Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/index.php:52) in /customers/a/c/1/hadalsame.com/httpd.www/wp-includes/rest-api/class-wp-rest-server.php on line 1794 {"id":21915,"date":"2019-03-05T10:03:47","date_gmt":"2019-03-05T10:03:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/?p=21915"},"modified":"2019-03-05T10:03:47","modified_gmt":"2019-03-05T10:03:47","slug":"somali-entrepreneur-brings-more-than-african-flavors-to-america","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/2019\/03\/05\/somali-entrepreneur-brings-more-than-african-flavors-to-america\/","title":{"rendered":"Somali entrepreneur brings more than African flavors to America"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Hadalsame) 05 March 2019<\/strong> <\/span>– Somali entrepreneur Hawa Hassan doesn’t only want to please her customers’ palates: She also wants her food company to help bring communities together after it helped her bridge cultural divides and reconnect with her mother, from whom she was separated as a child for more than a decade.<\/p>\n

Hassan is the founder and CEO of Basbaas Somali Foods, a sauce company named after the Somali word for “chili.” “It would be like somebody making ketchup and calling [their company] ‘ketchup,'” she told CBS MoneyWatch.<\/p>\n

Basbaas, which launched in 2015, makes two original sauces that blend local Somali flavors and can be used as a substitute for salsa or ketchup. “The idea I want to get away from is that this is a specialty product,” Hassan said.<\/p>\n

“Longer tables and shorter fences”<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sure, the sauces are tempting, but Hassan has greater ambitions. She wants to use her sauces — and mealtime gatherings — to “tell deeper stories about where I come from.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

“I feel like I’m in a position every day to build longer tables and shorter fences by sharing my culture and myself and my sauces,” she said.<\/p>\n

When she was young, Hassan fled civil unrest in her native Somalia for a Kenyan refugee camp, and in 1993, at age seven, she moved to Seattle, where she was raised by an American family.<\/p>\n

She became a star basketball player and earned a college scholarship before she was recruited by a modeling scout and moved to New York City.<\/p>\n

She modeled for 14 years, but the lifestyle never suited her — she always looked forward to launching a business.<\/p>\n

“Lost in the shuffle of my life”<\/strong><\/p>\n

She reunited with her mother in 2008 in Oslo, Norway.<\/p>\n

“I grew up with an American family, and a bit of my culture had been lost in the shuffle of my life,” she said. “But I reconnected with my family over food as if not a beat had been skipped. The more I reconnected with my family and the closer I got to my mom and the deeper our relationship got via food, it was really evident to me that I wanted to tell stories that would have a deeper impact — just by making condiments.”<\/p>\n

The money she had saved from her first career allowed her to make a smooth transition from model to sauce master.<\/p>\n

She now hosts regular dinners through her company. “We host dinners, about six a year, to have conversations about what’s plaguing our society at the moment.” Legal service providers and elected officials are among the guests who gather to discuss topics including “Dreamers” and immigration.<\/p>\n

Soon, Basbaas will explore more regions in Africa to incorporate other countries’ flavors into the companies’ offerings.<\/p>\n

“Like every entrepreneur, I’d love to exit at some point,” she said. “But right now this is my baby, and I’m very attached.”<\/p>\n

BY MEGAN CERULLO<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Hadalsame Media<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Hadalsame) 05 March 2019 – Somali entrepreneur Hawa Hassan doesn’t only want to please her customers’ palates: She also wants her food company to help bring communities together after it helped her bridge cultural divides and reconnect with her mother, from whom she was separated as a child for more than a decade. Hassan is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21917,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/BB-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C600&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9Xl2P-5Ht","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21915"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21915"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21915\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21918,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21915\/revisions\/21918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hadalsame.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}