Winter Preservation Tradition · Confit Lamb
Awarma
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Before refrigerators reached mountain villages, a single jar of awarma packed in its own rendered fat could keep meat edible for months, sealed like a Lebanese take on French confit.
Lamb or beef is slow-cooked in its own fat with salt and spices until tender, then packed into jars under a seal of the same rendered fat. Mountain households spoon it into a hot pan with eggs or stir it through rice through the winter months, a habit that carried over from before electricity reached the higher villages.
Why it's made this way: High mountain villages historically had no reliable refrigeration through the cold season, so families rendered and jarred meat in autumn to guarantee protein through winter, a preservation method still practiced by home cooks in Aley and Bhamdoun today.
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