Across Asia, Muslims celebrate the end of Ramadan with distinctive family recipes and local cuisines

Clockwise from left: India’s Muslim population celebrate Eid with seviyan, a sweet vermicelli pudding; top, bottom right: Indonesia, home to 13 percent of the world’s Muslims, marks the occasion with rendang and ketupat, a traditional rice cake. (AFP)
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Updated 22 April 2023
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Across Asia, Muslims celebrate the end of Ramadan with distinctive family recipes and local cuisines

  • With three of the largest Islamic-majority countries, Asia is home to 65 percent of the world’s Muslims
  • During Eid, food reinforces the connections households share with their faith, nation and ancestors

JAKARTA/NEW DELHI/COLOMBO/MANILA: Muslims across South and Southeast Asia are celebrating Eid Al-Fitr with feasts at which distinctive, traditional local dishes not only mark the end of a month of fasting during Ramadan but also help to reinforce, through food, the connections families share with their loved ones and ancestors.

Asia is home to about 65 percent of the world’s Muslims, and the three largest Muslim-majority countries, based on population, can be found there: Indonesia, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

In Indonesia, more than 230 million people profess to follow Islam, a figure that represents 86 percent of the country’s population and about 13 percent of all Muslims in the world.

The archipelago nation, which stretches more than 5,000 kilometers from east to west and 1,700 kilometers north to south, is home to more than 1,000 distinctive ethnic groups, all of which have their own traditions.

During Eid Al-Fitr, however, many customs and traditions span the normal divides between groups in such a diverse nation. These include giving generously to charity, visiting relatives, buying new outfits in which to pray, and sitting down for feasts that include popular local and national dishes.

One Eid staple in Indonesia is rendang, a slow-cooked dish of meat braised in coconut milk, galangal, lemongrass and other aromatic spices until it becomes caramelized. This hearty meal originated in Sumatra but now has multiple variations across the country.

Rendang is often paired on Eid tables with opor ayam, a Javanese chicken stew made by simmering the meat in coconut milk, curry paste and lemongrass.




Children greet each other after offering a special morning prayer to start the Eid Al-Fitr festival at the Jama Masjid mosque in the old quarters of New Delhi. (AFP)

Then there is ketupat, which is rice cakes packed inside young coconut leaves woven into a diamond shape. Many believe the dish was introduced by Sunan Kalijaga, a 15th-century theologian and one of the legendary nine missionaries credited with the spread of Islam in Java.

“During Eid, we will always have ketupat, rendang, opor ayam, papaya leaves and long beans cooked in coconut milk, and chicken liver and potatoes in fried chili,” Diella Yasmine, 31, from Jakarta, told Arab News.

She added that she also includes on the menu telur petis, hard-boiled eggs fried in a shrimp sauce, a dish she associates with her childhood and her family’s roots.

“My father is from East Java and this is just one of those dishes that must be served at the dinner table there,” said Yasmine.

“The dish always reminds me of my grandma’s home. When we used to go back to our hometown, this dish was always served. My grandma and grandfather have already passed away, so this telur petis is especially memorable.”

She revealed that her family is very strict about how the dish is prepared.

“Our recipe has been handed down for generations, from my great-grandparents. All the measurements must be consistent with the recipe,” said Yasmine.

In addition to authentic traditional recipes, she said there is one other element that is critical to the success of a dish.




An Indonesian family takes photographs after Eid Al-Fitr prayers at Baiturrahman Grand Mosque in Banda Aceh. (AFP)

“The secret to our family’s Eid cooking is using a traditional stove,” Yasmine said. “This makes it unique compared to our usual cooking. My family will always use a traditional stove and coconut fiber, which gives a smoky taste when we cook dishes with coconut milk.”

Pakistan is home to 212 million followers of Islam, while Bangladesh has 154 million. There are also more than 200 million Muslims in Hindu-majority India. These three countries account for almost a third of all Muslims in the world.

Each of the nations has its own distinctive identity but their peoples share many cultural traits, including a craving for sweets when Ramadan draws to an end.

Some of these cravings are satisfied during Eid by a traditional dessert known as seviyan or sawai in Pakistan and India, and shemali in Bangladesh, which is based on vermicelli pudding.

“The most important dish on Eid is sawai, or vermicelli — it is a must,” Rafat Shahab, a chef and caterer from Delhi, told Arab News.

“There are two types of sawai. One is muzaffar, which is without milk and is sweet and tasty. The other is sheer khorma, which has milk. You have to cook it slowly to bring out the taste. Eid is not complete without the sawai dish.

“Besides sweet dishes, other items on the menu are generally biryani — either mutton or chicken — chicken curry, and some vegetarian dishes.”

These meat and plant-based dishes have local variations across the northern parts of the subcontinent. However, Kashmir, the Himalayan territory claimed by both India and Pakistan, has its own distinctive traditions and cuisine. Eid in Kashmir is synonymous with wazwan, a multi-course meal in which most of the dishes are heavy on meat.




Muslims offer Eid Al-Fitr prayers on a street in front of a mosque in Manila. (AFP)

“Everyone prepares wazwan,” Farooq Ahmad, a chef in Srinagar, the largest city in the region, told Arab News. “At home, people prepare five or six types of wazwan dishes, such as gushtaba, rista, kabab and all.”

Gushtaba is a dish of velvety-textured meatballs cooked in spicy yogurt, while rista is meatballs in a red, paprika-saffron-fennel gravy.

“In Kashmir, the focus is not on sweets,” said Ahmad. “People don’t prepare sweet dishes at home. People buy sweet dishes for whenever they visit other people’s houses during Eid.”

In the south of the subcontinent, however, sweets dominate holiday tables. Ummi Abdulla, 85, from Calicut in Kerala, has written several cookbooks based on her recipes, and is known locally as the “matriarch” of Malabar Muslim cuisine. In her kitchen, she said, two dishes are always on the menu during Eid: chakkara choru, also known as jaggery rice, and banana curry.

“The chakkara choru is prepared with coarse wheat and jaggery (a natural sweetener made from sugar cane juice or palm sap),” she told Arab News. “This is very typical of Kerala, not found anywhere else in India.

“For banana curry we use thin coconut milk in the beginning, and after it is baked we add thick coconut milk and sugar. It’s very tasty. In Kerala, we find different kinds of bananas and no festival is complete without bananas.”

In neighboring Sri Lanka, where 2 million Muslims make up almost 10 percent of the country’s predominantly Buddhist population, sweet dishes are also the most keenly anticipated Eid treats, the most popular of which is watalappan, or cardamom-spiced coconut custard.

“Eid means wattalapam,” said Nafha Musthaq, a homemaker in Colombo who previously worked as an accountant in Dubai.

In her home, the Eid menu starts with vermicelli, beef curry and sweet sago porridge for breakfast and lunch, traditionally followed by biryani for dinner. But the day ends with watalappan.




Bangladeshi Muslims offer Eid al-Fitr prayers, which marks the end of their holy fasting month of Ramadan, at the National Mosque of Bangladesh, Baitul Mukarram in Dhaka. (AFP)

“It’s a sweet dish made of jaggery, eggs, coconut milk and cardamom,” said Musthaq, who added that the secret to achieving the best flavor lies in the type of sweetening agent used; she always chooses jaggery extracted from kithul, a sugar palm native to Sri Lanka.

“It’s good if you can use1 kilogram of it for every 15 eggs,” she said. “This is a special dish in every household.”

To the east, in the Philippines, where Muslims are a minority that constitutes about 5 percent of the country’s population of nearly 110 million, the favorite Eid dessert is panyam, a type of fried pancake. It is made with ground glutinous rice, brown sugar and coconut milk.

However, it is not the highlight of the holiday feast for Filipino Muslims, most of whom belong to the Tausug ethnic group primarily native to southwestern parts of the Mindanao island group. Instead, the Eid culinary spotlight belongs to tiyula itum, or “black stew.”

Sometimes known as “royal beef stew” and historically linked to the dining rooms of the former Sultanate of Sulu, which survived into the early 20th century, tiyula itum is nowadays served only on special occasions linked to Tausug traditions.

Cooking the stew is a complex process. Marinated beef is combined with charred coconut powder, which gives the dish its signature black color. The meat is then mixed with sauteed onions, garlic and lemongrass and slowly brought to a boil. Toward the end of the cooking process, hot chili is added to give the spicy kick that many people love.

“Most of us go all-out celebrating Eid, and having beef stew and tiyula itum with yellow rice is common at every Muslim Filipino table during the celebration,” Nur-mukin Usman, a guest lecturer at Mindanao State University, told Arab News. “The ingredients, especially the burned coconut husk, need to be prepared a day ahead or early in the morning.”

Kiram Irilis, a school superintendent in Sulu, a southern province that is part of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, said that tiyula itum must always feature during the Eid celebrations.

“That’s what I prepare for my people,” he said. “After our Eid Al-Fitr prayer, I feed everyone who enters the mosque. That is how we express our gratitude that we finished the month of fasting, that we persevered.”

 


Four pro-Palestinian activists charged over UK military base break-in

Updated 4 sec ago
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Four pro-Palestinian activists charged over UK military base break-in

  • British lawmakers voted on Wednesday to ban Palestine Action as a terrorist organization

Four pro-Palestinian activists have been charged after breaking into a military air base in central England last month and damaging two planes in protest against Britain’s support for Israel.
Counter-terrorism police said the charges were for conspiracy to enter a prohibited place knowingly for a purpose prejudicial to the safety or interests of the UK, and conspiracy to commit criminal damage.
The four, aged between 22 and 35, remain in custody and are due to appear in a London court on Thursday. Police said they will present evidence to court linking the offenses to terrorism.
The campaign group Palestine Action has said it was behind the incident on June 20, when the air base in Oxfordshire in central England was broken into and red paint was sprayed over two planes used for refueling and transport.
British lawmakers voted on Wednesday to ban Palestine Action as a terrorist organization. The group has condemned the decision as an “abuse of power” and announced plans to challenge it in court.
The police statement said those charged had caused 7 million pounds ($9.55 million) worth of damage to the two aircraft at the Brize Norton Royal Air Force base.
Palestine Action has routinely targeted companies in Britain with links to Israel, including Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems. 2


Hotels and homes evacuated on Greek island of Crete as wildfire burns out of control

Updated 42 min 59 sec ago
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Hotels and homes evacuated on Greek island of Crete as wildfire burns out of control

  • Homes were reported damaged as flames swept through hillside forests, fanned by strong winds
  • As fires crested ridgelines and edged toward residential areas, the blaze sent clouds of ash into the night sky

ATHENS, Greece: A fast-moving wildfire whipped by gale-force winds burned through the night and into Thursday on Greece’s southern island of Crete, prompting the evacuation of more than 1,500 people from hotels and homes.

The fire department said 230 firefighters backed up by 10 water-dropping aircraft were battling the flames, which have burned through forest and farmland in Crete’s Ierapetra area on the island’s southern coast. Two people were evacuated by boat overnight, while six private boats were on standby in case further evacuations by sea became necessary, the coast guard said.

Homes were reported damaged as flames swept through hillside forests, fanned by strong winds.

“It’s a very difficult situation. The fire is very hard to contain. Right now, they cannot contain it,” Nektarios Papadakis, a civil protection official at the regional authority, told The Associated Press overnight.

“The tourists who were moved out are all okay. They have been taken to an indoor basketball arena and hotels in other regions of the island,” he said.

The Fire Service and a civil protection agency issued mobile phone alerts for the evacuations and appealed to residents not to return to try to save their property.

As fires crested ridgelines and edged toward residential areas, the blaze sent clouds of ash into the night sky, illuminated by the headlights of emergency vehicles and water trucks that lined the coastal road near the resorts of Ferma and Achlia on the southeast of Crete.

Several residents were treated for breathing difficulties, officials said, but there were no immediate reports of serious injuries.

Crete is one of Greece’s most popular destinations for both foreign and domestic tourists.

The risk of wildfires remained very high across Crete and parts of southern Greece Thursday, according to a daily bulletin issued by the Fire Service.

Wildfires are frequent in the country during its hot, dry summers, and the fire department has already tackled dozens across Greece so far this year.

In 2018, a massive fire swept through the seaside town of Mati, east of Athens, trapping people in their homes and on roads as they tried to flee. More than 100 died, including some who drowned while trying to swim away from the flames.


Ryanair cancels 170 flights due to French air traffic controllers strikes

Updated 40 min 36 sec ago
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Ryanair cancels 170 flights due to French air traffic controllers strikes

Ryanair said it was forced to cancel 170 flights affecting over 30,000 passengers due to a national strike by air traffic controllers in France, planned on Thursday and Friday.

“In addition to flights to/from France being canceled, this strike will also affect all French overflights,” the Irish airline said in a statement.


Thailand set for another acting PM after cabinet reshuffle

Updated 03 July 2025
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Thailand set for another acting PM after cabinet reshuffle

  • Power passed to transport minister and deputy prime minister Suriya Jungrungreangkit who took office for only one full day
  • The revolving door of leadership comes as the kingdom is battling to revive a spluttering economy and secure a US trade deal averting President Donald Trump’s looming threat of a 36 percent tariff

Bangkok: Thailand’s king is scheduled Thursday to swear in a new cabinet in a reshuffle that will see a third person in a week take on the role as the country’s prime minister.

The Southeast Asian nation’s top office was plunged into turmoil on Tuesday when the Constitutional Court suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra pending an ethics probe which could take months.

Power passed to transport minister and deputy prime minister Suriya Jungrungreangkit who took office for only one full day, as the bombshell was dropped in an awkward interim ahead of the reshuffle.

When former defense minister Phumtham Wechayachai is sworn into his new position as interior minister he will also take on a deputy prime minister role outranking Suriya’s — thus becoming the acting premier.

Before Paetongtarn was ousted she assigned herself the role of culture minister in the new cabinet, meaning she is set to keep a perch in the upper echelons of power.

She arrived at the Government House on Thursday morning for a group portrait before heading to the Grand Palace to meet King Maha Vajiralongkorn for the closed-door oath-taking.

The newly-appointed cabinet is set to hold its first meeting Thursday afternoon, with a royal statement expected in the evening.

The revolving door of leadership comes as the kingdom is battling to revive a spluttering economy and secure a US trade deal averting President Donald Trump’s looming threat of a 36 percent tariff.

Phumtham is considered a loyal lieutenant to the suspended Paetongtarn and her father Thaksin Shinawatra, the powerful patriarch of a dynasty which has dominated Thai 21st-century politics.

Thaksin-linked parties have been jousting with the pro-military, pro-conservative establishment since the early 2000s, but analysts say the family’s political brand has now entered decline.

The 71-year-old Phumtham earned the nickname “Big Comrade” for his association with a left-wing youth movement of the 1970s, but transitioned to politics through a role in Thaksin’s telecoms empire.

In previous cabinets he held the defense and commerce portfolios, and spent a spell as acting prime minister after a crisis engulfed the top office last year.

Paetongtarn has been hobbled over a longstanding territorial dispute between Thailand and Cambodia, which boiled over into cross-border clashes in May, killing one Cambodian soldier.

When she made a diplomatic call to Cambodian ex-leader Hun Sen, she called him “uncle” and referred to a Thai military commander as her “opponent,” according to a leaked recording causing widespread backlash.

A conservative party abandoned her ruling coalition — sparking the cabinet reshuffle — accusing her of kowtowing to Cambodia and undermining the military.

The Constitutional Court said there was “sufficient cause to suspect” Paetongtarn breached ministerial ethics in the diplomatic spat.
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South Korea’s leader says trade deal with US remains unclear ahead of Trump’s deadline

Updated 03 July 2025
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South Korea’s leader says trade deal with US remains unclear ahead of Trump’s deadline

  • Lee said the tariff negotiations with the US have been “clearly not easy”
  • Trump’s 90-day pause in global reciprocal tariffs is set to expire on July 9, potentially exposing South Korean products to 25 percent tax rates

SEOUL, South Korea: South Korean President Lee Jae Myung said that it remained unclear whether Seoul and Washington could conclude their tariff negotiations by the deadline set by President Donald Trump for next week, noting Thursday that both nations were still working to clarify their positions and identify areas of agreement.

Speaking at his first news conference since taking office last month, Lee also reiterated his intentions to improve badly frayed ties with North Korea, though he acknowledged that mutual distrust between the Koreas is too deep to heal anytime soon.

Trump’s tariff hikes and other “America First” policies are major challenges for Lee’s month-old government, as are North Korea’s expanding nuclear program and domestic economic woes. Lee, a liberal, came to power after winning a snap presidential election caused by the ouster of conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol over his ill-fated imposition of martial law in December.

Lee said the tariff negotiations with the US have been “clearly not easy” and stressed that the countries must reach mutually beneficial outcomes.

“It’s difficult to say with certainty whether we will be able to reach a conclusion by July 8. We are now doing our best,” Lee said. ”What we need is a truly reciprocal outcome that benefits both sides and works for everyone, but so far, both sides are still trying to define exactly what they want.”

Trump’s 90-day pause in global reciprocal tariffs is set to expire on July 9, potentially exposing South Korean products to 25 percent tax rates.

Washington has separately been seeking higher duties on specific products such as automobiles and semiconductors, which are key exports for South Korea’s trade-dependent economy. There are growing concerns in Seoul that Trump may also demand a broader deal requiring South Korea to pay significantly more for the 28,000 US troops stationed on the peninsula to deter North Korean threats.

Lee has consistently urged patience on tariffs, arguing that rushing to secure an early deal would not serve the national interest. His trade minister, Yeo Han-koo, was reportedly arranging a visit to Washington for possible meetings with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

On North Korea, Lee said he would seek to restore long-dormant talks with North Korea, whose expanding military cooperation with Russia pose major security concerns to their neighbors.

“I think we should improve relations with North Korea based on a reliable coordination and consultation between South Korea and the US,” Lee said. “But I expect that won’t be easy as mutual antagonism and distrust are too serious.”

Lee previously faced criticism that he was tilting toward North Korea and China and away from the US and Japan. But since the election, Lee has repeatedly vowed pragmatic diplomacy, saying he would bolster the alliance with the US while also seeking to repair ties with North Korea, China and Russia. Some critics say it’s too difficult to satisfy all parties.

Lee’s government has made proactive efforts to build trust with North Korea, halting frontline anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts and taking steps to ban activists from flying balloons carrying propaganda leaflets across the border.

North Korea hasn’t publicly responded to the conciliatory gestures by Trump and Lee, but officials said North Korean propaganda broadcasts have since been unheard in South Korean border towns.

Lee said he’s been talking with his presidential security and intelligence officials about how to revive talks with North Korea but didn’t elaborate.

Trump has also expressed intent to resume diplomacy with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Lee has said he would support Trump’s push.

North Korea has refused talks with the US and South Korea since earlier Trump-Kim nuclear talks collapsed in 2019. North Korea is now pursuing relations with Russia, supplying troops and weapons to support its war against Ukraine in return for economic and military assistance.