Abdul Fattah

Abdul has been making his delectable baklavas and other middle eastern sweets for the past twenty years.

It all began when he wanted to start out on his own shop after having moved away from his family's business of baking breads. He learned to make baklavas from one of the best baklava chefs in his Syrian hometown.

Abdul became so good at it that he started his own baklava shop. That one shop turned into two and soon people were coming from other towns just to buy his sweets.

Then war and politics changed everything, but Abdul wasn't going to give up. He had to move to Jordan with almost nothing and once settled down, he started making his sweets again.

Soon he managed to get some investments to start a baklava shop in Jordan. By this time his eldest son, Mahmud started helping him too.

Mahmud, though only nine at that time, picked up the art of making these delicate sweets fast. He could help his father turn the paper thin filo pastry, made from scratch, into the wrinkled wonders that are lovingly called "grandma's bracelets".

In 2016 Abdul had the opportunity to move to Canada and he came to PEI with his family. He fell in love with this beautiful little island and the friendly locals around him. He learned to speak English and fulfilled his dream of going back to making his famous baklavas again.

Everyone kept asking, "would people like baklavas here?". He didn't know!  

Maybe people so far away from the middle east will not like these sweets, he thought. This uncertainty kept him from starting to make the sweets, until the PEI Newcomers Association introduced him to Tenchef!

With Tenchef he could just make a small batch of baklavas without risking too much. This allows him to find out if the people in this distant shore would find the same joy that he finds in his baklavas.

So his adventure begins once again!