The first time I met Brant, he was deep in conversation with a mutual friend, regaling her about discovering kaymak in Turkey. A small crowd was gathering. Many of us had never heard of this Turkish fresh cheese, but Brant’s love of food and culture and the discovery of where they cross was totally infectious.
I reached out the next day and we made lunch plans. I showed up with a loaf of bread and he showed up with homemade mozzarella. We were instant friends. It turned out that he’d been traveling the world taking lessons near and far about all things dairy. His dream was to buy land and get water buffalos and make fresh cheese. My dream was to put fresh cheese on the bread I couldn’t stop making.
Soon after, we started a weekly trade—dairy for bread—and once a week we would sit together tasting new batches of butter and catching up on life and the state of the world.
Something kept coming up again and again that I was always interested in hearing more about: In the course of Brant’s travels, he’d spent a lot of time in Lebanon. In his stints there, long before the rest of the world started to notice, he saw the devastating affects of the Syrian civil war. Lebanon being so close to Syria, refugees were poring into Beirut and Brant and his friends decided to do something to help. He started a non-profit called Sadalsuud, and it would be their mission to support Syrian families in their displacement.
I wanted to do what I could to contribute, and I gave to special projects here and there to do a small part, but it never felt like enough.
Our bread and cheese exchange forged ahead, and as good trades go, we were both grateful for the other’s skills. I so looked forward to the butter and cheese (and once I even got a whole gallon of buffalo milk to play with!), but I started to most anticipate my break with Brant every week and its propensity to connect me to the wider world. That’s what Brant does. He brings people together by finding connections and making space for them in everyday life.
When he told me he was moving back to Lebanon to focus on his non-profit, I was not surprised. The conflicts were escalating and it was too hard to run a non-profit from afar. “The only thing is,” he said. “I’m going to miss your bread…” He’d captivated me with descriptions of the amazing man’oushé breads available to him in Lebanon…and yet I knew what he meant. He’d been listening to my evolution of grain geekdom over the past year and he was right there with me. We both understood the deeper complexities of a food system that really sustains people and one that ravages, and we both hoped for more. So despite everything else in the state of the world, we baked bread and made cheese.
“I’ll teach you!” I said. “I’ll teach you how to make bread before you go!”
And so we hung out together one Saturday for a last goodbye, and I showed him how to mix and fold and proof while he detailed to me all the reasons I need to visit Lebanon.
It turns out that bread was part of his calling and as soon as he got settled in his new home, he started baking with a passion that bloomed. He sent me pictures of his loaves and I’d pass them around like a proud mama. Within the year, he’d gotten the idea to add a bakery component to his non-profit. He reached out to baking superstar Sarah Owens, and together they launched the Sadalsuud bakery.
Brant once told me that one of the strangest experience of living in the Middle East was scrolling through his social media feeds and seeing the stark contrasts of his American friends alongside his Middle Eastern friends. We’re so isolated from what is going on in Syria, but we shouldn’t be.
I’d been wanting to do more, and this photo drove the desire deep into me, and it lodged there. Those hands, that mortar shell, the dough… As my friend who posted it said, “Dude has nothing, but is still feeding people the only way he knows how.” Feeding people…the phrase lingered. I can do that. I can feed people to do just a little bit more. I tagged Brant in the photo. The next morning, we talked and an idea was underway.
It started with the desire to fill in gaps of scarcity, but as is Brant’s proclivity, we were soon in an exciting discussion that included such things as carob molasses, full-hull tahini, fresh thyme, and our shared love of freekah. He detailed the durum flour he was able to find locally near Tripoli, and he told me about the progress of the bakery.
Through this discussion, a new loaf was born. A loaf that is my Oregon version of one of Brant’s Lebanon-inspired loaves. Thousand Bites of Bread will be selling these loaves of durum and white wheat with the addition of smoky freekah and fresh thyme. All of the money raised with these loaves will go to Sadalsuud Foundation to buy equipment to keep the bakery employing Syrian refugee families and sending their children to school and building connections with local Lebanese families. I believe in Brant’s mission with urgency and I hope you’ll share in this delicious part of the endeavor.
In Brant’s words:
“In this time of extreme hatred and division in this world, I believe it is more important than ever to come together, to uplift one another, and to prove with our actions that humanity is more important than divisive political agendas. You all inspire and uplift me, and more importantly, you instill hope in my Syrian friends in Lebanon. Syrians often feel the world has forgotten them, but your donations and efforts on their behalf have uplifted them and assured them this is not the case. Thank you my friends, I love you.”
So here we come full circle from that rainy Saturday when I taught Brant to bake bread. I thought I was sending him on his way with the knowledge to feed himself. That was not enough for him. He took that knowledge and found new ways to feed the world. So, off I go.
I’m planning to do my part in Tripoli soon, but in the meantime, please consider giving to Sadalsuud by purchasing a loaf of bread in the shop.
For more about Sadalsuud Foundation, visit their site. And here’s a link to Brant’s blog about the project.
Savor the freedom of your life with delight and the privilege of that fact with gratitude.
All my best,
