A Field Report from the Front

Who will win – hummus or “houmous”? Shawarma or soy?
We went in hungry and came back confused.

The Battle Begins in the Fridge

This is not a conventional war.
No territory. No ideology. No ceasefire talks in Cairo.

This is the real war.
The intimate one.
The war between the Belly and the Cauliflower.

On one side:
Veteran forces. Heavily armored. Backed by strong supply chains – the neighborhood bakery, the late-night convenience store, and juicy chicken thighs with double fries.
On the other:
A nimble guerrilla movement of personal trainers, vegan influencers, and aggressive rebranding campaigns for root vegetables.

The battlefield is everywhere:
The dinner table.
The supermarket aisle.
Instagram.
The mirror.

Because in the end, this isn’t carbs vs. protein –
it’s emotion vs. reason,
stomach vs. conscience,
pleasure vs. “bro, what about your iron levels?”

The Cauliflower Comes Out of the Closet

In the last decade, cauliflower has undergone a glow-up that would make Cinderella file a complaint.

Once a sad vegetable you bought for Passover just to fry it and call it “traditional,”
today it’s a full-blown culinary influencer.

Roasted cauliflower with tahini.
Crispy cauliflower in a stone oven.
Cauliflower that hooked up with an eggplant, had a child, and named it “vegetable musabaha.”

Yes. We’ve reached that point.

But the Belly is unimpressed.

It laughs at this revolution like a fat uncle at a wedding yelling toward the buffet:
“Where’s the meat?!”

To the Belly, cauliflower is decoration.
A side dish.
Something you eat before the shawarma arrives –
and no, vegan, we don’t care that it’s “on a bed of Sudanese sesame.”

The Language War: How Rice Cakes Became a National Threat

One of the fiercest fronts is linguistic.

Once, we knew what “eating like a human being” meant:
Falafel.
A full pita.
Tahini.
Lots of pickles.
Dessert eaten standing up.

Today?
You need military-grade intelligence just to read a menu:

“Quinoa salad with zucchini curls, freekeh chicken, and charred jojoba hearts over natural charcoal.”

Who are these hearts?
Why freekeh?
Why is everything deconstructed?

I’m already deconstructed.
Where is the food?

The Belly believes in clarity.
Fat is fat.
A pita is a pita.
Chicken thighs are not a Rita song.

Any attempt to replace kubbeh with kale is viewed as a culinary provocation.

Weapons of Mass Consumption

Cauliflower is light artillery.
Easy to microwave.
Borderless.
Low-calorie and morally smug.

The Belly, however, holds nuclear weapons.

Pizza burekas.

A ballistic missile filled with molten regret that explodes on your pants five seconds before a first date.

The Cauliflower can scream about low carbs all it wants.
The Belly will calmly order a double Bulgarian cheese pizza –
with mushrooms.
Because health.

Meanwhile, civilians – meaning all of us – are torn.

Morning: green smoothie.
Lunch: sushi.
Night: authentic pita with kebabs.

The next morning?
Guilt.
Maybe a seven-minute walk by the beach.
To “reset.”

The Politics of Eating

As with everything here, food became political.

Vegan leftists.
Carnivore right-wingers.
Tel Aviv with spirulina.
The periphery with goulash.

A parliament discussing food security –
while serving kubbeh soup in the cafeteria.

Committees talking public health –
with trays of buttery mini-burekas waiting behind closed doors.

And the Belly?
It votes for no one.

It votes for whoever says:
“Bro, want more fries?”

A Peace Agreement: Is Fusion the Answer?

Maybe we don’t need to choose sides.

Maybe there’s room for both:
Shawarma and fresh salad.
Shakshuka with challah and a kale smoothie with orange notes.

Maybe we should stop feeling guilty on both sides of the plate
and accept a simple truth:

The Cauliflower may win on aesthetics.
But the Belly wins the heart.

For now – drink water.
And save room for shared dessert.

Because nothing unites like warm malabi in July.

Final Report

The battle ends in a fragile caloric stalemate.
The people are still fighting –
but at least they’re eating well.

And in this country, honestly?
That’s already a victory.