Rewilding the Kitchen: Alfiyyah wa Alsafsaf

Nahla Tabbaa is an interdisciplinary  artist, chef and curator whose practice explores tensions between the urban and the organic, the beautiful and the grotesque. Sensitive to the self-organising agency of materials, she adventures into the world of immateriality and the intangible through experiments in alchemy and combining elements from the organic and inorganic. As an act of resistance, she leans into alternative constructs of time and ancient practices as a way to summon magic in the mundane everyday. She sees our present state as a catastrophic dystopian world that can no longer be dismantled with human hands, but rather, she is seeking wisdom in the more-than-human world. Through working with invasive and indigenous plants, plant medicine, hiking, animal care and reading into regional mythology and folklore, her work moves towards a place where she can propose a new system of radical care and the sacred.

Her mediums are sculpture, drawing, alchemy, research and the culinary arts. 

Shereen is a Master Herbalist and co-founder of hikma rituals, a Dubai based herbal apothecary. She received her qualification with distinction from the College of Naturopathic Medicine (CNM) in the UK. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics from University College London (UCL).

Born and raised in London to Iraqi parents, she embraced herbalism to reconnect with the earth and her Iraqi and Kurdish ancestry. Her childhood, steeped in folk remedies from her grandmothers, fostered a deep connection to nature despite her urban upbringing. Shereen is passionate about the bond between humans and the earth, exploring natural healing and the preservation of SWANA-region plants as a tool for land stewardship.

Hikma Rituals offers a curated range of premium wellness products inspired by the cultural and botanical heritage of the region, designed to promote health and overall well-being. By blending tradition with modern aesthetics and sustainability, Hikma Rituals creates a unique and immersive customer experience, standing out in the crowded wellness market. Their mission is to reconnect individuals with traditional plant-based rituals through sustainable, culturally authentic wellness products. Hikma Rituals promotes regenerative farming and ecosystem preservation through its sustainable and ethical sourcing practices.

Rewilding the Kitchen is an alternative culinary school conceived and curated by Nahla Tabbaa since 2021. The school invites artists, chefs and writers to activate the kitchen, and ingredients as spaces of thought, critique, recipe development and experimentation. To ‘rewild’ is to restore a material or environment to its natural state; participants in this school are invited to embrace the rewilding of shared ingredients and food that are local and available within our daily life and surroundings. 

Since its conception, Rewilding the Kitchen has supported participants in producing recipes and culinary performances that are reflections of the personal practices, thoughts and memories- and has served as a milestone for artists wishing to explore food as an art medium. Nahla has commissioned her fellow chefs and collaborators to become session hosts, leading intimate and tailored workshops that combine making, tasting and reflecting.