With the Liwa Date Festival due to kick off this week in Al Gharbia in the Western Region of Abu Dhabi, we’ve been out and about exploring yet another Emirati tradition – this time focusing on the history of honey trading in Abu Dhabi.

A resident of the UAE for a number of years now, we had no idea that so many different types of honey were available here in Abu Dhabi or that several homegrown varieties existed. Indeed, there are bees buzzing around the districts of Al Mushriff and Sweihan as we speak, gathering the pollen needed to create a delicious variety of Sidr honey (on sale at Mazaraa’s organic food store) – a pot of which is sat open on our desk as we write this.

We’ve had a long love affair with this sweet, sticky substance, since watching Disney’s Winnie the Pooh. We can remember our mother getting rather frustrated that we insisted on eating it in true Pooh-style, using our fingers to clean the inside of the jar (we still haven’t grown out of this habit as we now have a decidedly sticky keyboard).

We digress. Back to the date festival.

This year promises to be bigger and better than last year, with yet more cultural displays, traditional handicrafts and locally made wares on display at the Festival’s popular market.

We’re particularly looking forward to the new cooking competition included in the festival’s programme this year. We always get given lots of dates around this time of year, and end up with far too many to eat by ourselves so we can’t wait to get a few recipes that we might be able to share with friends and colleagues.

See our news feature in this week’s issue for a more detailed outline of what’s hot at this year’s festival (and a map of how to find it).

Megan Wynes