Damascus · booza
بكداش (Bakdash)
It is the shop the origin story of Arabic booza attaches to by name in every source, Arabic and English alike, and it is the only Damascus shop in this guide with a dated, named-byline account of still operating after the government that ruled Syria for the shop's entire modern history fell. Two independently reported forced closures on health grounds, both followed by reopening rather than by sale, point to a family determined to keep the shop rather than cash out.
What we know
- Hand-pounded with metre-long wooden mallets and infused with sahlab (orchid-root flour) rather than churned — pounded until it takes on a soft, stretchy texture
- Co-owner Samir Bakdash says the recipe has not changed since his great-grandfather devised it in the 1890s, and reopened the shop the day after Assad fell as a personal statement of relief from a government that had 'forced him to pay bribes just to keep his shop open'
- Twice closed by Damascus governorate health inspectors on food-safety grounds (mixing Aleppo pistachio with a cheaper substitute, using powdered rather than fresh milk) and twice reopened — first in July 2017 and again in August 2018 — with the owner refusing repeated pressure to sell the shop
- Founding attributed to Mohammad Hamdi Bakdash in Souk al-Hamidiyah; the shop began as a lemonade stand before becoming Damascus's first and most famous booza seller
- A $1-per-bowl price, and a queue that in December 2024 included armed fighters fresh from the front line tucking sidearms behind their backs to eat
- Sourcing conflict recorded rather than resolved: the founding year is given as 1895 by most of the record's sources and as 1885 by two others, one of which contradicts its own summary
- Status
- open
- Address
- Souk al-Hamidiyah, between Bab al-Nasr and Bab al-Barid, Old City of Damascus, Syria
- Maker
- Founded by Mohammad Hamdi Bakdash (محمد حمدي بكداش); run for decades by his son Mowaffaq Bakdash (موفق بكداش), who died in February 2022; co-owned at the December 2024 reopening by Samir Bakdash (سمير بكداش)
- Opened
- 1895
- Last checked
- 2024-12-10
Something wrong here? Tell us.