Like the stock market, an open-air produce market plays by its own rules.
Whether it's the NASDAQ or the fevered day-trading of just-picked pears and just-baked, brick-heavy chewy Jerusalem noodle kugel at the holy city's Mahane Yehuda market, it pays to do your homework before you go in.
If Mahane Yehuda's your choice, here's how to play.
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"Burekas - kilo for 12!" a vendor calls out in the din of the Mahane Yehuda outdoor market late on a Friday afternoon in Jerusalem. A middle-aged woman takes a bite out of a sesame-covered chicken nugget as flower sellers shout out competing prices and a man asks into his cell phone whether eight challot are enough for Shabbat.
Sundown is in less than two hours, and the shuk is bustling.
Shoppers are doing their final grocery run before the Sabbath begins and the market goes eerily quiet. On this unseasonably warm day, a teenage girl strolls down the open area of the shuk in a colorful winter scarf and sleeveless white top. A woman in a red helmet wheels her bike past a stand of fresh fish.
Stall owners are loudly - and sometimes, it seems, desperately - flogging their wares. "Four shekels pears! Four shekels!" one stall owner cries. A short distance down the newly covered walkway between Agrippas and Jaffa streets, another vendor is hawking a kilo of pears for half the price. On the outskirts of the shuk, a man in a black kippa and white beard leans his elbow on a pile of dog-food bags at the entrance to his grocery store, peering down the sidewalk for customers.
In short, Mahane Yehuda can be a confusing place as well as an exciting one, so here's a quick, and by no means comprehensive, guide.
Haggling: Many people are under the impression that shuk equals haggling. But believe it or not, your wiles are better put to use in the staid-looking judaica and jewelry shops (read: tourist traps) in the Ben Yehuda pedestrian mall in the center of town, or at the Arab shuk in the Old City, than at Mahane Yehuda.
Almost every stall has a cardboard sign bearing the price per kilo for each type of fruit or vegetable. Dried fruit and nut stalls or spice stands may be more likely to have the price per gram. Stay away from the stalls without prominently displayed prices - it probably means they don't want everyone to know how expensive they are.
The process is simple: You put the goods in a bag, they weigh it and tell you how much it is, and you fork over the cash. No words need even be exchanged, and you can often see the total amount displayed on the digital scales, which is particularly useful if you don't speak Hebrew. Tip: Bring a lot of small change.
The lay of the land: Mahane Yehuda stretches between Agrippas Street and Jaffa Street, and has two main sections, which run parallel to each other. One is a covered walkway, which is closer to town and was recently covered as part of extensive renovations. Then there is the uncovered walkway, which appears pretty wide during the week but becomes cluttered with vendors who move their tables to the center on Fridays.
Most of the rest of the shuk consists of stalls in the alleys connecting the two walkways as well as shops located on Agrippas and Jaffa, facing the street. You will be able to find the entrances easily by looking for the Border Police officers chatting to each other or looking bored.
Fruit and veg: There are so many fruit and vegetable stalls in the shuk (almost all nameless) that I couldn't begin to recommend any specific ones, so suffice it to say that the ones closer to the Agrippas Street entrance of the covered walkway tend to be more expensive than the ones further down. Tip: If you don't see basil (known in Israel as basilikum) at a stall selling herbs, that doesn't mean they don't have it, so don't hesitate to ask.
Bakeries: If you're walking down Agrippas Street on a Friday afternoon and suddenly find the sidewalk entirely blocked by American yeshiva students, here's why: They have come for Marzipan rugelach. Don't be fooled by the name, though. Marzipan does not sell marzipan. It has built its reputation around the chocolate-filled pastry that, when made by this bakery, is sticky sweet and extremely rich, and has a huge fan base. Its challot and apple cake are also recommended (but nowhere near as popular).
Another highly regarded source of challah (regular and whole wheat) and pastries is Pe'er, which is located on the right side of the covered walkway if you're coming from Agrippas. If you're here during Hanukkah, try their sufganiyot (doughnuts). Their main branch is in the German Colony.
Salatim: Meaning "salads," this is the catchall phrase for what is technically called "hummus and other stuff." Tzidkiyahu sells high-quality (and relatively high-priced) salatim - such as Turkish salad and a variety of eggplant concoctions - as well as appetizers and side dishes like Moroccan cigars and Yerushalmi kugel. It's also easy to find: Coming from Agrippas, it's the second stall on the left in the covered walkway.
Spices: Buying spices that have not undergone mass manufacturing is part of the fun of the shuk. If you haven't yet tried the popular Israeli (and biblical) spice zatar, known in English as hyssop, now's your chance. The green spice is often sold mixed with sesame seeds, and makes a great addition to hummus or Israeli salad (vegetable salad cut up really small).
You can check out the top-of-the-line spices at the first stall on the right in the covered walkway, coming from Agrippas. The place, called Tavlinei Pereg, is easily identifiable by the two inverted cones of paprika that are always on the counter (they're known in the store as "the twins"). Dried roses - which, like many of the spices, are stored in burlap bags displayed on the ground - go for NIS 35 for 100 grams. Across the walkway, on the corner, is another spice stall that sells everything for NIS 5.
On the other side of Agrippas at Tavlinei Tevel/The World Spices, suspicious customers can head for the back of the store and take their pick of white, yellow or black rocks advertised as warding off "the evil eye."
Candy: There are plenty of small candy stalls scattered throughout the shuk, but if you want a wider range, head for Mamtakei Eli Haim by turning left onto Agrippas when you leave the walkways of the shuk. Here you can pick up a nice box of chocolates as a gift or get some junk food for yourself. You can also check out its new competitor, Hamamtakim Shel Erez, which is almost as big and has an eye-catching yellow sign (turn right onto Agrippas when you leave the walkways).
Random stuff: Don't think the shuk is limited to food. Scattered around the marketplace you will find clothing, pots and pans, electronics, paper plates, a couple places that develop film, and even a recently opened cafe smack in the middle of the stalls.
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