Cooking for world peace

America is in conflict with a number of countries —- Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, North Korea, Myanmar, Cuba, Syria and so on — but most Americans know very little about these places. Two artists in Pittsburgh are now trying to change this.

Jon Rubin and Dawn Weleski have created the Conflict Kitchen, a restaurant that serves food from countries with which the United States is in conflict. In addition to preparing exotic sandwiches, the restaurant organizes events, performances and discussions.

During the summer, the Conflict Kitchen was devoted to an Iranian theme, serving kubideh sandwiches: sesame bread with spiced ground beef, fresh basil, mint and onion. The restaurant also held a teleconferenced meal: diners in Pittsburgh and their counterparts in Tehran ate the same food while they talked via webcams.

In November, the theme changed to Afghanistan. Customers are now served turnovers filled with pumpkin, spinach, lentils, or potatoes and leeks. Each sandwich comes in a printed wrapper containing background information and opinion on Afghanistan's cuisine, culture and political situation.

The kitchen is open for lunch every day and late at night on weekends. It's located in Pittsburgh's East Liberty neighbourhood, at the corner of Highland Avenue and Baum Boulevard.

Pittsburgh is already a very multicultural city, with a large student population and residents descended from dozens of ethnic groups. If you can't get there, you can reflect on the world's problems over your own dinner by reading Chris Fair's Cuisines of the Axis of Evil and Other Irritating States: A Dinner Party Approach to International Relations, and Gill Partington's The Axis of Evil Cookbook, both published in 2008.