St. Sharbel Maronite Catholic Mission will host its sixth annual Lebanese Festival on Sunday, July 28, at St. John the Baptist just southeast of Union Grove. The festival will begin following the noon Mass and concludes at 8 p.m. There is no admission charge.
The festival features an all-Lebanese menu, which includes a variety of dishes such as beef shawarma; marinated beef strips on a skewer cooked on site and served with tahini sauce and a fresh garnish of parsley, tomatoes, pickles and lettuce; and shish tawook, which is marinated chicken breast pieces on skewers grilled on-site and served with garlic sauce.
According to Vera Maalouf, St. Sharbel’s Mission Coordinator, she and the church ladies will prepare the shish tawook together.
“About 300 pounds of chicken breasts will be prepared,” she said. “Our most traditional tabouleh salad will be served with a platter of chicken or the beef shawarma. We will also have hummus available, as well as fresh falafel, which will be prepared by one of our parishioners who has had a falafel stand at the (Bristol) Renaissance Faire for many years. We cook it on-site and serve it on a plate or in a sandwich. It is delicious.”
For dessert, St. Sharbel will offer several delicacies such as baklava, a flakey pastry with sugar syrup on top; nammoura, an eggless semolina coconut cake drizzled with sugar syrup; and other Lebanese sweets.
In addition to food, the festival will feature Lebanese musicians Doris Farhat, Shadi Keys and Marie-Joe Noon.
“Doris Farhat is a famous Lebanese singer in the United States. She entertains at Lebanese and Arab festivals across the country and is a very dedicated member of our church,” said Maalouf. “Shadi Keys is her band lead. He is a phenomenal keyboardist. Marie-Joe Noon is a new parishioner with us and has a beautiful voice. She has done some professional singing. Doris will sing in Arabic and Marie-Joe in English. I love both of them.”
The St. Sharbel Festival is popular with the approximately 75 members of the mission as well as with the regular visitors who attend the liturgy and healing Mass on the 22nd of each month. Last year, festival attendance hit 1,000, and they expect many more this year as they received positive feedback from the local community.
St. John the Baptist is located at 1501 172nd Ave., Union Grove. For more information, call 805-402-5060.
