Hawa Hassan: How Do You Tell More Than a Single Story?

Food with Mark Bittman

Sweetness and Light

Nutrition, Arts, Food, Culture, Cooking, Health & Fitness, Society & Culture

4.9 • 947 Ratings

🗓️ 28 May 2025

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The author and chef talks to Mark and Kate about how and why her personal experiences have prompted her to share the experiences of others; telling a better story of what it means to be displaced; the most harrowing travel experience she had while working on her latest book, Setting a Place for Us; and where to find the best sushi outside of Japan.

The Bittman Project is featuring three recipes from Hawa Hassan's new book, Setting a Place for Us:

Rice Bread: https://bittmanproject.com/recipe/rice-bread/

Fresco de Melon (Cantaloupe Juice, with or without rum): https://bittmanproject.com/recipe/fresco-de-melon/

Madesu (Stewed Red Beans): https://bittmanproject.com/recipe/madesu-stewed-red-beans/

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to food. I'm Kate Bittman. I hope you're enjoying being here with us, and if that's the case, you might want to find us online at bitmanproject.com, where we've got more than 1,500 recipes, cooking how-toes, essays about how food affects us, Mark's opinions, our recommendations for things to eat and cookware
0:22.6	and books, and a lot more. It's a burgeoning community, and if you care about food, I'm
0:27.6	fairly certain you'll your people where. of wartime and a comforting talisman of where you come from and who you are. It's the tide that
0:56.4	binds you to your people wherever they are in the world. I can't take credit for such an eloquent
1:02.2	passage. It's from Hawa Hassan's new book, Setting a Place for Us, Recipes and Stories of Displacement,
1:09.6	resilience, and community.
1:12.2	Hawa Hassan was born in Mogadishu, Somalia, the second eldest of ten siblings.
1:17.7	When she was four, her family fled the country during the Somali Civil War,
1:22.2	going first to United Nations refugee camp in Mombasa, Kenya, then to Nairobi, and ending up three years later
1:29.7	in Seattle, where her mother sent her to live with family friends. The goal was for the rest of the
1:35.7	family to join her eventually, but by the time she was in middle school, she realized no one was coming.
1:42.6	In setting a place for us, Hawa combines her intimate understanding of
1:46.8	displacement with interviews, recipes, and stories that span global borders. Each chapter is a window
1:53.0	into a different country, El Salvador, Yemen, Iraq, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, to name a few,
2:00.7	offering historical insights on how war and displacement have Republic of Congo, to name a few, offering historical insights on how
2:02.7	war and displacement have shaped each region's foodways and cultural identity, and shedding
2:08.1	light on the importance of preserving recipes and food traditions in places of conflict
2:13.0	and migration.
2:15.2	How great to focus so much on telling the stories of others. We loved having
2:20.2	Hawa on, and here we are. Thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me. I'm
2:27.6	really excited to be in conversation with both of you. This new book is great. Your first book in
2:33.6	Bibi's Kitchen was also great. It came out five years ago and told the stories of you. This new book is great. Your first book in Beebe's Kitchen was also great. It came out five
	...

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