Saving the world's most endangered food

Some dishes die out over time, but the Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity is working to stop that. Its Ark of Taste catalog helps food products survive by making them popular again and supporting producers unable to compete with industrial products.

The catalog already lists 5,000 food products from all over the world, and is open to further nominations. Anyone can suggest traditional local foods, including plants, animal species and transformed products, such as yak cheese and Pokot ash yoghurt, as long as they're artisanal and endangered.

The Gourmantché people in Burkina Faso's Tapoa region make a special honey from nectar that bees gather from an array of plants in the arid savannah. Local communities use it in traditional dishes and medicines, but also for celebrations and rituals. Tapoa honey marked a particular milestone for the Ark of Taste, as it was the 5,000th passenger to get on board.

Hidden between Norway's fjords, the small village of Undredal is home to 100 people and 500 goats. Together, they hold the secret of Geitost, an artisanal goat's cheese made from fresh raw milk. Cheesemakers add a splash of whole goat's milk and cow's milk cream to fresh whey. Following a boiling process, it is then cooked for 8 to 10 hours.

Industrial boats carrying fish from Mauritanian waters to Europe endanger both species and the livelihoods of local people. With a little help from local NGOs and Slow Food, the Imraguen women of Mauritania are trying to preserve traditional knowledge. They buy mullet from fishermen, extract the eggs, rinse and salt them, then let them dry naturally.

In Morocco's Souktana plateau, between 1,300 to 1,500 metres above sea level, a group of 11 producers farm small plots of the coveted spice, saffron. Between October and November, farmers and their families gather the saffron flowers at dawn when the petals are still closed. They then remove the crimson stigmas, the most valuable part of the flower.

Since French colonialists introduced vanilla to Madagascar, the country has become a leading producer of the spice. In the Mananara Nord Biosphere Reserve, vanilla grows in rainforests just a few meters above sea level. Farmers pollinate the plants by hand every dry morning between September and January and nurture them until the flowers assume the familiar form of black pods.

The Lesachtal valley in southern Austria has been home to a wide variety of cereal grains for over 4,000 years. Because rye was best able to stand the cold winters, rye flour became the basis for the typical Lesach valley bread - although the recipe also calls for a small amount of wheat flour. In times gone by, local families would bake a new batch of local bread every two to three weeks.

Don tea is not just any tea. This fermented green tea, also known as "doncha Jangheung" or "Cheongtaejeon" is produced with extreme care in Jangheung, southwestern South Korea. After a long artisanal process and six months of fermentation the tea is ready. But some keep it stored for up to twenty years to improve its flavor.