From KCRW, I'm Evan Klyman, and you're listening to good food.

Although she's lived abroad most of her life, Gaza is where journalist and

active as Leila El Hadad calls home. Growing up and as an adult she would visit

Gaza to spend time with her extended family.

She also spent years reporting on the region for Al Jazeera.

During that time, she launched the blog,

Gaza Mom, which she eventually turned into a book of the same name.

In 2012, she co-wrote the cookbook, The Gaza Kitchen,

which was republished a few years ago in an updated third edition.

Most recently, Lela has written an essay for Savor, a cuisine under siege, about keeping her family's recipes alive,

as well as an op-bed for the Los Angeles Times about trying to find

solace during this year's Ramadan.

Hi Lela, welcome to Good Food.

Thank you for having me.

Tell us a bit about your family background.

Where are your parents and grandparents from?

My parents are both from Gaza, born and raised in Gaza City and southern Gaza's town of

Hanyunis, respectively.

My mother's maternal grandfather was Circassian, who was part of a persecuted group of Muslims from Sochi, and he married my great-grandmother who herself was Kurdish from Damascus and they had my

grandmother who was born in Palestine and my parents both met in Gaza as

newly minted doctors after finishing medical school, got married there, and eventually moved first to England

and then to the Gulf, Kuwait, and then Saudi Arabia.

...