Connecting a community with cuisine
Artwork by Nawar Alkhaleel, an artist who relocated to Canada in January 2020 with her partner, a TBB candidate, and young son.
Talent Beyond Boundaries has released a free cookbook showcasing recipes from TBB Alumni, staff and volunteers around the world.
We all need food. It is a necessity for a healthy existence. Eating the same food, daily, becomes boring and it is more fun to be creative in the kitchen if you can. With an opportunity to diversify, food lovers are eager to try new ingredients and dishes. Often we love to visit new restaurants or cook from recipes that are foreign to us, to be able to try something unique. In a way these experiences can provide a mini holiday, a journey to somewhere else, via the cuisine.
Immigrants and refugees find that food preparation can be a way for providing comfort to themselves or others. Comfort food in this way is a positive, it is the journey back to family, the expression of sentimentality for home as we remember it. The familiar aroma and taste of ingredients and meals elicit memories of where we first enjoyed them. It conjures up a visual of who we shared those dishes with and the fundamental pleasure of cooking and eating ‘comfort’ foods.
As Marina Brizar, TBB’s UK Director, says:
“As someone who is far from home, making my mum’s food is a connection to home and a continuation of tradition, across not only borders but generations.”
As an avid foodie and someone who loves to cook, Marina decided it would be wonderful to create an e-cookbook to celebrate the diversity of those who work for and are helped by TBB. She believes, as many of us do, that sharing our food and our recipes is a beautiful way to transcend boundaries.
The cookbook idea simmered away, but as with all things Marina chooses to take in hand, this idea was swiftly whisked into an action plan and a small team engaged with equal enthusiasm.
Naturally, it takes a community to pull together recipes and ideas and formulate them into a usable and shareable form. The TBB community responded with gusto as recipes came in from refugees and staff alike.
Why share recipes? The community of people who come together to share their favourite dishes are also sharing their story. We may not all have the same language, or be in a position to come physically together to understand each other through giving and receiving. What we can do is a communal act of storytelling via the sharing of our favourite dishes.
As Chris Ying, co-founder of the now defunct Lucky Peach magazine, states
“Deliciousness is an undeniable benefit of immigration.”
Many refugees and migrants find themselves caught in the world of food at some stage. It may be seeking out familiar ingredients, it may be a hospitality job they can hold whilst sorting out life, it may be connecting over a simple co-created meal. As people move and mingle with others they bring techniques, new ingredients and ideas for cooking with them. This exchange is a way of enriching household cooking for each new home that tries it.
Marina and two student volunteers, Hannah and Hannah, pulled together the gifting of global recipes and ideas from a melting pot of cultures. Cooking up the recipes to check that they worked, whilst in a UK lockdown, brought the small team closer to their global community. With a solid appetite for success the team whipped and whisked, chopped and sautéed, before blending all the ideas into a pretty e-cookbook delivered pre Christmas 2020.
Flipping through the recipes is mouthwatering and stirs the inevitable desire to don an apron and collect ingredients.
The meals stretch from Syria, to Iraq, to Palestine, China, Canada, Australia and Northern India. There are hints of cardamom, rose water, semolina, pine-nuts, paprika, bulghar and za’atar sprinkled throughout. Snapshots of different places with a celebration of diversity hidden in a list of ingredients.
Tarek and Sheyma are Middle Eastern contributors. During Covid restrictions they taught themselves some new recipes. They have shared one for Dawoud Basha, a meaty middle eastern meal, now a firm household favourite. They write,
“We believe that food was created to make humanity happy, and the secret to making a delicious dish is love.”
Noura, TBB’s Middle East Director, shares her recipe for Atayef. It evokes memories of cooking with her Mum and Nana in both Syria and the USA. The love for this dessert is expansive and recipes for it existed in books over 1000 years ago. When Noura made a batch to check her recipe, she noted, “my mom and I were cracking up as family and friends suddenly emerged from all corners of the house as its aroma spread - it never ceases to bring everyone together. :-)”
This beautiful yet simple book of TBB shared recipes presents soul food, dishes that are reminiscent of home countries, plus memories of cooking with loved ones.
The cover was painted by Nawar Alkhaleel, an incredibly talented artist from Syria who now resides in the USA. The passion of each contributor is gently folded along with their instructions into this cooking guide. Cooking and sharing these recipes and meals, creates an entree for deeper understanding of cultural diversity.
This cookbook is a celebration of how food connects us to others we don’t yet know, whilst reminding us of family who may now be distant.
