When I spoke to the founder of one of Alabama’s most renowned halal food trucks, he apologized for not being able to give our conversation his full attention: he was in the middle of making strawberry barbecue sauce to pair with lamb ribs. Ashurah Ali Mustaqeem carefully curates his rolling menu—including curried oxtails, Caribbean jerk chicken, and agave-glazed fried chicken and waffles—so every item registers as bold, boundary-pushing, and deeply rooted in the cultural fusion of Alabama’s Southern and Muslim communities.
Mustaqeem’s work is part of a culinary movement taking root across Alabama: halal meat, prepared in accordance with the state’s palate.
Lamb ribs are one of Ashurah Ali Mustaqeem’s best sellers/ Provided
While Muslims have lived in the South since seventeenth-century human traffickers kidnapped and enslaved people from Islamic areas of Africa, few were able to practice their religion openly until the 1960s, a decade during which the U.S. made legal progress toward racial equality and changed its immigration law. Alabama’s Muslim population has since grown significantly, with tens of thousands of Muslims living in the state. During the 15 years I’ve lived in Birmingham, I’ve watched my fellow Muslims shift from a small, othered group to a vibrant community.
Although Muslims remain a religious minority in Alabama, so many eaters statewide follow Islamic dietary laws that there’s now demand not just for halal meat, but Zabiha halal meat— meat that is slaughtered by a Muslim under specific requirements. That’s Mustaqeem’s preference: The slogan on his logo declares, “Not just Halal, but Zabiha!”
Mustaqeem, a long-time friend of my dad by way of the African American Muslim community in Alabama, has thus far had trouble locally sourcing lamb ribs in the quantity he requires. This is in part because Alabama farmers are apt to send their Zabiha output straight to Detroit, home to the nation’s largest concentration of Arab Americans. Consequently, he often buys meat from trusted Michigan-based suppliers. But he hopes if he keeps educating people about Zabiha practices, the cuts he seeks will become more widely available in Birmingham and beyond.
Zabiha and halal are often used interchangeably; in fact, even within the Muslim community there is often confusion about what each word means. Halal, which translates to “permissible,” alludes to meat that is allowed to be eaten: non-pork products, seafood, and meat from animals that were generally treated well before slaughter.
Zabiha is more specific, connoting the slaughter of the animal with certain specifications: saying Allah’s name, cutting the throat in one swift motion with a sharp knife, and ensuring other animals do not see this process—all of which must be done by an adult Muslim.
Mar-Jac Poultry in Birmingham is no stranger to Zabiha. The vertically integrated company, responsible for roughly 5% of the nation’s halal poultry meat, has its own feed mills to produce completely halal feed.
According to Mar-Jac chief financial officer Tanveer Papa, most producers use feed made with “lard, because it’s much cheaper.” By contrast, Mar-Jac’s feed is bound by locally purchased vegetable fat or halal poultry fat.
Papa notes that Mar-Jac Poultry is the only poultry company that has an all-Muslim crew on its slaughterhouse floor. While other companies employ just one Muslim to say the required blessing during mechanical processing, every back-up killer at Mar-Jac is qualified for the job.
“They are reciting Bismillah (In the Name of God) and Allahu Akbar (God is Great) on every bird as much as possible throughout the process,” Papa explained.
For my mom’s friend Kirin Nabi, a longtime resident of Hoover, Alabama, the choice to embrace Zabiha halal represented the nexus of her personal commitment and the community’s growth. Kirin, a librarian at heart, was at a halaqah, or study circle, where they explained the slaughtering process and what it truly means to eat Zabiha. Right then, she made a sincere effort to align her food choices with Islamic principles.
“It is such a privilege that we have these options, and I wanted to honor that,” she said of greater Birmingham, where about half of Alabama’s Muslims live. “There are probably six halal meat shop options in Hoover.”
I have fond memories of visiting those grocers, often owned by some close friend’s father or uncle. When I accompanied my mom on trips to buy chicken breast for shawarma, whoever was behind the counter would typically give me a date or piece of Arabic gummy candy before we left.
But Kirin doesn’t confine her shopping to independent butcher shops. Her go-to grocery is Restaurant Depot, also a favorite of Mustaqeem’s. Kirin says, “We get everything there—chicken tenders, hamburgers, meatballs, even gyro strips and turkey pastrami.”
Elsewhere, Kirin describes the process of verifying halal options as routine.
“I’ll just talk to the manager and say, ‘Hey, where’s your chicken from today?’” Even in Alabama, the question doesn’t faze the places she calls, ranging from Zaxby’s to KFC. Sometimes they’ll check the freezer and confirm it’s fresh from Mar-Jac.
“If it’s a priority, you’ll make it work,” she says, decades after choosing Zabiha halal.
Mustaqeem converted to Islam about 30 years ago.
“As an African American man from the streets, when I became Muslim, I found that it was kind of difficult for me; not cooking pork,” he said of the inspiration for reimagining soul food staples to align with Islamic dietary restrictions.
Three years ago, Mustaqeem launched Alabama Ali. His vision for halal accessibility involved bringing diverse people together through food. “I wanted to create a space where all creeds and cultures could gather,” he says.
Mustaqeem drives his food truck around the South/ Provided
In keeping with his mission, Mustaqeem looked into kosher practices to reach an even wider Abrahamic audience. He’s also had non-Muslim customers say they appreciate the humane treatment of animals in Zabiha slaughtering practices.
Mustaqeem’s signature dishes are an innovative blend of Afro-Caribbean flavors and stateside comfort. He incorporates spices and flavors that acknowledge the diversity of Muslim communities in the American South; his menu includes Obono okra stew from Africa, gyro with Indian spices, and Nigerian-Mediterranean akira falafel.
“When I design a menu, I design it for the people that I’m dealing with,” he says. “I try to lock in on the consciousness of the people, and when they’re not conscious, I try to educate them.”
Ashurah Ali Mustaqeem is the chef-owner of Alabama Ali/ Provided
“We use everybody’s spices,” he says. The Alabama Ali food truck is stocked with cardamom, fennel seed, cinnamon, clove, allspice, and pomegranate. They use sunflower butter because of people’s allergies, and palm oil for African-styled recipes. The Maafe, or peanut stew, is West African, but Mustaqeem uses vegetables more commonly consumed by Americans, such as potatoes, carrots, and Brussels sprouts. When he cooks Italian, it has a twist, like jerk Alfredo.
When he cooks for people from Pakistan, for example, he pays special attention to the spice. “You got to have some heat in there, so I get the finest. I use Scotch bonnet rather than the regular pepper,” he says, “but I would keep the same kind of pepper that they love, and I’d make a chutney out of it, or some kind of relish.” When he makes hot dogs or sausages from scratch, he’ll make masala sausage for a South Asian crowd.
Still, nothing beats the lamb ribs, which have garnered a cult following. At a halal festival in Atlanta, he sold 500 pounds of them—carefully sourced all—in just two hours.
Juwayriah Wright is an editorial producer and contributor for TIME Magazine. She’s covered Ramadan and activism, Muslim life in America, Syria, the polio crisis in Gaza, and other atrocities affecting the Middle East.
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