Recipes Carry Voices and Stories: An Interview with Mirna Bamieh
Special Feature: 
Keyword: 
Palestinian cuisine
foodways
gender
nafas
culinary appropriation
food history
Abstract: 

In this interview, guest editor Christiane Dabdoub Nasser and artist, chef, and ethnographer Mirna Bamieh discuss the status of Palestinian cuisine in the world food scene, questions of colonial appropriation of Palestinian food, and the alchemy or nafas that makes each individual cook’s food uniquely their own. They also delve into the transformations of Palestinian cuisine over time and efforts to preserve recipes as a way of safeguarding the histories and cultures that they represent and resisting settler-colonial erasure.

Author biography: 

Mirna Bamieh explores the politics of disappearance and memory production by unpacking the social concerns and limitations of Palestinian commiunities amid contemporary political dilemmas. With degrees in humanities, visual arts, and culinary studies, she melds food and storytelling to develop socially engaged work through Palestine Hosting Society (palestinianhostingsociety.com), a live art project she founded in 2018. Since 2019, she has also been reflecting on the process of fermentation through text, ceramics, and video works incorporated into site-specific installations.

Christiane Dabdoub Nasser is an independent cultural consultant, researcher and writer. She published her first novel, A Moon Will Rise, in 2021.