Potomac Church Treats Community to Weekend of Middle Eastern Flair

For the past three years Katie Kirkpatrick has looked forward to the bazaar every September. Along with several friends, Kirkpatrick attended the Middle Eastern bazaar to enjoy her weekend with a festive flair.

“The food is great, prices are reasonable, and it is a blast seeing all the Middle Eastern products for sale,” she said. “I am a big fan of the deserts—all of them—.”

This year Kirkpatrick was amused to see that younger members of the church were heavily promoting the ice cream sundaes topped with crushed up baklava.

On the weekend of Sept. 23-25, the church celebrated its 28th year hosting the bazaar. .

The bazaar is a family affair for Margo Ghanen, who, along with her husband, is in charge of the meats being cooked for the event.

Saturday afternoon Sam Ghanen was busy serving chicken, beef and lamb to a long line of customers. Ghanen said his family prepares and cooks 800 lamb shanks for Saturday and Sunday, with 200 shanks prepared Friday night. They also prepare 300 to 350 shish kebobs a day.

Saturday afternoon Ghanen added another special duty to his plate and was cooking an entire lamb on a spit behind the church.

“This lamb is special," he said. "It is being roasted as a thank-you gift for all the hard work the volunteers put in during the weekend. I will serve it Sunday night as a special treat.”

The Ghanens' son, 20-year-old Osama, has been helping his parents cook the meat for years, but this year he went in a different direction and debuted an outdoor Hookah Lounge.

Guests could rent a cut-glass water pipe called a hookah and flavored tobacco for $10. By early evening his tables were filled with people smoking, relaxing and watching the activities around them.

Meanwhile, Jessica Hawkins was busy selling homemade apple pies and serving apple cider to thirsty guests. She pointed to man sitting on top of a crate of apples and told Patch that he was responsible for getting the bazaar's supply honey crisp apples to the church.

Mark Buchko, has been in charge of the apples for the past three years. Beginning in early summer, Buchko searches out the best supply of apples he can find. This year's honey crisps were from New Paris, a small town in Pennsylvania.

Buchko said he compares prices of apples sold in local grocery stores to his Pennsylvania honey crisps and noted that his apples are almost almost $1 per pound cheaper than grocery store honey crisps.

This is a great cost savings for the church, which goes through his supply of apples quickly.

“The church choir baked 40 pies in two and a half hours," Buchko said. "They may have set a record.”