(I am really hungry right now..)

Turkish people, and I know Arabs too, make always a lot of food when we have visitors. Its something cultural to serve so many food. But is it necessary? And wasting food? And haraam food? This episode will be about that.

Well, most of us know how much we, the people from the east, eat. Especially during ramadan and when we have visitors, the tables are full. But how can we do that, when other people crave for a piece of bread? I have it good alhamdulillah, but that doesn’t mean I have to exaggerate. The more we make, the more food will be thrown away. You know how much food is thrown away each year just from 1 house? Its like food for a whole week! That’s so unnecessary. I always get mad at my mother when she makes too much food. Not because I don’t want people to eat it. No, I think that we can save that for another day. I mean, making 7 different dishes just for a few people is just too much and really a waste of time. Instead of that, you can make just 3 different dishes and just use the rest of the time for reading Qur'an, for example. Three kinds of bread, two different desserts, five different soups. Why? Do you think our Prophet (pbuh) would be happy if he saw that? Its a must to feed your visitors, but don’t be too excited. I mean, there was once a man who needed to stay at a place for a night. Our Prophet asked around who he can stay with and a man said he can stay with us. When he came home with the man, his wife was mad. They didn’t have any food anymore and even the children slept without having dinner. Then they made a plan. There was food enough for just one person, so they made soup for the man and placed it in front of him. They pretended that they ate too, but they didn’t. It was too dark so the visitor couldn’t see them not eating. Do you know how proud our Prophet was at this family? Just because of a bit of soup. We don’t need to serve food which could feed a whole country. Instead of doing that, we can give that money to others or just give the food to people who really need it. Its unbelievably much and not good to make so much food.
And with so much food, food gets wasted too. Just because its too much, most of the people don’t eat their whole plate. What happens then? It will be thrown away. You know our Prophet warned us about wasting food. How can we throw away food, if there are people out there who can only dream of it? My mum always throws it away, and gets mad at me when I throw it in the garden for birds to eat. (Just because it will invite mice:P) But our Prophet said, if you can’t eat it give it to animals. But just don’t waste food.
Now we are talking about food, there is a topic which I can discuss hours with people (which I do when I am teaching children/teenagers) . How many of us eat by the McDonalds, KFC, Burger King?I have a lot of friends eating there and I just get mad when I think about it. When I ask them they say ‘Its made of cow’ or ‘Its just chicken’ No, its haraam. Allah says that we can only eat animals who are killed Islamically. Halaal. You can’t go to a supermarket and buy chicken which isn’t halaal. You can’t go to the Burger King and eat a Hamburger just because its made from cow. It has to be killed Islamically, so with a prayer and other rules, and if its not, its not halaal. No matter what. Also try to watch out with E-numbers. Alhamdulillah, we have this card which we use when we go to grocery stores and stuff. There are a lot of E-numbers who aren’t halaal, so I advice you to watch out for them.  May Allah only let us eat Halaal food..