It’s nearly impossible to smell a stew bubbling on the stovetop without evoking feelings of warmth and nostalgia. Whether in times of hardship or celebration, when someone rolls up his or her sleeves for us in the kitchen, this language of cooking lingers forever. With this idea in mind, the young students at the first Saudi Culinary Arts Academy, called Zadk, have turned to their stoves as graduation approaches.
For chef Baneen Al-Abbas, the laughter and love felt in her grandmother’s kitchen come quickly to mind when onion sautéing and cumin fill the air. These ingredients are part of Jareesh, an ancient dish for the desert communities of the Arabian Peninsula. Al-Abbas has creatively transformed it into croquettes filled with cracked wheat, tender meat, and aromatic spices.
Chef Zahrah Alturaiki draws inspiration from the village of Al Ahsa, an oasis filled with palm trees, where her mother used to prepare traditional selg stew with love and enthusiasm for family gatherings every Friday. Alturaiki’s innovative dish resembles a green pearl surrounded by a golden desert of sauce and pieces of meat flanked by a fort.
Moad shared a dish of small pillow-like dough stuffed with meat and rice, served on a bed of yogurt. His mother taught him the traditional recipe while he cared for her during her battle with cancer. The dish was his way of honoring the memory of his mother in front of the judges at his graduation.
Although every chef applies the same techniques learned during the academy’s program and uses local ingredients, each dish tells a unique story that holds a special place in their hearts. This approach is Rania Moualla’s art of immersing students from all walks of life in the meaning of food while preserving the rich culinary heritage of Saudi Arabia. Moualla is the founder of Saudi’s Culinary Arts Academy, Zadk.
Five years ago Moualla agreed with the Culinary Arts Academy Switzerland to use their curriculum to create a Culinary Arts Diploma with a distinct focus on Saudi cuisine. She soon realized that getting a hold of traditional Saudi recipes wasn’t easy. “Whenever I asked a friend for a recipe, they would send me the dish itself instead of the recipe. It was clear they viewed it as their own treasure. I realized that a mother might only share her recipe with her son or daughter. That’s how the graduation project came to life,” she smiles as we connected some weeks ago over a video call.
The academy creates a cookbook for each graduation that includes the graduates’ recipes and their stories. So far, the academy has documented 74 Saudi recipes.
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Raina Moualla’s Culinary Academy is a core reflection of her values. The woman hailed as the founder of the first Saudi Culinary Academy in a male-dominated profession—not only in Saudi Arabia but worldwide—was drawn to this line of work through her charity work and passion for cooking.
She was born to a history teacher mother and a psychology professor father, where family gatherings over cups of coffee and homemade food were cherished as the most valuable parts of life. After marrying and moving to Al Khobar, Saudi Arabia, she began experimenting in the kitchen, determined to “find a way to maintain the quality of my mother’s food, but take half the time,” as she writes in her book A Spoonful of Home, Shortcuts to My Mother’s Recipes. She destined all the profits of her book to support kids with disabilities.
Not many in the culinary profession can say they’ve been inspired by participating in a food project in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro during the Paralympics or by speaking with A-list restaurateurs such as Arzak, but Moualla is the open-minded kind.
Her visit to San Sebastián—a Spanish city often overlooked by mainstream media, but home to the world-class Basque Culinary Centre—led her to realize the potential for a homegrown culinary academy. Her city in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, known for its vocational training and work-oriented education, could help dismantle the “franchising” of food culture in the country. According to Moualla, the discovery of oil increased the influence of Western culture, particularly the American model, which has overtaken local food traditions.
Moualla’s generation, as well as her children’s generation, has grown up with chain food parlors and food delivery services that have become synonymous with modernity. This shift has caused a disconnection from food and cooking as a “way of building community.” Moualla reflects on the hospitality of Arab culture, but she laments that “people overdid it with generosity, creating huge food waste that doesn’t reflect the values of our culture.” Her academy, Zadk, is post-American cuisine and aims to promote zero-waste cooking, healthy nutrition and locally produced food.
“My father-in-law told us that they used to live only on dates for days and would tie his belt around his stomach to cope with hunger,” she shares. Before the oil boom, people in the Eastern Province relied on pearl trade and fishing for sustenance. The staple foods in this region included wheat, dates, fish, camel milk, and meat.
Millions of oil barrels later, Moualla must persuade sponsors about the rich culinary heritage of Saudi Arabia, which she believes is “hidden in the houses,” and the importance of teaching this heritage alongside modern culinary techniques and skills. Through her academy, she could create opportunities for Saudi youth by offering financial assistance and scholarships to students from disadvantaged families who aspire to become successful restaurateurs in Saudi Arabia’s growing tourism industry.
On June 24, 2018, the same day she was allowed to drive as a woman for the first time in Saudi Arabia, her culinary academy was officially registered—the first legal establishment of its kind in the kingdom. She has created an endowment, along with three other sponsors, that owns the for-profit company. This endowment cannot be inherited, and any profits generated will revert back to it. The governance body responsible for the academy will decide how to allocate any profits. Its board includes notable individuals from the food industry connected to Al Khobar, with the governor of the Eastern Province, Prince Saud bin Nayef, serving as the honorary chairman.
“I remember talking to my board, and they said, ‘Rania, you have to choose between male and female.’ I replied, ‘I’m not choosing.’” Moualla was ahead of the times. Eventually, she obtained the license to teach both women and men in the same kitchen, just as the country became more open to gender mixing in education and the workplace.
She then began reaching out to hotels and seeking students passionate about cooking, particularly those who could not afford the tuition. Zadk has implemented a model where the Human Resources Fund of the Saudi Government sponsors 75% of the tuition costs. In exchange, students commit to working for one or two years at one of the hotels that collaborate with the academy. During this period, the employer pays 50% of the salary, while the government covers the other half. Afterwards, the students are on their own.
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The program of the Culinary Academy in Saudi aims to enroll a young local population into the workforce, but Moualla has often come up against limits in his pursuit of saudization in the gastronomy sector. “I remember a hotel manager who said he was trying to bring celebrity chefs to Al Khobar, but they wouldn’t come. I looked at him and said, ‘Why do you want a celebrity? My students are here. Why don’t you let them try?’” explains Moualla. “They ended up collaborating on a pop-up restaurant in a five-star hotel run entirely by our students. It became a success story.”
“The program is an excellent opportunity for students to graduate as chefs with a high-level curriculum without going abroad,” says Moualla. For their families, who have often undervalued this profession and are skeptical about their children pursuing a culinary career, the professionalism of the academy leads to a change in mindset—Prince Saud bin Nayef attends the graduation ceremony just as he does for engineers or doctors.
“My students come from various backgrounds. We provide them with education, job contracts, and a future,” celebrates Moualla. Female chefs from the academy have the same opportunities to open restaurants and build their own businesses.
In addition to maintaining the quality of education, Moualla wants to focus more on the social aspect of the academy moving forward. Outside the academy, she involves students with the local community through extracurricular activities, sharing the art of sustainable cooking at food stalls. The academy also supports the Productive Families program in partnership with local organizations. For three months, they taught valuable skills to women working from home to enhance their products and help them become more self-sufficient and economically independent. Moualla also plans to create a recipe that teaches kids the importance of their local cuisine, which is healthier than the fast food offered by franchise chains.
In November this year, the Saudi Culinary Arts Academy won the Best Culinary Training Institution in the Middle East award and the program’s international accreditation, TEDQUEL. “But this is not my trophy,” says Moualla. Her greatest reward came when one student held the trophy and promised her that he would carry Zadk’s values into the outside world. As an institute, she says, they ensure students are well-prepared to join the workforce. Given her contribution to Saudi society, this is an understatement.
