Seed Ark

A journey into the food heritage, history and cuisine of the Levant -

protecting wild habitats, foraging wild foods, saving seeds of landrace wheat & vegetables

Grow a Diversity Garden to celebrate the multi-cultural traditions of our shared Land. Plant Landrace Levant Seed: prickly-seeded Galilee Spinach, Melochiya, Faqous, Arugula, Biblical-era Wheats Seed Ark catalogue

   
cards
 
    $25

Seed Ark is a social renewal initiative to restore threatened landrace baladi and wild seed biodiversity - with seed exchanges and traditional food festivals to celebrate life-nurturing seed stewardship that honors the diverse peoples on our shared land. Preserving biodiversity is a seminal act of cultural empowerment for traditional peoples.

Food is central to our being, our culture and our relationship to other living beings on our planet. Landrace seeds are at the heart of food sovereignty, bearing a Noah's Ark of resilience, flavor and nutrition urgently needed as we face climate change. Although the Mideast is the ancestral home to key world food crops, due to the turmoil that plagues our region, our biodiversity is threatened. Wild edible plants and indigenous knowledge of their uses are embedded in Jewish and Arab food traditions, but today are threatened. By restoring our landrace and heirloom seeds of diversity, each of us can celebrate our irreplaceable biodiversity and food heritage on our shared land.

Our Goals

- To steward our seed, land and water for ecological farming, to foster the biodiversity and cultural diversity that sustains healthy land and people.

- To draw on our shared love of seed-saving, organic gardening and food arts to foster co-existence of diverse peoples through practical cooperation, to nourish the one true path - that is peace.

Links

ROOTS Arab-Jewish Cooperation

Seed-Saving in Arabic

Palestinian organic Farmers

Medieval Arab Farm Traditions

Our Projects

Restoring Ancient Wheat and Bread Traditions

Restoring Our Seed , Northeast Organic Wheat

Jewish Journey Grains

Youth Seed-Saving Guidebook

Jerusalem Seed Exchange

 

Seed Exchange in the SPNI Courtyard

 

Dr. Gary Nabhan sharing inspiring seed teachings

 

Sharing our Seed

 

Moshe Basson & Eli Rogosa

 

Delicious dinner graciously hosted by Kevork Alemian and 'Chefs for Peace' at the YMCA. To learn more about this Armenian-Arab-Jewish cooperative cuisine project contact: chefsforpeace

 

Sharing baladi and heirloom seed in Bethlehem with Gary Nabhan

 

 

 

 Seed Exchange
& Wild Foods Buffet

Aug 19th - SPNI - Jerusalem

2:30 - Food as Path for Cultural Restoration - Dr. Gary Nabhan
3:30 - Action-Planning
Moshe Basson, Naomi Tsur, Eilon Schwartz, Yitzik Gaziel, Ula Biran

4:30 - Heirloom Seed Exchange and Wild Food Tasting
Bring your open-pollinated seeds and wild edibles to share.

 
Keynote Speakers

 

Dr. Gary Paul Nabhan

 
A 'Johnny Appleseed' of the remaining genetic riches of the world, Gary (an Arab-American with family roots in Lebanon) cross-pollinates traditional ethnic knowledge and cutting- edge science; working landscapes and wildness. Dr. Nabhan's books include: 'Coming Home to Eat; The Pleasures and Politics of Local Food', 'Enduring Seeds: Native American Agriculture and Wild Plant Conservation', 'Geography of Childhood - Why Children Need Wild Places', 'Forgotten Pollinators' - integrating biology, agroecology, ethnobotany, and cultural geography. Co-founder of <nativeseeds.org> and on the board of Seed-Savers Exchange. <seedsavers.org>

Article: Listening to the Other http://www.oriononline.org/pages/om/04-3om/Nabhan.html

 Renewing Biblical Food Traditions for Today

Food historian, storyteller and restaurateur Moshe Basson, scours the hills of Jerusalem as well as local traditions and ancient writings for foodstuffs and methods for an authentic Jerusalem cuisine. Moshe tramps through unkempt fields and overgrown gardens, "sometimes in the middle of town, sometimes in the mountains," to find humble delicacies like khubeiza, a mallow akin to spinach. He plucks sage and sumac, saffron and thyme, hissop and even dandelions. Walking the ancient hills, telling stories of Jerusalem history, experimenting with cyclamen, green almonds and wild asparagus, from the childhood smells of his parents bakery in Beit Safafa to his mother's tomato and mint soup, Basson evokes the foods that have influenced Jerusalem cuisine through the generations.

 

Moshe Basson


Did you know:

The first book of the Mishnah, 'The Ways of Seeds' written down in ancient Israel between the 2nd and 5th century, is about Seeds, Farming and Blessings.

'Blessing is only possible in things hidden from sight, as it is said,
'The Lord will command the blessing with thee in thy barns.'
Blessing is only possible with things not under the direct control of the eye.

Our rabbi taught: On entering a barn to measure the new grain, say:
'May it be Thy will to send blessings on the work of our hands.'
When one begins to measure:
'Blessed be the Source of Life that sends blessings into this heap.'

But if one has already measured the grain, the prayer is in vain, because blessing is not to be found in anything that has already been weighed, measured or numbered, but only in a thing hidden from sight. " Taanith 8b

Rabbi Ahai ben Josiah said, 'He who buys grain in the market, to what may he be compared? To a child who is cut off from his mother, and although it is taken to homes of wetnurses, it is not satisfied. And he who buys bread in the market, to what is he compared? To a man who digs his own grave - a wretched, precarious existence. But he who eats of his own produce is like a child reared at his mother's breast.' Avot d'Rabbi Nathan 29a

'G-d created the world so that all shall live in pleasantness, that all shall be equal, that one shall not lord over the other, and that all may cultivate the land. However, when warrior-minded people multiplied they began to rely on their might, and left off cultivating the land an turned to robbery. '
Hochmat haNefesh 22b, Elezar Judah of Worms 13th cent.

Sataf Bustan Chai