'Soup For Syria': Chefs Share Recipes To Raise Funds For Refugees

Barbara Massaad was watching a TV news program about the plight of Syrian refugees from her apartment in the suburbs of Beirut when she decided to visit a refugee camp herself.

"I just wanted to go and see what was happening," she told me. "So I went and started taking photographs and talking to people about food."

Why food? Because Massaad is a cookbook writer and photographer. She grew up working at her parents' kabob shop in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. Then she became a force in the Slow Food movement, starting the Beirut chapter, and racked up prestigious gastronomic awards for books like Man'oushe: Inside the Street Corner Lebanese Bakery.

A mother of three, Massaad says she was particularly touched by the Syrian children she met and photographed at the camps. She wanted to raise awareness, so she thought about writing a cookbook based on Syrian cuisine, or perhaps a more sociological look at what refugees actually eat. But then, she reconsidered. After all, who wants to eat like a refugee? Then came a call from a friend who, with Massaad, helps run a Beirut farmers market.

"And she said, 'Hey, Barb, why don't we make soups and just give them out to refugees at the farmers market on Tuesdays?'" Massaad recalled. "We made, like, really hearty soups with beans and vegetables and pasta. And lentil soups, because lentils are really popular around here."

Then the idea struck: a cookbook — to benefit refugees — devoted entirely to soup. Massaad called upon an all-star lineup of culinary celebrities for help with Soup for Syria.

"I'm friends with Alice Waters," Massaad says of the pioneering farm-to-table owner of Chez Panisse in Berkeley, Calif. "I contacted her and of course, everything that has to do with humanitarian efforts, she was like, 'Of course.' "

Waters contributed a recipe for carrot soup. TV host and writer Anthony Bourdain pitched in with one for soup au pistou, with white beans, leeks, fennel and zucchini. The Israeli-born British restaurateur Yotam Ottolenghi, of such cookbooks as Jerusalem and Plenty, sent a recipe. So did such stars as Paula Wolfert, Claudia Rodan and Mark Bittman.

"It's an easy ask," Bittman says. He's the bestselling author of How to Cook Everything and How to Bake Everything, and he created the Minimalist food column in The New York Times. Bittman says you feel connected to a place when you eat or cook its cuisine.

"You know, I gave them something that's quite the opposite," he said. "I gave them a Korean soup recipe. But they wanted to put together a cookbook that had an international flair to it, and it seems that's what they got."

Readers will find various soup recipes that range from Armenian Cabbage to Iranian pomegranate to Portuguese chickpea to Turkish black-eyed pea with lamb and noodles. They might sound exotic, but Massaad wanted the recipes in Soup for Syria to be easy-to-make and accessible, in terms of price. Soup is universal comfort food, says Massad. It bridges cultures.

"It's special, soup," she says.

So far, Soup for Syria has been published in the U.S., the UK, Italy and the Netherlands. And it's about to come out in Germany and Turkey. Massaad says all proceeds benefit the UN's work with refugees and other charities on the front lines of assisting them, such as the Syrian American Medical Society, which runs hospitals in refugee camps. And with very little attention or publicity, Soup for Syria has already raised more than $300,000.

Jill Boutros

Red Lentil Soup with Mint and Lemon

Serves 4

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (or substitute butter)

1 medium onion, chopped

2 small garlic cloves, chopped

Salt, to taste

½ teaspoon Aleppo pepper or paprika, plus more for serving

1 medium tomato, chopped

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1 teaspoon dried mint, plus more for serving

1 cup (200 g) red lentils

¼ cup (40 g) coarse bulgar (burghul)

4¼ cups (1 l) chicken or vegetable stock

Juice of 1 lemon

Heat the oil in a large soup pot over medium heat and sauté the onions until soft.

Add the garlic and sauté an additional minute. Season with salt and the Aleppo pepper or paprika. Stir in the tomato, tomato paste, and mint and continue to cook for another 2 minutes.

Stir in the lentils and bulgar, then cover with the stock and 2 cups (475 ml) water. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer, partially covered, for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

Sprinkle each serving with a little dried mint and Aleppo pepper, along with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice.

"Soup for Syria is an excellent example of collaboration for a worthy cause. As I write, the snow continues to fall here in the mountains overlooking Beirut. I know very well that many refugee families are suffering through the storm, struggling to keep their accommodations warm and their stomachs full. Who wouldn't want to help?"

—Jill Boutros

Recipe from Soup for Syria: Recipes To Celebrate Our Shared Humanity. Collected and photographed by Barbara Massaad. Published by Interlink Books, $30.00 hardcover

Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.