Now you can get Palestinian breakfast sandwiches in Toronto

Mohammed Alkurd, the owner of Makann, a new Palestinian breakfast counter in the Annex, took a roundabout journey to his current career as a sandwich artist. “I was born in Gaza. I moved to the US in 2018, where I received a master’s in special education,” he says. “Since graduating, I’ve been working as a curriculum developer.”

Since 2023, Alkurd has been living and working in Toronto, but a few months ago, he decided it was time for a change. “A big project I’d been working on ended last August. I hadn’t taken any real time off in about a decade, so I took a break and reassessed my life,” he says.

Related: Toronto is getting its very own Eggslut

He planned to open a Palestinian-inspired café. Alkurd didn’t have any experience in the food service industry, but he saw a gap in Toronto’s breakfast scene. There’s no shortage of grab-and-go spots selling breakfast sandwiches, but nowhere was offering the kind he knew from back home: freshly baked Palestinian flatbread stuffed with traditional spreads and fillings.

“Every kid in Gaza knows how to make flatbread,” says Alkurd. “They learn from their aunts, their mothers, their grandmothers, their friends.” Alkurd keeps his recipe simple: flour, olive oil, yeast and yogurt. “Getting the balance right was tricky, but eventually I landed on the consistency I wanted—something sturdy enough for sandwiches, but still soft.”

While the daily baked flatbread is the star, the toppings—vegetables, egg, home fries, labneh, cheese, za’atar—form a tight, thoughtful roster of sandwiches. “Back home, we don’t eat flatbread this way—it’s much more austere, with just za’atar or just cheese. We don’t do big sandwiches like North Americans,” he says. “I really wanted to do that here.”

Related: The viral 7-Eleven Japanese egg sandwich is coming to Canada

Alkurd plans to keep his core menu items firmly in place. The foole and egg sandwich, for instance, layered with fava bean paste, egg, home fries, tangy sumac onions and a signature special sauce, isn’t going anywhere. But he’s also eyeing limited-time specials, like a homemade hummus and egg sandwich or a sweet summer flatbread spread with pistachio and labneh.

For now, the limitations of his one-man operation (which has already had to double production to keep up with demand) is keeping Alkurd’s ambitions modest. “I’m happy just running a place where people can grab a great sandwich and come back again and again,” he says. “I don’t have time to think about what’s next. But, right now, this fun and hectic way of life makes me glad I took the leap.”