Amena Brown:
Welcome y'all back to another episode of HER With Amena Brown. And those of you that have been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that I always talk about how when we are gathered here listening to the podcast, we are in our HER living room. But in my house, my living room is actually an open room that opens into the kitchen. And with today's guest, I feel like we're in our HER living room and we are also adjacent to the kitchen. So, I'm so excited to have all of the conversation. Palestinian author and writer, whose work has won awards from James Beard in PR and the Guild of Food Writers, I want you to welcome author of The Palestinian Table, and her latest book, The Arabesque Table, Reem Kassis.
Reem Kassis:
Thank you, Amena.
Amena Brown:
Oh, my gosh, Reem. First of all, let me tell y'all that are listening here that Reem and I have a mutual friend who has regaled me with your amazingness for a long time, Reem, actually. Our friend, Lyric, shout out to Lyric, she is a fantastic culture and food journalist, a photographer, writer. She's amazing. And she and I also just love to talk food.
Reem Kassis:
She and I love to eat food.
Amena Brown:
Okay. It's like a bonding in our friendship that we're just always discussing what we're eating. And so, she had told me about you and your work a while ago, and then when she reached out, like, "Hey, Reem's book is coming out." And as soon as she started talking, I was like, "Yes, whatever you're about to say, yes. Do I want to interview Reem? Yes.
Reem Kassis:
She knows the most amazing people, and she told me about you as well. She's been talking about you for a while, and she's like, "I have this friend, do you want to be on her podcast?" And I was like, "Absolutely. I mean, I don't even need to know anything else. If you recommend her, it's 100%. So, I guess we were both on the same page there.
Amena Brown:
Completely meant to be. And I'm just, y'all, first of all, I have to tell you, podcasting is, it's a limited situation because there's no way for Reem and I to talk and show you how beautiful Reem's books are. I mean, gorgeous. Okay. It is a wonderful combination of this writing, and the recipes are there, and the images are just gorgeous. So, even having looked at the images, I'm like, I really wish that it was not a pandemic, that I could be in the kitchen with you, Reem. I also want to just speak out here and to the listeners that I know there are executives who work in television listening to this podcast, and you need to go ahead and make a TV show of Reem Kassis. So, I'm just talking out here, and I need you to do it, and mainly selfishly so that I can be a guest.
Reem Kassis:
So I can finally cook for you in person.
Amena Brown:
Okay. I'm going to be there messing up everything, eating all of it. I want to talk about some of the themes in your work, and I just really identified with a lot of those themes, and I want to talk also about your latest book, because I want people to get a chance to hear a bit about the inspiration behind it. I really identify with the fact that you wrote your first book, and then you were like, "That might be it."
Reem Kassis:
Yeah, pretty much.
Amena Brown:
You were like, "I don't know if this is coming back." So, I want to start with that. Can you talk about what was your journey into book writing? Did you see yourself ever getting into that? Were you, I'm using the air quotes here, dragged, kicking and screaming? Were there other people in your life that were like, "Reem, we would love for you to write more, share these stories more"? I mean, how did that become a part of the food journey, the writing?
Reem Kassis:
It's interesting because, for those who don't know me, my background was not in writing or in food at all. I did grow up in a literary family, if you will. My grandfather was a children's author, and he was very well recognized back home. So, those always felt like big shoes to fill. I loved reading, I loved writing, but it was not something I thought I would pursue professionally. And then I went to undergrad in the U.S., I got my MBA, I worked in consulting, and it wasn't until my first daughter was born, and I was on maternity leave for a year because London's amazing like that, and that's where we were living at the time, that I started working on this book.
Reem Kassis:
And it actually didn't start out as a book, it started out as my desire to put together my family's recipes and stories in a medium that she could have with her wherever she went in the world. And I think when I saw them all come together, I realized, "Okay, these are my family's recipes, they're stories, but taken together as a whole, they could be the story of any Palestinian family. And it's a story that is most often not heard and very different to the one we're used to, and I felt a sense of responsibility to share that with the world. And that's how that first book came to be in a very simplistic way.
Reem Kassis:
Obviously, the journey was a lot messier than it sounds in hindsight, but that's why I always said I thought it would be my first and last book because it wasn't something that I jumped into with the idea that I'm going to turn this into a career. And then once the book came out, obviously, I did interviews, and podcasts, and people would ask questions like, "What is the difference between Palestinian cuisine and Lebanese or Syrian?" And I started digging into this whole idea of food history, and I was shocked at what I realized, which is that the lens through which we look at cuisine is very distorted because it only looks back in the range of 100 to 200 years. But cuisine is so much older than that. The very idea of national cuisine is a relatively recent construct.
Reem Kassis:
So, with this new book, I wanted to grasp in a way or showcase what a modern Arab table looks like. What do we eat at home today as Palestinians who live abroad, who have access to certain ingredients but not others, who have friends from one part of the world and another? And at the same time, I realized, if I want to show that with integrity, I have to trace the history of these dishes. And that's where the idea for this book came from and how it evolved into the one that you see today.
Amena Brown:
Reem, you voiced just now something that really meant a lot to me in your work, that you didn't want your writing to be disconnected from history. And I just think that's so powerful. And I mean, also, I am a person that's very inspired by old things, but I think a part of it is because, to me, it feels hard to make or write or capture, if I'm not also aware, or bringing into this space. This is not a new thing we're doing. Even if we are here now, where there are these types of appliances or these ways our homes may be set up now, we are doing a thing that has historically been done as well. And I love that connection.
Reem Kassis:
I mean, cuisine in general, I mean, it's also, it runs so deep. And if you look at its past, it is very cross-cultural, it is very integrated, right? You learn from other people. Your circumstances, occupations, wars, empires, they influence it. So, knowing your history and cherishing it is not mutually exclusive with evolving and changing. And I guess that was the point I was trying to get across because you see so many people who will cook a certain dish and either attribute it to one cuisine or completely forget to attribute it to a certain cuisine as if recognizing the history detract from the beauty of what we have today. And I think it's the opposite.
Reem Kassis:
Seeing how much something has changed, and understanding its rich past makes us appreciate it all the more, even if that pass is not always a pleasant one, which, in many cases, it's not.
Amena Brown:
Right, right. I think the other thing that I want to talk to you about also in the idea of how, especially when we're talking about food, and we can't talk about culture without talking about food, and then we can't talk about food without talking about culture, I mean, they're just so interconnected that way, but when we're talking about food and culture interlinked together, I think in particular, and I don't know if this is an American thing, a West thing, a colonization thing. I just don't know. But I'm going to bring it up here because I'm interested to hear your thoughts about this. Even for me, I love to cook, but I'm a home cook. I love to say, "I might make ugly food, but it still tastes amazing." I don't really plate.
Reem Kassis:
I don't either.
Amena Brown:
I'm just like, "Here is everything. It's delicious. I don't know what it looks like, but it's here."
Reem Kassis:
Tastes good.
Amena Brown:
Exactly. And as I've grown as a home cook, and sometimes have desire to cook things from other countries or other cultures, I've noticed how it can sometimes take a little more digging to get to the writers and chefs that are actually native to that culture, or are native to that country where you're actually getting to hear from them how we make this, what is the history of this? That there are other sites, I won't name their names here, but other sites that exist there, that you're like, "Oh, I'm going to find this particular dish." And then you get there, and it's somebody, wherever they live, in the middle of wherever, and they're like, "Here's how I make this."
Amena Brown:
And then when you actually read that from a writer that's writing about what they ate of this in their family of origin home, or growing up in their mother, aunt's, grandmother's kitchen, and I think that is also really integral to your work and why I am so glad your voice exists, because we want to hear about this from you. We don't want to hear about it from someone who, this is not home, this is not family to them. Why do you think that's important for writers like yourself to share these stories from your own upbringing, your own cultural experience?
Reem Kassis:
I think it's a couple of things. I mean, for starters, you can't divorce food from culture, because so much of it is dependent on the context. So many of the dishes that I will talk about, it's not just a sum of the ingredients and the way that the dish tastes or it looks like, it's also what it signifies. What occasions is it eaten on? What history does it tell? How did it change over time? There are dishes now, which I talk about in the book, made with rice. But traditionally, my grandfather tells me, they were so poor that rice was something reserved for the wealthy. They only ate bulgur grains.
Reem Kassis:
And someone coming from outside the culture trying to tell you a certain story about a dish, he might cover or she might cover just the way that dish is cooked today, and forget all that history that brought it to the point that we're seeing. But also, other than that, I mean, what I notice sometimes is, you look at a certain dish, and you can bring 10 Palestinians, and each of us will tell you, "Oh, no, no, no, this is the way it's supposed to be made. And this is the way my mother makes it." And they're all right. There's nothing wrong with them. I always say this, especially about maqluba, which is considered one of the national dishes of Palestine, there are probably as many versions of it as there are families in the country, which is totally okay in my mind.
Reem Kassis:
And then I struggle sometimes, I think, "Well, what about if someone wants to convey that dish to the Western world, and that person is not Palestinian? Is that wrong? Or is that right?" I wish the answer was clear-cut black and white, it's wrong, it's right. I think if you're someone who has immersed yourself in that culture, if you are a non-Palestinian who has lived in the country, lived amongst its people, understood that culture, and you're doing it justice, I don't have a problem with that. Some people will disagree with me and they'll say, "No, you have absolutely no right." But then you start drawing a line where there's no creativity, and there's no interaction. And cuisine was not meant to be that way. It never was.
Reem Kassis:
The issue I have is when someone gives you a dish that does not, A, recognize the origin, is not even remotely close to what the people in the country eat. And then once you bring in the issue of profit, who's benefiting from it? And I'm not just talking financially, I'm talking publicity-wise, who's getting the recognition for it? If you're getting it at the expense of the people who have provided you with this, then we start to have an issue.
Amena Brown:
Yeah. Oof, that's such a great point. And even for people that might, to use the example you gave there, for people who might be non-Palestinian, that may want to share this such-and-such recipe, it's like, if you were immersed in the culture, if you have been immersed in a culture that isn't your own, then the hope would be that you even walk into whatever that page or writing space is with this sense of honor, which, to what you were talking about in your own writing process, that is still connected to history, that is still connected to the culture in which the food is rooted, which I think is so powerful and so beautiful.
Amena Brown:
I also want to talk about home, because that is this theme that comes up a lot in your work, and it's also a topic that fascinates me because I was a kid that moved around a lot growing up, and then before the pandemic anyway, I was traveling mostly, became a performing artist that traveled a lot. So, my sense of home is very... I mean, sometimes I look at it and think like it's fractured on some levels because it wasn't like I grew up in this home from being born until I got out of high school or something, and then went into my adulthood and made that place home, it was sort of like, all these different places became home to me. But I'm always interested in how we talk about home because there are so many different ways to define that, that sometimes that is a very specific place.
Amena Brown:
Like, I was actually talking with my sister the other day about how home is very specifically for me in my mother's house. And it's like, wherever my mother's house is, if it's down the street, if it's-
Reem Kassis:
That's home.
Amena Brown:
Wherever she is in her house, when I step across the threshold, I am at home. When you think of home, what are, could be one place for you, could be specific places, but what are the specific concrete places you think, "Oh, that feels like home to me"?
Reem Kassis:
It's interesting you say it's where your mom is, because for me, it's a combination of location, as well as people. My mother used to always say, "For me, home is where my kids are." My grandmother used to say the same thing. She would say, "Holidays are when my kids are together." So, there's a sense of home is where the people that you love and care most for are. With that said, I noticed, I live outside Philadelphia now with my husband and two daughters who I care about more than anything in the world, but I constantly feel uprooted. I don't feel home. And I think, in large part, and I talk to my husband about this all the time, I say like, "Where are the roots? Where is the family, the history that ties me to this place?" And it's not here.
Reem Kassis:
And if I go back to my paternal or maternal grandparents' villages, I grew up in Jerusalem. So, I didn't grow up in those villages. But I go there, my grandmother, my great-grandmother, her mother, everyone is rooted to that place. Everyone knows everyone. You are born and you die in that place. And I used to look at that, like, "Oh, my God, I want to get out. I want to see the world. This is so claustrophobic." And now that I've left and I've seen everything, I realize how much value there is in being in a place that can be traced so far back that gives you a sense of place and meaning.
Reem Kassis:
So, for me, the places that really mean home are the people. It's obviously my parents, my brother, and my husband, my kids, but when I'm back home in Jerusalem in particular, it's where I grew up, so, in the old city, that's associated with so many pleasant memories for me that it screams home when I go there, but then also the villages that my grandparents are from. They're very different. It's very rural, it's very communal, it's changed over the years. But when I'm there, I feel a sense of belonging that I don't always feel in other places. But then the flip side of that is having lived so long outside, I also feel like an outsider when I go home.
Reem Kassis:
And I'm constantly straddling this divide and it's not an easy place to live in. People look from the outside and think, "Oh, it's glamorous. You live in one place, you travel to another." But it's actually, it's almost a burden on some days.
Amena Brown:
Yeah. On a level, I'll say, I get that, not as much having the international elements of that, but having grown up visiting where my parents both grew up in North Carolina, that that was home for them. But because my grandmother was there, it felt like home to me. But of my mom's siblings, I think we moved around the most, my mom and my sister and I. So, we were always rotating around that. And there were times where we would come home and be with our, what would, I guess, be like second cousins. By the time, you get to like your second and third cousins. We had enough family in North Carolina that that's what it was like there. And feeling like, "Oh, my voice sounds very different."
Reem Kassis:
Right? The accent. Yes.
Amena Brown:
Right? From their voices. And I remember the town that my grandmother was from, and my parents both are from that same place, where they would go for fun to like this particular skating rink. And I was living in bigger cities with my mom by that time, where it's kind of like, "Oh, that's all you have, is this little skating rink? Oh." But to my cousins, it's like, that skating rink's everything, because that's where everybody of a certain age is going to have fun on a weekend. And those different aspects are so interesting to how we find home, hearing you talk about that, just this duality there of like, there is something about the air there, and the soil there that feels home to me.
Reem Kassis:
Absolutely.
Amena Brown:
But there is this element of like, "But this is not where I grew up, or I really went to school." Maybe one year, I went to school there living with my grandmother, but otherwise. I want to also ask, as we're talking about home, I want to talk about the kitchen. And I'm riveted by how there is this generation of womanhood in your writing, Reem, that it is you as a mother, to your daughters, the things that you want them to know, but it is you remembering yourself as a young girl in these kitchen moments with your mother, and your grandmothers, and so on. Can you talk about, what's the scene like in the kitchen with the other women in your family? Obviously, it's the place where like, is the food getting prepared? Is the food getting cooked? It is. Are other womanhood lessons happening there in the kitchen? And what were some of those that you remember, or that you experience now even with your own children?
Reem Kassis:
The experience is very different because I like to have my girls in the kitchen, and I like teaching them and talking to them. For my mother's generation and my grandmother's generation, it was, "Get out of the kitchen."
Amena Brown:
Really?
Reem Kassis:
My grandmother was not that way with my mother, but my mother was that way with me because she looked at my generation as the one that was going to get out of the kitchen and was going to do something. So, if I tried to cook, it was, "Li, go study. This is not your thing." When I mentioned that I was thinking to write a cookbook or do something with food, my mother's response was, "Who goes and gets an MBA to end up in the kitchen?" Of course, she backtracks and says she never said that, or she said it, she didn't mean it that way. And it's a point we talk about all the time. And I mention this in the book, it wasn't just her, it was everyone in society back then. Someone telling my father, "Why send her to the U.S. for university? She is going to end up in the kitchen anyway."
Reem Kassis:
So, there was that element of it. But as most kids will tell you, whatever you're not supposed to do, you want to do. And so, I wanted to be in the kitchen. I wanted to see what they were cooking. It's also where you heard all the gossip, right? Because that's where the women are, so, that's where you learn about things you're not necessarily supposed to learn at certain ages. I remember my grandmother had this, I guess you would call it a pantry these days, but it was a room above her fridge. You had to climb on a ladder to get to it. And my cousins and I would hide in there. And of course, we'd listen in on to everything that the women were saying. And other times, we'd run in and out of the kitchen, we'd try to help out, but the women would shoo us and whatnot.
Reem Kassis:
But once you get older, they start relying on you a bit more and you start to learn some of the tips and tricks. Although, for me, most of the learning was visual and auditory. I wasn't actually helping out in the kitchen. I think the first time I cooked, I was an undergrad, and I wanted to make maqluba in my dorm kitchen. I don't even know how I pulled it off, but it was long before Zoom and FaceTime, and my mother goes at one point, "It's cheaper for me to get a ticket and come cook it for you than to pay your long-distance phone bills. Stop calling to ask how to make it." But I learned along the way.
Reem Kassis:
I mean, it's something that, there's this concept in Arabic called nafas, which it means, it's similar to breath or air, but in the context of cooking, it talks about something that a cook will impart into the food part of their spirit, their love, their generosity. And I feel if someone has that, their food will turn out very good, even if you don't have that much experience, and obviously, you hone it through time and through cooking.
Amena Brown:
Hmm, I love that. I love that there was that little nook to hide in.
Reem Kassis:
And listen, now that I think about it.
Amena Brown:
Because it was like when you were a little girl and the women in the family are gathering, I mean, it just feels like that's a place to be. They're going to be in there talking about all sorts of stuff that is going on.
Reem Kassis:
Oh, yes. Everything. Who did what? And who in the village? And what the latest gossip is. And it was a simple time, but fascinating nonetheless.
Amena Brown:
Okay, Reem, you shared a little bit about this before, but can you talk about what the experience was like for you making the career shift that led to where you are now as an author? I just found that part of your story, I found it so fascinating, but I also think there are a lot of people listening that are in this kind of in-between place before that shift happens. So, can you talk about, what was the shift where... I feel like in your story, there's sort of this like, "Before time, before this, that was really different." And then, how did you find yourself finding, in a way, it seemed from your story, and you can tell me if I'm describing this accurately, but it seems like you were finding your way back as you were finding your way forward. So, what was that change like? Were you afraid when you felt the change coming?
Reem Kassis:
Absolutely. I'm still afraid, if we're being honest. And that's one thing I want to preface my answer with, which people will look at someone who has transitioned and is "on the other side," or has accomplished something, and they'll think, "Oh, it looks easy." Or, "Oh, it looks great." But it's a struggle, and it's still is for a lot of reasons which I'll get into. But like I told you, I left Jerusalem wanting to prove to anyone who thought otherwise that a woman's place was not in the kitchen, that she could achieve professional success in other domains, that you could be in a male's world and do well. And I was on that track. I mean, I did my undergrad at Penn, I did my MBA at Wharton straight out of undergrad, which is very uncommon. I worked at McKinsey.
Reem Kassis:
So, I ticked every single box, and then I think it hit me at some point soon after I started working in consulting that, "Here I am ticking all these boxes, but they're somebody else's boxes, not mine. This isn't what makes me happy." And I was lucky enough for I was able to leave and transition to something else, but it was very scary when I first started out because there was no guarantee that it was going to work out. I was also, by the time that I decided to make this transition, I was married, and the issue of financially supporting myself on my own wasn't a big thing. And people don't talk about this, but taking a risk like this, it requires either a willingness to really tie in, bootstrap your life, or you're going to have to find a way to make ends meet if you're financially dependent or not financially independent.
Reem Kassis:
So, that was one part of it, which is something that needs to be talked about. How do you allow someone who wants to pursue their creative arts, to be able to make a living? And I get really angry when I think about this, that why is it that someone who's producing, let's just call it widgets, or a tech app, or whatnot, is able to go out there and raise insane amounts of money, but someone who is producing art, which is what I would argue makes life worth living, maybe it doesn't move the economy or boost it, but it's what gives our life meaning and purpose, why is that not valued in the same monetary terms?
Reem Kassis:
And when I say to you it's still difficult for me today, this is one of the issues where I look at people I went to school with, who remained in those careers, who've made partner at those firms, which I could've already been at that point had I stayed. And obviously, as a food writer, you're not in that same bracket when it comes financially. And I think I judge myself based on those things because I was conditioned to do that. For five years, I was in an environment that equated success with money. And it's hard to transition to a point where you equate success with something else with contribution. And that's what I think. I think what's helped me is thinking, "In 50 years, or in 100 years, when I'm not here, will there still be a part of me that's remembered, that's recognized?"
Reem Kassis:
And I think when you contribute something to society in any kind of art, whether it's books, performance art, painting, and music, those are things that can last forever. Not that the other work is not important, but I felt there were a hundred people who could do the job I was doing professionally, but not that many people who could be the same mother to my kids, and also produce for my people and my community the thing that I signed my hands up. Sorry, that was heavy, and a lot.
Amena Brown:
No, it didn't feel heavy to me, Reem, but it feels powerful, and it feels very honest, because I think when we're having conversations about, insert buzzwords here, about dreams, about passions, about calling, about what that looks like in our vocations, it has been really important to me, and particularly on this podcast, because women of color are here sharing their own stories and experiences, and I'm sharing some of mine too, that we have some honest talks about what that actually looks like. I worked in corporate for a while doing communications for a big Fortune 500, and I was so excited like for the first time to be getting paid, at that time, what felt like paid so well to be writing, and then six months in was like, "Wow, I hate this. I hate this."
Amena Brown:
And then quitting and going broke. I did an episode walking through people like, people see you at the book signing or they see your name on whatever the articles and different awards are, they see your name there, and they're like, "Oh, goodness." And you're like, "Well, behind the scenes, what that really means."
Reem Kassis:
"This is what it looks like."
Amena Brown:
"Some struggles were had. Even the day before set award was received, I was actually-
Reem Kassis:
Yes, exactly.
Amena Brown:
... doing these things." So, I think and hope that it's helpful for people to hear. It's not to say, don't pursue this thing that you feel passionate about that may not have this equation to how it's going to be, air quotes, how other people might define success. It's not to say, don't pursue those things or look to make these shifts. It's to say, there's rough and tumble along the journey. Right?
Reem Kassis:
There's rough and tumble in every path you decide to take. And I think it's recognizing that there is not a single career path in this world that you will take that will be smooth sailing the whole way through.
Amena Brown:
Yeah.
Reem Kassis:
Yeah, okay, I have my name on books, and I go to book signings and whatnot, but you know what I do at home? I wash the dishes, and I have to. All day long, that's what I do. I'm cleaning up my stove when I forget a pot and it boils. This is what day-to-day life looks like. It's not the glamorous book signings. And then when you're in corporate America or the corporate world anywhere, I was working 16-hour days. And I remember, like you were saying, thinking, "Oh, my God, I'm getting paid so well, I can afford anything I want to buy now." But suddenly, all those things I thought I wanted to buy, the designer clothes and handbags and shoes, I had no desire to even wear them, and just my life felt so meaningless at that point that that stuff could not fill whatever gap I was feeling.
Reem Kassis:
And if there's one thing I've noticed is, it's when you start doing something that thinks of someone else more than you, or something that gives back, you find a sense of meaning much more than when you're pursuing things that are purely hedonistic, just for your own satisfaction.
Amena Brown:
I love you brought up the word meaning. I think that's important when we're thinking about what do we want to do in the world, in our communities? And I think it is about, is it meaningful? And of course, I get it, not everything we do is going to be meaningful. Even in my current writer event life, I mean, I'm sure, for all of us that are in creative space, I mean, there are all sorts of gigs and different things that you take something so they can pay the bills. You do that. But I think it's good for us to think about, "What are the things in my life, whether it's my vocation or not, that I want to do because it's meaningful, because it means something to me, or because I think it would mean something to my people or to my community?" I think that's so important.
Amena Brown:
Reem, let's talk about The Arabesque Table. Okay? What was the writing process like for The Arabesque Table? And I'm just going to tell you, I've never written a cookbook or anything with recipes in it, so, I don't know that part, but I have written two books, and it's a wild time for me. It's like, I feel like I start out eating a lot of carbohydrates, because I'm just like, "Oh, why would I do this to myself?" It's a lot of stress. There's a lot of beautiful ideas I had when I was sketching out the book, and then I get to actually writing it, and it doesn't sound like that at all.
Reem Kassis:
It's just so much better in your head than when you put it on paper. I know.
Amena Brown:
Yeah. So, talk to me, what was your writing process like? After you've envisioned The Arabesque Table, what was it like when you actually had to sit down and do the writing?
Reem Kassis:
Here's the funny thing, The Arabesque Table was not the book I initially envisioned, and I'm so glad it wasn't. A lot of the things I'm telling you about the history and how much of it, I integrated in the book, and also the idea of positioning it as Arab versus middle Eastern, that came throughout the writing process. So, in a way, not knowing what you're doing sometimes is a blessing.
Amena Brown:
Okay. That's encouraging everyone. Remember, sometimes not knowing what you're doing can be a blessing. I'm going to take that home with me, Reem. Okay. Yes.
Reem Kassis:
I only say telling myself that. But the day-to-day process, look, it was a little bit harder than the first one for a couple of reasons. One was, the first book was taking recipes I'd grown up with and I knew, and just testing them, making sure they work, and getting exact ingredients for them. Here, it was developing a lot of recipes, guessing what might or might not work, and sometimes having to test it multiple times, all while cooking with kids who are four and six. With the first book, they were a newborn and two years old. They ate whatever I told them to eat, or they had milk and they were fine. Whereas now, it was constant complaints, and on top of recipe testing, you're cooking things that the kids will eat, but that was most of my day, and then my nights were transcribing all those recipes. And then the actual meat, I kept to the very end.
Reem Kassis:
So, that's when all the chapter intros, the introduction, that's when it all came together. And then, the introduction to the book did not happen until I was supposed to go home to Jerusalem in March for my photo shoot. And two days before, they issued a blanket quarantine, had to cancel our flights. We didn't even know if the book could come out when it was scheduled to. And I felt so much during that time, anger, frustration, and I was able to write the introduction through those feelings. And it's not the introduction I would have imagined at all, but somehow, it came out something so much better than I could have envisioned. So, another hopefully useful thing is sometimes just accept those feelings, live through them. Something beautiful can come out of it on the other side, if you will.
Reem Kassis:
But the writing mostly happened yet towards the tail end of it, and a lot of the writing happened when I was back home in Jerusalem. So, it's interesting, the recipes were tested abroad in the U.S., but then the more narrative part was written back home. And being able to see it from both angles or both sides, I guess, made the book what it was. It's modern, it's contemporary, it's cross-cultural, but it's also going far back in history.
Amena Brown:
Would you say location matters to your writing process? Did it do something different to you being home in Jerusalem writing and just being there, the air, the feeling of being there, and then being here in the U.S. writing, does that add a different something to your writing process?
Reem Kassis:
I think so. I mean, it's hard to scientifically explain how the writing process works. There're so many elements. It's like cooking. Why is it that if I cook a dish when I'm angry, it tastes one way, and if I'm happy, it tastes another way? And if I'm doing it in this kitchen, it's like this, and in another kitchen, it's like that? And I think writing is similar. It's not that being there changes the way I write, but the thoughts I have, the emotions I experience are different, and that comes through in the writing. And yes, smelling the air probably reminds me of certain memories when I was young that might not have been triggered in my mind had I been writing it in my apartment. So, in that sense, yes, absolutely, it does.
Amena Brown:
I was reading through a couple of the recipes in this book, and there's all this funny talk on the internet right now about when you go to like a blog to read a recipe, you're just like, "Pass, scroll, scroll, scroll."
Reem Kassis:
"Scroll, scroll. And now jump to the recipe."
Amena Brown:
"I don't want to read this, I just want to get to the recipe." But in reading your book, both are, I mean, in many blogs, they're also equally important, okay, but in your book, they are equally important. I mean, you had one of the recipes that I was reading through was for a certain type of salad, and in your intro, you were writing about, where does the idea for salad come from? What are the actual roots of that in ancient food? And you were giving us that context, and then you were like, "Here's why I'm doing what I'm doing with this recipe now for this sort of modern context."
Amena Brown:
Can you talk about, you've told us already how it's important to connect history to like what you're writing, can you talk about the process of these recipes and these stories and history that's going along there? What was that like? And what do you hope readers gain from getting to have those layers in this book?
Reem Kassis:
I think the book has about 130 or 125 recipes in it, I started out with over 200.
Amena Brown:
Whew.
Reem Kassis:
So, the process involved a lot of elimination, and people always ask, "How did you figure out which recipes you were going to keep in?" And I think the headnotes you alluded to were part of the reason certain recipes stayed and certain recipes went. It's, you have 250 pages, Amena. There's a limit to how much history you can convey. So, I guess what I picked and chose were the stories that charted that journey from past to present. So, rather than having five recipes whose headnotes talk about the origins of salad, I will pick one which explains how it's from Roman times, and salad is the Latin word for salt, and that's how vegetables are seasoned, and so on and so forth. I think a lot of it was trying to figure out, "How do I tell this story? Which snippets of information can showcase the specific points I wanted to get across?"
Reem Kassis:
And those points were a lot of the origins that certain foods we think belong to are actually completely inaccurate. Things like tomatoes. People think Italian food, they think pasta with tomato sauce, or even Arabic cuisine, they think tomato stews. Tomatoes didn't make their way to our part of the world till the 19th century.
Amena Brown:
Wow.
Reem Kassis:
And they're a result of the Colombian exchange or inquisition into the Americas. Same with other ingredients, chilies, they're not native to India or to Thailand. Coco is not native to Switzerland or Belgium. And it's fascinating to see the history of ingredients and crops, and that's why the book is broken up by ingredients because those are the ones that really show you the shift in the history of cuisine.
Amena Brown:
Why call the book The Arabesque Table? I want to ask on both words here, on Arabesque and table, why are both of these words important to the journey of this book?
Reem Kassis:
I think Arabesque is the most important word in that title. The table was similar to the first book. It was this idea that this is where you serve a meal, everyone's welcome at the table. It was the same publisher, so, it was a nice way to maintain the consistency. But Arabesque was very, very important, and I fought hard to get that title on the book because I wanted it to come across that this was not just another "Middle Eastern cookbook." And I also had an issue with the term, Middle East, because Middle East is a European, a Western imperialistic view of our part of the world in relation to the Easternmost colony of the British Empire, which was India. So, India is to the far East, Europe is Europe, and we're in the middle between the two, so, it became the Middle East. But it doesn't mean anything.
Reem Kassis:
And a lot of terms in the social sciences don't mean something concrete, but people use them. And in the culinary world, people use Middle East because it's essentially evocative and it eludes to certain things and certain dishes in your mind, but accurately, what combines and unites the food of our region is the acculturation under Arab culture and Islamic rule. So, I very much wanted the book to be Arab cuisine, and I wanted that to come into the title. With that said, to call it The Arab Table would also not be accurate. And here I am preaching about telling the truth and acknowledging the history. A lot of the recipes in this book are the result of cross-cultural interaction. They take inspiration from other cultures from travels. They're a modern way of eating, and arabesque alludes to the fact that it's Arab, but it's not 100% Arab.
Reem Kassis:
And then there's one other reason which I don't talk about in the book because, again, limited word space, but arabesque is a dance move in ballet, where you have one foot on the ground with a hand reaching forward and your other leg up in the air. And it felt to me, this was kind of a symbol of how you're rooted and you're grounded in history but you're still reaching towards the future trying to move forward, but it doesn't have to be either, or you can do both at the same time.
Amena Brown:
Ooh, that's imagery at the end right there. I mean, the whole thing that you shared there, I hope everyone listening is really hearing Reem and learning on this, because when we are here, for those of you that are listening that are in the West, you're in the States or in other parts of the West, there is so much of how we are being told to view other cultures, other nations, other parts of the world, that are not actually accurate to what it means to be there, to be from there. And so, I love that correction of being able to say, "Let's not say Middle Eastern, let's say arabesque." I also just love how the E-S-Q-U-E, I mean...
Reem Kassis:
Sounds so sophisticated, if you will.
Amena Brown:
It does a thing at the end.
Reem Kassis:
Very like, I don't know, it sounds like the banquets that they used to have in the past. And they really were very elaborate.
Amena Brown:
Oh, I love that. Reem, what would you say? People who are listening, they are needing to get this book. Just know that the outro is coming, and I'm going to be in the book. Everybody better take all their money. I'm going to be in there just like really giving everyone the information. But what do you hope that readers receive from The Arabesque Table as they... I mean, I would think, a book like The Arabesque Table, some people will read it cover to cover, some people might read through those beginning portions where you're setting the scene here, and then there'll be going in and out looking through the different recipes, deciding what they want to cook. Right? Everyone will have different ways that they approach reading the book. But what do you hope people are getting from it as they're engaging with it?
Reem Kassis:
You know how we talked about the concept of home before on the show? And I wrote about this in The Palestinian Table as well, I think what unites Arab cultures across the board is the sense of home and the sense of generosity, where, if somebody knocks on your door a minute before you set the table, you will always have an extra plate and enough to feed them. And I cannot obviously invite every single reader into my home, but what I hope that they get while reading through this book is the sense of generosity, the sense of welcomeness, that you are welcome into this cuisine. You are welcome not only to enjoy it, but to try it and to experiment yourself with it, adapt it to suit your tastes. You're not committing a crime by doing that.
Reem Kassis:
It's better to enjoy it and learn about its history, and then adapt it to yours so that you can continue to eat from it. And then the other thing that, less on the emotional side, I hope they realize just how many misconceptions we have about food and its origins, and how important these conversations are to be having, and that we need to look at food through a much longer and deeper lens than the one that we've been looking at it, this one.
Amena Brown:
Reem, thank you so much for being a guest in our HER living room, but I feel like we've entered into the HER kitchen a little bit. And so, I just want you to know, Reem, I am dreaming up a time when the pandemic is over, that someone would just, first of all, pay you lots of money to do this on TV. And then, secondly, I'm dreaming that they would pay me at least a medium to large amount to be on TV with you for one of those episodes.
Reem Kassis:
I would just be happy if you didn't come to my house and eat at my table. So, that would be good enough for me.
Amena Brown:
Yes. We're going to do that, Reem. Thank you so much for joining me.
Reem Kassis:
Thank you, Amena.
Amena Brown:
This has been awesome. I'm so glad we got to gather in the living room and around the table with Reem Kassis. Make sure you get her latest book, The Arabesque Table, at your favorite bookseller, and you can also follow Reem on Instagram at Reem Kassis, that's at R-E-E-M K-A-S-S-I-S.
Amena Brown:
For this week's edition of Give Her a Crown, I want to shout-out Chef Edna Lewis. I found my way to Edna Lewis when I was in the process of healing a body broken by major surgery and weeks of recovery, a friend came to my house and made me biscuits from Edna Lewis's recipe, shout-out to my friend, Andy, and they were so much better than the hockey puck of a biscuit I tried to make myself.
Amena Brown:
I started reading Edna Lewis's, The Taste of Country Cooking. I was transported to Freetown, Virginia, to the farm and the hearth kitchens of Black women who cooked, and planted, and reaped, and sowed according to the season. Over the years, I have cooked my way through Edna Lewis's book. It has returned me to my Southern roots. She reminds me of the women I come from. Chef Edna Lewis is one of the four mothers of Southern food and soul food. Chef Edna passed away in 2006, but her recipes and her storytelling will be passed on for years to come. Chef Edna Lewis, give her a crown.
Amena Brown:
HER With Amena Brown is produced by Matt Owen for Sol Graffiti Productions as a part of the Seneca Women Podcast Network in partnership with iHeartRadio. Thanks for listening, and don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast.