Think of all the delicious meal that will be on our dining tables on this Thanksgiving, all the familiar recipes: Turkey, all the stuffings we love and all the deserts. For many of our newly resettled refugees this will be their first Thanksgiving, for some including myself this is one of many Thanksgivings. Nothing would make this Thanksgiving more special than finding the food and flavors we understand. Integrating recipes from newly resettled Americans is what makes our Thanksgivings more special with the experiences, flavors and stories we understand and connect with. Some newly resettled refugees recently came together to write a timely book that has what you need to know about the recipes these refugees had brought with them.
Nothing makes America more special than the stories and food that are the common denominators to our collective humanity. This year Refugee Services of Texas released Plated Stories: Legacies from Home to Table. The stories and recipes in this book are from several countries of 21 refugees, asylum seekers and other immigrants who came together to share their stories and favorite dishes. The book brings stories spanning from Africa, Central America, Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe, all the food – everything from Egyptian spinach stew to Salvadoran stuffed tortillas to Vietnamese taro pudding to Croatian pastry – with easy instructions and culture-specific twists in each recipe.
To purchase the book, you can find the link here.