Categories: News

In Anchorage, Alaska, a growing Muslim community is in full swing preparing for Ramadan—with a few additional obstacles

In Anchorage, Alaska, one of the nation’s most ethnically diverse cities, and home to a growing Muslim community, celebrating Ramadan looks a little different—and requires a little more ingenuity—than in other parts of the world. The New York Times reports on how Muslims break the Ramadan fast at America’s northmost mosque, where geography poses a major problem for sourcing necessary foods and spices. Alaska already imports 95 percent of its food, and is continuing to feel the fallout effects of supply-chain disruptions. And while there are more halal options than there used to be in Anchorage—including three halal specialty shops—it can still be a challenge to find many ingredients. Residents start stocking up over a month in advance; bringing spices in from their hometowns of Senegal or Pakistan; practicing making dishes ahead of time; and even, for at least one resident, securing some hyper-local meat from a neighbor who hunts according to Islamic law and recently shared some halal caribou. —Alex Hinton

Related Post
The Counter
Share
Published by
The Counter

Recent Posts

Grist acquires The Counter and launches food and agriculture vertical

Grist, an award-winning, nonprofit media organization dedicated to highlighting climate solutions and uncovering environmental injustices,…

6 months ago

Is California giving its methane digesters too much credit?

Every year, California dairy farms emit hundreds of thousands of tons of the potent greenhouse…

3 years ago

Your car is killing coho salmon

Highway 7 runs north-south through western Washington, carving its way through a landscape sparsely dotted…

3 years ago

The pandemic has transformed America’s dining landscape into an oligopoly dominated by chains 

One of the greatest pleasures I had as a child growing up in the Chicago…

3 years ago

California is moving toward food assistance for all populations—including undocumented immigrants

Undocumented immigrants experience food insecurity at much higher rates than other populations, yet they are…

3 years ago

Babka, borscht … and pumpkin spice? Two writers talk about Jewish identity through contemporary cookbooks.

Writer Charlotte Druckman and editor Rebecca Flint Marx are both Jewish journalists living in New…

3 years ago