An Egyptian Presses Asab in Düsseldorf and Germans Think It's Bamboo

An Egyptian has brought asab to Germany, and the Germans think it's bamboo.

On Königsallee, Düsseldorf's most expensive shopping street, past the designer storefronts and the gallery openings, Karim Aly feeds sugarcane stalks into a metal press. Passersby slow down, squint at the stalks, and try to work out what they're looking at.

The business is called TamTam Farm to Hand, and it exists because Aly missed home.

Sugarcane juice sits in the memory of half the world. Mention it to anyone from Egypt, India, Vietnam, Brazil or across Africa and you'll usually get a story back. Aly, who has lived in Düsseldorf for the better part of a decade, noticed nobody in Germany was selling it fresh.

"Fresh sugarcane juice was practically nonexistent in Germany. I could only find canned versions in Asian supermarkets, but they could not compare to the fresh sugarcane juice we know from Egypt," he tells SceneEats.

The gap between canned and fresh here is roughly the gap between a carton of orange juice and an orange squeezed into your glass.

The cane is cut fresh and airfreighted to Düsseldorf within a week, and Aly inspects every batch himself.

"In summer, heat damage is likely to happen during transportation, and all products of poor quality are thrown away," he says. "I'd rather throw away a portion of the product that doesn't meet my standards."

Putting the machine out in the open was deliberate. Aly positioned it so the whole process is visible from the street: cane goes in, juice comes out, lemons and oranges get squeezed on the spot. Anyone who has stood at an asab stall in Cairo knows the theatre of it.

"For many Germans, sugarcane stalks look either like bamboo or just wood," he says. "Moreover, most of them hadn't seen this fresh sugarcane juice prepared right here."

The menu has grown well past the classic, shaped mostly by the customers, and it has turned into a rough map of how the world drinks the same thing differently.

"Indian customers often prefer sugarcane juice with ginger, sometimes with lemon as well. Some also add a pinch of Himalayan salt, which creates a unique balance of sweet, salty, and refreshing flavours," Aly says.

"Vietnamese customers usually drink it plain or with a little lemon. Brazilian customers often enjoy it either on its own or with lemon. Many African customers prefer pure sugarcane juice, while Moroccan customers often choose sugarcane with lemon. Egyptians consume it in a classic form."

The bestseller caught him off guard. It's the TamTam Juice, sugarcane with passion fruit, lemon and orange, served in a bottle shaped like a sugarcane stalk that took on a life of its own online.

"When I first created it, I thought customers would mainly choose the classic sugarcane options," he says.

TamTam has since secured a second spot on Königsallee, with Cologne and Bonn next.