Ahmad Basal

The smell of freshly made caramel, choco­late and sug­ared nuts greets you as you enter Palmira, a Syr­ian pas­try shop lo­cated in car­rer Ballester­ies in the Old Quar­ter of Girona. This unique en­ter­prise is run by two friends, Soumaya Waez and Ahmad Basal. The lat­ter, a Syr­ian refugee, was forced to leave his fam­ily while flee­ing the war and spent 45 days trav­el­ling through nine dif­fer­ent coun­tries until he fi­nally ar­rived in Salt. There he found a friend, who he had first met in Greece and who promised to help him ac­com­plish one of his dreams and open his own bak­ery.

Ahmad takes care of the prac­ti­cal side of things while Soumaya helps him run the busi­ness. The shop is one of a kind among pas­try shops in Girona be­cause it sells Syr­ian pas­tries, from Baraze to Knafe. Its other key dif­fer­en­tial el­e­ment is that it sells all sorts of sweet­breads from the Mid­dle East.

Com­ing from a long line of bak­ers, Ahmad grew up sur­rounded by all man­ner of in­gre­di­ents used in pas­try-mak­ing. Even so, his in­ten­tion was al­ways to study law, some­thing he hasn’t yet had the op­por­tu­nity to do due to var­i­ous cir­cum­stances and then the out­break of war.

Now that the bak­ery is suc­cess­fully es­tab­lished in the area, hav­ing been in busi­ness for around a year, Ahmad feels he has at least been able to ac­com­plish one of his dreams. Ever for­ward-look­ing, the young en­tre­pre­neur is now ready to ex­pand the busi­ness by open­ing a new sta­b­lish­ment in Barcelona. But be­fore he can do that he will have to get per­mis­sion for his brother to come and join him from home.

1. Knafe: Typ­i­cal Syr­ian pas­tries filled with pis­ta­chio.

2. Bag of pis­ta­chios: One of the main in­gre­di­ents.

3. Palmira’s gift boxes: Such del­i­ca­cies de­serve to be wrapped in style.

4. “Stained glass”: Mixed nuts on pas­try.

5. Cop­per trays: Bought in from Turkey.

6. Rolling pin: This one is spe­cial for rolling out the dough.

7. Colo­nial del­i­ca­cies: Syr­ian desserts from the French colo­nial era.

8. Pho­to­graph of Palmyra: The photo shows the now-ru­ined tem­ple of the city of Palmyra, the place the bak­ery takes its name from.

9. Baraze: Bis­cuits cov­ered in sesame seeds.

10. King’s crowns: Spe­cial filled dessert de­lights with sug­ared pis­ta­chios on top.

11. Scale: Used to de­ter­mine the weight and price of the boxes and pas­tries.

12. Uni­form: A pro­fes­sional from head to toe.