From The Guardian
An excerpt:
Last Ramadan, I couldn't find a halal sausage for love or money. I scoured the specialist butchers, peered into supermarket chiller cabinets and visited practically every purveyor of Islamic meats in the city, to no avail. During my quest for artery-clogging bangers filled with Islamically acceptable meats such as chicken, lamb or beef, it suddenly dawned on me what was to blame for my sausageless situation: assimilation.
While the media is full of cries that immigrants and their offspring are resisting taking on English values, I know better. Assimilation is happening at unprecedented levels.
Saleem Ahmed, 47, who owns the Food Asia supermarket in Bradford, confesses his need to start his fast with a big greasy plateful. He also confirms my fears about the Great Sausage Rush of 2005. "Things are changing a lot," he says. "Last year we ran out of sausages, but we've been maintaining stock this year. There are more halal manufacturers coming on for things like pies, sausages and burgers, and they seem to have cottoned on to what people want during Ramadan. In the evening, people want to [break] their fast with Asian foods, samosas, pakoras and things like that, but in the morning it seems they want a traditional English breakfast with beans on toast and such things.
"But I'll tell you what people really want this year," he says, leading me to a crammed freezer. "Stone-baked pizzas! It's the strangest thing."
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