Farming for Health Podcast #31: Chef Reem Assil

In this fascinating interview, Chef Reem Assil shares her story: from living in Oakland, California where she felt like a stranger in a strange land because of her Palestinian-Syrian heritage to winning a prestigious award for her cookbook, Arabiyya—and plenty in between.

Reem was always baking, and perhaps that was because of the fascination she felt with the scientific work performed by her mother. Through alchemy, different ingredients turned into something magical: in her mother’s work and in her baking.

Then, through her passion for social justice, Reem went to Lebanon in 2010 where she worked as an activist and community labor organizer. She wanted to give voice to people in the neighborhoods where development was leading to the displacement of people instead of an investment into them. It was hard to mobilize the communities, though, because they didn’t yet have a vision of the jobs and housing they could fight to have.

Reem then spotted a street corner bakery in Lebanon, and she quickly realized how this symbolized the resiliency of the many generations of people in the Arab world as they endured war, drought, and famine. Because bread—a food that all cultures have in some form—was born in the Arab region of the world, this served as a celebration of the journey: for her, personally, and for the people in the community. So, she ended up bringing back this experience for people in the Bay Area of California. 

In 2022, Chef Reem published Arabiyya: Recipes from the Life of an Arab in Diaspora. Named as one of the top best cookbooks of the year by the San Francisco Chronicle and one of the best cookbooks of the year by Food & Wine, Los Angeles Times, Saveur, and Epicurious, the book also won a prestigious 2023 IACP Cookbook Award from the International Association of Culinary Professionals. 

To hear more about Chef Reem’s inspiring story, listen to our Farming for Health podcast titled “Bread, Celebrating Community, and the California Approach.”

Past Episodes of our Farming for Health Podcast

If you’ve missed any of our previous episodes, you can find them here:

• Episode One: Keto, Cruciferous Vegetables, Salt and Your Mindset
• Episode Two: Cooking, Conviviality, and Preserving the Harvest
• Episode Three: Ferments, Food Insecurity, and Wasted Food
• Episode Four: Anti-Cancer Diet, Food as Medicine, and Vegetables
• Episode Five: Plants, Happiness and Mindful Neglect.
• Episode Six: Whole 30, Sustainable Habits, and Loving Vegetables
• Episode Seven: Iodine, Egg Yolk Enzymes, and Miso
• Episode Eight: Fungi, Bitter Foods, and Food Extinction
• Episode Nine: Understanding Food, Nutritional Healing and Farming
• Episode Ten: Enjoying the Process, Connection and Soup
• Episode Eleven: Monica Geller, Community and Limiting Salads 
• Episode Twelve: Nourishment, Creativity, and Full-Spectrum Health
• Episode Thirteen: The Joy of Cooking, Fermentation, and Seasonality 
• Episode Fourteen: Cauliflower, Potlucks, and the Joy of Food
• Episode Fifteen: Time Savers, Pickled Raisins and Cooking With Creativity
• Episode Sixteen: Romanticizing Food, Seasonal Eating, and Shamed Spinach
• Episode Seventeen: Being Present, The Eat In Method and Food as Fuel
• Episode Eighteen: Regenerative Grazing, Monarchs and Voting with Your Dollar 
• Episode Nineteen: Childhood Injustice, Soil Health, and Relationship with Nature
• Episode Twenty: Yoga, Climate Changes, and Creating a Livable Future
• Episode Twenty-One: Understanding the Soul, Flow State, and Finding Your Purpose
• Episode Twenty-Two: Regenerative Food Systems, Food Sheds, and Resiliency 
• Episode Twenty-Three: Leaning In: Culinary Trends and the Power of Teaching
• Episode Twenty-Four: Mentorship, Self-Care, and Hospitality
• Episode Twenty-Five: Community, Self-Care, and Mindset Tools
• Episode Twenty-Six: Sustainability, Koji Coffee, Being Intentional 
• Episode Twenty-Seven: Finding Your Passion, Picky Eaters, and Cooking for Levi
• Episode Twenty-Eight: Creativity. Brining Vegetables and Family Pasta Night
• Episode Twenty-Nine: Triathlons, Eat to Nourish, and Be Bold With Your Cooking
• Episode Thirty: Ben’s Friends, Community “WE,” and Taking Action