About Jackie

 
 Jacqueline Hamati (Jackie) is originally from a village in Lebanon called Hamat. She was born in Jordan of a Jordanian father and a Palestinian mother. Got her K-12 education there. At age 18, she got married and moved to Bethlehem-Palestine, where she had four beautiful children. She became a stay-at-home mother to raise her children with her husband while being away from her parents and siblings. After her kids grew-up she took training courses in communications and management in Tel-Aviv, Jerusalem and Bethlehem University and established a computer company with her husband, George. She was the owner, Human Resource Manager, Executive Director, and Marketing Manager. She worked hard for six years. According to Bethlehem University’s yearly surveys, her company ranked # 1 for 5 years in a row in customer service, best prices, quality and after sales service.

In 2001, the second Intifada started in Palestine, and the family had to move to Jordan to seek peace for the children. She worked there as an accountant for Terra Sancta College for nine years, but couldn’t stay longer since she was the only Jordanian member in the family and couldn’t give Jordanian nationality to her family.

A must decision was made to move to the United States for better education and employment opportunities for the children. The immigration papers took 4 years until the family was able to move to the US! In 2008, only one year before they moved, her younger daughter Julie got married, and in 2009, only one month before the relocated, Jessica got married! Jessica and Julie got their education in Jordan University. Today, Jessica, is a very successful school principal in Jericho-Palestine. She has two boys and a girl. Julie is a teacher and established her own business, Julie’s Letter Design, and she is a mother of three boys. The boys, Jacob and Rajai moved in with the parents. Jacob graduated from Temple University, majored in Finance and Raja’i still has one year to get his master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Drexel University. 

 

When Jackie first arrived to Pennsylvania, she decided to go back to school. She went to Temple University and got a degree in Human Resource Management. She got a high GPA, and was the ceremony speaker. A mother of four kids and three grandchildren at that time, in 2016.

She worked as a Job Developer for less than one year when she decided that she doesn’t want a permanent job to prevent her from seeing her family in Jordan. In 2018 she moved to California. Now she is the VP HR for her family business United Language Services. She works from home. Travel once or twice a year just to stay with the family and mainly the grandkids! She takes her laptop with her and work from any part of the world.

She was always passionate about the Middle Eastern food, and the she was the best cook as her family and friends testimony. She was raised in Jordan. The country of hospitality and generosity. The place that when you visit, you’ll hear “ahlan wa sahlan”— which means “welcome” — all the time.  Jackie brought this to her guests to LA to enjoy.

Her career as a Chef inspired by her origins and her love and appreciation for taste, quality and tradition. After 35 years of experience cooking authentic, traditional and savory meals, she sought even more opportunities to further develop her creativity. Since she is passionate about food, teaching it, cooking it, and sharing it, now she cater events, teaches cooking and baking classes and welcome her guests into her Home Restaurant for authentic Middle Eastern dishes in LA. Her cozy home is in the heart of LA. It has a garden that reminds her of back home.

Jackie has infused original Mid-Eastern flavors from her travels to Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Qatar, Dubai, Syria, Egypt and more.

She’s also a previous owner of a food truck in LA. She loves to eat fresh meals, drink wine, gather with friends, laugh and live her life up.

Anytime her guests feel like they have a special meal in mind, they contact Jackie and she arranges to cook it for them. She’s so excited to share with you the spices she mixes for her cooking! To her, Cooking is Relaxing.