about Ramadan. Khoshev is the first thing you eat after you break your fast at sunset. It can be made in a number of ways, but the basic recipe is dates, with prunes, apricots, raisins, soaked in either water or milk. You prepare this first thing in the morning, so by the time you break your fast, the water/milk has taken on all the sweetness of the dates and raisins, etc. and tastes fabulously delicious.

Ramadan TV Series

Every Ramadan, following iftar (breakfast, or break the fast), families gather around their TV sets and prepare for the best TV pickings of the year, the special Ramadan series which air every night during the month of Ramadan. Like month-long mini-series, the shows build on one another, so to "get" what's really going on, you probably have to watch each night.

Comedies, historic dramas, talk shows, candid camera, Hindi movies, and a whole lot of Egyptian series that look an awful lot like daytime soap operas, you have your wide pick of viewing. I must say, it seems to me the pickings get better each year.