Soul-satisfying soups: How a humanitarian cookbook project is raising funds for Syrian refugees

“Soups for me have always been something very comforting. I remember telling my dad once, ‘The soup is warming my heart,’” Barbara Abdeni Massaad says. “It’s comfort food. It nourishes your body but it also nourishes your mind, and when you’re cold, what better substance to drink or to eat than soup ” Freezing conditions compelled Massaad to first visit the Syrian refugee camp in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. The cookbook author and photographer lives in Beirut. It was wintertime, and even in the comfort of her heated apartment, it was chilly. “I thought of all the refugees living in tents. And I saw footage of the children in the tents being really, really cold. That hit me because I’m a mother of three children, and I can’t stand the fact that children are cold,” she says. Massaad knew immediately that she wanted to help but didn’t know exactly how. She found the answer organically, in the form of a humanitarian cookbook project: Soup for Syria, (Interlink Publishers, 2015). The book has raised more than US$300,000 to date, with all proceeds going to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR)’s food relief initiatives. “Each one of us has a God-given talent (that we can use) to help somebody that comes to our country and is in need of something,” she says. “At the beginning when I went to the camps, they didn’t know what I was doing or who I was. So I had to simplify it and say for example, ‘If I was a hairdresser, I would come and cut your hair for free. But I’m not a hairdresser so I’m going to try to do something with what I’m doing in my life.’ – so something dealing with food, journalism and photography.” The seed for Soup for Syria was planted in a farmers’ market. Massaad is the president of Slow Food Beirut, which runs the Earth Market in the city’s Hamra district. A friend suggested that they make soup to hand out to refugees at the market and Massaad thought “it was a brilliant idea.” She had initially thought about cooking with the women in the camp, and sharing their recipes in a Syrian cookbook. Access to ingredients and hygiene issues posed challenges, so her focus naturally shifted to a collection of soul-satisfying soup recipes. She reached out to her network of friends – some of whom are world-renowned chefs and food writers – who were happy to oblige. Contributors include London-based restaurateurs Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi(Gondi, Persian chicken and chickpea dumplings), California Slow Food icon Alice Waters(Carrot Soup), chef and television personality Anthony Bourdain (Soupe au Pistou), Michelin-starred Australian chef Greg Malouf (Fennel Soup with Lemon and Cinnamon), and Egyptian-British cookbook writer and cultural anthropologist Claudia Roden (Borlotti Bean and Pasta Soup). “I wanted to have these people close to this project and all of them were very enthusiastic. It was wonderful – they gave me their recipes, so they feel like they’re part of it too,” Massaad says. “It’s been an awesome experience. There are a lot of good people in this world.” The fact that her mentor Carlo Petrini, founder of the international Slow Food movement, wrote the book’s foreword was particularly meaningful. “His philosophy is basically, ‘You eat good food, you eat clean food, and you’re fair to the people who are making your food.’ He’s very, very sensitive to what’s happening all over the world. So I think he really loved the idea because it was through food, trying to make a difference.” Having lived through war herself, Massaad says that she is able to identify with the refugees somewhat. She was forced to leave Lebanon when she was 10-years-old. When she arrived in Florida, where she lived until she was 18, she didn’t speak English. “I remember feeling like, ‘Oh my god, it’s so hard and everybody’s talking around me. I don’t understand a word they’re saying.’ And feeling (scared),” she says. “When you speak to the refugees, don’t think that they’re happy to emigrate to Germany, France, Italy or Lebanon. They want to go home. That’s the goal… Even if you (place them in) the most developed country, they still feel like home is where the heart is. That’s where they want to be, which I understand.” Massaad’s photographic portraits of some of the families living in the camp appear throughout the book. She says that meeting and photographing the children, and being able to bring them some joy, was the most meaningful aspect of the project for her. “It was like a game – each one wanted to pose. It was really cute,” she says with a laugh. “They would fight: ‘Who’s going to be photographed ’ It was really funny.” Soup for Syria is available in Canada, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and the U.S, and a Turkish edition is in progress. While Massaad is proud of the funds the project has raised, and hopes to raise more, she says that money wasn’t the only goal. “Empathy, that’s the main objective,” Massaad says. “It’s about raising awareness that people are suffering. And these people are not so different from you and me – the beautiful children, the beautiful families. What they need is food, shelter, love and most importantly, dignity.” Source: National Post