WILMINGTON — With a background in computers and law, but a passion for animal rescue, vegan eating and shining a light on his heritage, Maad Abu-Ghazalah has opened a food truck that debuted in Wilmington this week.
READ MORE: Food Truck Tracker: Sept. 6 – 13
Arabelle Palestinian & Southern Cuisine set up at the Skyline Center Wednesday, stocked with plenty of dips, sandwiches and entrees in a 6-foot trailer. Unlike most large-scale food trucks, Abu-Ghazalah doesn’t cook on his trailer; all items are prepared and prepackaged at the commissary kitchen ahead of time, so it’s grab-and-go for the customer — meaning an easy process, often without lines or wait times.
“When I moved to Wilmington, I wanted to try something new and get out from behind the desk,” he said. “I thought a food truck would be a good way to get out and meet people.”
He moved from San Francisco a few months ago. The Port City has always been a place of appeal, Abu-Ghazalah said, as he ran a triathlon in town two decades ago. Arabelle is a side business to Abu-Ghazalah’s software company, Docket Wizard. A graduate from Notre Dame, he also has a law degree and founded the company to keep track of patent deadlines for attorneys. It’s his second computer operation; Abu-Ghazalah sold a data analytics company in 2012 to Bloomberg.
But after combatting growing traffic for 30 years in Silicon Valley, he aspired for a more laid-back lifestyle.
“I definitely enjoyed every minute of it,” Abu-Ghazalah said of his time in the Golden City. “But I was ready for a quieter feel and Wilmington fit the bill for me.”
A vegan for 10 years, the food truck idea began percolating from a desire to educate people on Arabic food and culture. Abu-Ghazalah said he hears frequently how people confuse items like falafel, tabbouleh and hummus as Greek.
“They’re from Levant, which is Syria, Lebanon, Palestine,” Abu-Ghazalah said. “I’m fulfilling my duty to educate people about food that they like, yet nobody seems to know where it comes from.”
Diners will find traditional items, like baba ganouj with pita and sliders stuffed with crispy fried falafel, packed with cumin and fresh herbs, such as cilantro and parsley, and topped with homemade tahini and shatta hot sauce. The latter is a Palestinian condiment made with garlic, cayenne and chili peppers.
Muhammara is also served, a roasted red pepper and nut dip. Abu-Ghazalah uses dry Aleppo red peppers from Syria, plus bell pepper, red pepper, walnuts, pomegranate syrup, and Bulgar. It’s blended and served with pita.
Abu-Ghazalah has punched up a few dishes with Southern flair. He toyed with blackened falafel, but had to switch gears as the blackened seasoning made it more soggy than crispy.
“And falafel has to be crispy,” he said.
Diners will find vegan kufta (meatballs made with Impossible crumbles instead of traditional lamb), served over yogurt sauce, and hummus with Creole seasoning, slathered on a pita and stuffed with caramelized onion and cauliflower.
“I want to make the food approachable,” he said, “and the Creole and Arabic flavors really go well together.”
Abu-Ghazalah also serves a jambalaya with fenugreek spice, as well as a lasagna. The latter was the one item he craved the most when he decided to follow a plant-based diet only. It also was the inspiration for him to cook more for himself. Abu-Ghazalah realized, even though he became vegan to become healthier, he was leaning on more junk food at first.
“It’s really simple, if you just eat fresh fruits and vegetables,” he said. “And I challenge somebody that tastes the lasagne to realize it’s not vegan. … Instead of ricotta cheese, I use almond-based cheese, eggplant for texture, spinach and Beyond sausage.”
The entrees have to be heated up since they’re not served hot from the trailer, but sandwiches and dips are ready to eat.
Abu-Ghazalah uses cold-pressed Palestinian olive oil in his preparations at CJ’s Commissary Kitchen on Castle Hayne Road. That’s where the heft of his work for the food truck is completed.
“Everything goes really fast at the events and I have time to talk to people and interact with customers, which is really what I want to do,” he said.
Abu-Ghazalah’s love for food was ingrained in his upbringing in Saudi Arabia. His family lived in a small town run by an American oil company, for which his father worked.
“It had an American school and they had a fence around it, so the culture was like this little piece of America in the middle of Saudi Arabia,” he said, eventually immigrating to the United States to attend Notre Dame.
His mother was always preparing traditional Middle Eastern dishes during youth, he said, something he considered building a podcast around years ago. Abu-Ghazalah’s kufta, hummus and baba ghanouj recipes for Arabelle are all his mother’s.
“I don’t know if you’ve ever cooked with an immigrant mom — it’s not easy,” he quipped. “First, you can’t ask about portions or seasoning. You ask, ‘How much salt?’ She will say, ‘Put enough salt, but not too much.’ If you chop things and you’re not doing it right, she’ll just take over and start chopping herself. So that podcast, I realized, wouldn’t work.”
His family lives in Jordan now and Abu-Ghazalah travels there a few times a year and stocks up on spices and other flavorings to add to his vegan Rolodex. He made the lifestyle change while on a fishing trip years ago; as everyone was pulling up their catch on the boat, he said when he saw the fish unable to breathe or make a sound, it hit him hard.
“People were laughing and having a good time and the fish were all suffering,” he said. “If they had vocal cords, they’d be screaming bloody murder. Somehow it just struck me in that moment how they must have felt.”
Always an animal lover, Abu-Ghazalah also started an animal sanctuary, Daily Hugz, in Palestine a decade ago. To date, he’s rescued 70 dogs and 15 donkeys, adding the culture treats the animals differently, in that they aren’t allowed in homes normally and often roam the streets.
“Then the war broke out and I couldn’t go back,” he said. “I was panicked and people were saying, ‘You’re just gonna have to let them loose,’ but they wouldn’t last a day or a week or so on the streets, but ASPCA came through for us, and they chartered a 747, and we brought all the dogs here to the U.S.”
Four dogs remain as his own companions in Wilmington and the sanctuary overseas still operates. Today, it helps displaced animals find permanent homes more than houses animals onsite.
“We’re going through a lot of turmoil right now, but it’s home,” Abu-Ghazalah said. “And, you know, that’s how things get better: You have a little friction to make a fire for change.”
Arabelle food truck’s upcoming schedule is below:
- 9/13, 6 p.m.: Waterline Brewery
- 9/17, 11 a.m.: Skyline Center
- 9/20, 6 p.m.: Waterline Brewery
- 9/21, 1 p.m.: Fermental
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