iinta’s culinary mastermind, Deke Zaher, is a true connoisseur of unique cuisine and fresh, whole food ideas.
His foremost memories of being in the kitchen start at the age of four. Zaher says during large family gatherings he was often in the kitchen with his aunts rather than playing video games with his cousins. Zaher’s favourite memory is the scent that occurs when olive oil is heated and has garlic and lemon added to it, calling it “the essence of Palestinian cooking.”
Zaher’s first public display of his family’s traditional cooking was in 1984 when he explained to his fellow classmates what was in the hummus that he regularly brought to school.
“I got tired of being the kid with weird lunches,” he says.
Zaher officially trained to be a social worker, which was his career for 19 years, where he often supervised lunch periods in schools — a place where junk food is readily accessible. Over the years he noticed correlations between what the kids were eating and their behaviour afterward, noting lack of concentration, lethargy and mood.