674: Sean Sherman Shares The Diverse Indigenous Foods of Turtle Island

In short

Podcast Summary: This Is TASTE - Episode 674: Sean Sherman Shares The Diverse Indigenous Foods of Turtle Island

Episode Overview Host: Aliza Abarbanel and Matt Rodbard Guest: Sean Sherman, an award-winning chef and activist from the Oglala Lakota Sioux tribe Secondary Guest: Natalia Rudin, author of *Cooking Fast and Slow* Release Date: [Date of Release] (not provided) Main Topics: Indigenous food traditions in North America, Sean Sherman's cookbook *Turtle Island*, the philosophy of decolonizing food.

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Key Themes and Discussions

Sean Sherman

Background and Culinary Journey

Early Life: Grew up on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota; his initial experiences with Indigenous foods were limited due to historical injustices that removed traditional food sources.
Career Path: Started working in restaurants at 13, eventually moving to Minneapolis where he became a chef.
Connection to Culture: Desire to revive Lakota food traditions led him to research Indigenous foods and their historical significance.

*Turtle Island* Cookbook

Research and Development: Involves years of research into Indigenous food systems across North America.
Philosophy: Focus on decolonizing Indigenous food, removing colonial ingredients (e.g., beef, dairy), and emphasizing local, wild ingredients.
Recipe Highlights:
*Papaw Hapi*: A traditional dish featuring dried bison and prairie turnip.
Emphasis on using indigenous ingredients, such as wild rice and various game meats.
Cultural Significance: The book aims to showcase the diversity of Indigenous cultures and cuisines, integrating knowledge and culinary practices from various tribes.

Owamni Restaurant

Restaurant Concept: Focuses on modern Indigenous cuisine, unique dining experience where all dishes are gluten-free, dairy-free, and sugar-free.
Sourcing Ingredients: Prioritizes local Indigenous producers and seasonal ingredients to create dishes that reflect the culture of the land.

Decolonization of Indigenous Cuisine

Culinary Philosophy: Not about recreating the past but envisioning a future where Indigenous foods thrive.
Educational Component: The work at Owamni and through the *Turtle Island* book aims to teach and normalize Indigenous food practices.

Natalia Rudin

Cooking Fast and Slow

Cookbook Overview: Combines quick recipes and slow, comforting dishes aimed at busy individuals.
Recipe Development: Focuses on making healthy, plant-based meals accessible and easy, utilizing flavor boosters for quicker dishes.

Personal Insights

Sean's Thoughts on Cuisine: Believes food should be an expression of place and culture.
Culinary Diversity: Reinforces the importance of recognizing the beauty in diverse food cultures.

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Key Takeaways

Cultural Revival: Sean Sherman emphasizes the need for Indigenous peoples to reclaim their food traditions, reflecting a living culture rather than an extinct one.
Innovative Cooking: Both Sean and Natalia advocate for adaptable, creative cooking methods that can fit into modern lifestyles while honoring traditional practices.
Social Responsibility: The work done through these books and restaurants aims to build a community around Indigenous foods and help support local economies through ethical sourcing.

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Additional Notes

Sean Sherman's journey reflects broader themes of identity, culture, and sustainability in food practices.
The conversation also touches on the importance of food access and knowledge sharing in Indigenous communities.

Listen to the Episode For more insights and details, listen to the full episode of *This Is TASTE* featuring Sean Sherman and Natalia Rudin.

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Transcript

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0:00This episode is brought to you by Resi and American Express. Resi is a digital platform that connects restaurants to restaurant lovers by elevating dining experiences, providing original industry content, and helping to fill some of the country's most exciting dining rooms. Because restaurants have always been more than just places to eat. The amazing world of restaurants is just a few taps away in the Resi app and at resi.com.

0:31We weren't trying to cook like we're a museum, you know, because we're often portrayed in museum settings as Indigenous peoples as an extinct race, you know, but obviously that's not the case. You know, we're futurists. What do we want our, you know, kids and grandkids to think about when they think about Indigenous foods? This is Taste. I'm your host, Eliza Barbanel.

0:59Sean Sherman is an award-winning chef, educator, author, and activist. A member of the Oglala Lakota Sioux Tribe, he is dedicated to reviving indigenous food traditions through his Minneapolis restaurant Awamni, the nonprofit Natives, and Cookbooks, including his fantastic new book, Turtle Island. Today on the show, we talk about the years of research that resulted in Turtle Island, decolonizing indigenous food traditions, and much more. Also on the show, I have a great conversation with Natalia Rudin. Natalia is the author of a terrific new book, Cooking Fast and Slow, easy, comforting, mostly plant-based recipes for busy people.

1:37I hope you enjoy this episode. Sean Sherman, this is Taze. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Thanks for having me. I've been an admirer of your work for a long time, and I'm really excited to get to speak with you especially about this book, Turtle Island, which I think is so special. To start off the conversation today, I want to just get a little bit of insight into who you are and your relationship with food, and I'm wondering if you could share an early food memory from growing up. So, you know, I grew up on Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, and Pine Ridge is the third largest reservation in the United States.

2:15And I'm enrolled with the Oglala Lakota there. And so I grew up there till just a little bit before high school. And growing up on the reservation, we lived out in the country. So out on the Great Plains, you're not too far from the Black Hills of South Dakota and also the Badlands of South Dakota, which is part of the reservation on Pine Ridge. So we spent a lot of time just outdoors as kids, you know, in the 70s and 80s and not a lot of TV watching. And there was no smartphones back then and stuff like that. So just a ton of time outside. And my mom moved me and my sister off the reservation right before I started high school.

2:53And we moved to a small town in the Black Hills on the western edge of South Dakota near Wyoming called Spearfish. And I started working in restaurants at a very young age. I was only 13 years old when I started working my restaurant career. And I did that all through high school and college. And then I just kind of moved to Minneapolis eventually, started continuing to work in restaurants and moved my way up to a chef. And eventually, you know, had a pretty good career, but went, you know, kind of realized the absence of indigenous foods at a certain point in my own heritage and being Lakota.

3:28So it kind of shot me on a path to want to understand indigenous foods and my Lakota foods and, you know, kind of bringing me where I am today. And, you know, there's quite a few different food memories growing up on the reservation of various pinpoints of utilizing indigenous foods. But largely our indigenous foods were removed from us just because of the history of things and how, you know, indigenous peoples were treated because it wasn't a unique story for us as Lakotaks that happened to indigenous peoples all over North America. Yeah, I think that's such a great kind of quick encapsulation of what's a, you know, very nuanced and lengthy career.

4:03I don't know if there's maybe a memory from when you started cooking more Lakota food, indigenous food of a dish that you felt like was kind of encapsulating your passion and your interest in what you want to be doing that you would share. You know, I think that over, you know, for me, like some of the basics that we grew up with, we harvested a lot of wild choke terries out there on the plains. We harvested a wild prairie turnip called Timsula. That's a really important staple also for a lot of Lakota people. So we hunted a lot and we had a lot of grouse and pheasant and elk and rabbits and things like that, duck and geese.

4:38And so we did have some wild game around, but a lot of times our foods were commodity food program foods, a lot of canned government USDA style foods that came in kind of black and white cans with a UPC symbol on it. So things like beef with juices and chicken with juices and government cheese and powdered milk and things like that. And so for me, like when I started really focusing on indigenous foods, I, you know, it was an education that I kind of had to search for because there was no one cookbook that kind of encapsulated what I was looking for. because I was just trying to understand, like, what were people doing before European influence and before colonization?

5:15You know, what were we eating? What did we use for salt and fats and sugars? And, you know, what were we storing? What was our food preservation methods? You know, what kind of animals did we use? Which parts of the plants did we use? And just all these questions that I just kind of started sleuthing towards having a better understanding of what indigenous food systems were for my tribe specifically to start with. And then I kind of branched out and started researching other tribes too. And, you know, today we're looking at the entirety of North America. But when we're doing these very regional foods, like especially in the cookbook, it was fun to be able to do some from my home.

5:47And there's one called a papaw hapi, which is basically kind of a dried bison and timsula soup, which is that prairie turnip. And I think that one was really fun because to me, that one was super traditional and it was utilizing just those indigenous ingredients. And then it was really just, to me, tasted like home when we were testing that recipe and shooting that recipe. And that was something that was really fun. Yeah, I think there are so many recipes in this book that are so evocative that it's hard maybe to think about one that really stands out. But I think that certainly was one that I was noticing a lot.

6:22And we're talking a little bit about, I think, what seems to be a larger practice for you, which is decolonizing indigenous cuisine, removing ingredients that were brought over, you know, after the point of colonization that weren't like inherently traditional. Can you maybe speak a little bit about what that looks like in practice at your restaurant, O 'Wamni? So when I formed my business, which was called The Sous Chef, spelled S-I-O-U-X, back in 2014, I had been already working on this kind of indigenous food philosophy for a little while. And then had already started even doing some indigenous dinners previously to forming the company.

7:01But when I formed the company, I just kind of utilized the philosophy that I kind of put together myself, which was I wanted to showcase modern indigenous foods. And I wasn't trying to recreate the past and try to cook everything like it was super traditional. I was trying to reimagine what indigenous foods were moving forward because, you know, I'm a professional chef. We work in professional kitchens. We have modern equipment and all these kinds of things. And so I really just tried to utilize the basic techniques that people had to utilize for countless generations and understanding the components and the different wild foods and agricultural pieces that were out there in the game and utilizing my education as a chef to be able to put together an interpretation of what modern indigenous could be.

7:42So part of that was just cutting away colonial ingredients of things that had been introduced to North America. So I removed things like dairy, wheat flour, cane sugar, beef, pork, chicken, and really focused on wild game, on wild plants. because there's so much out depending on where you are in whatever region. But I was kind of focusing on the Great Lakes region at the time since I'm in Minneapolis and Minnesota. And, you know, searching for who still held indigenous seeds out there and working really closely with a lot of seed keepers and seed growers and, you know, utilizing a ton of game.

8:14So we've cooked all sorts of different animals. And, you know, the protein diversity in this book is pretty intense because you have everything from whale to iguana, you know, covering all of North America. So I think it's, you know, for me, that's the philosophy that we brought when I opened up Awamany, which is just keeping that same challenge of just using indigenous foods, you know, so creating a restaurant that was completely gluten-free, dairy-free, sugar-free, soy-free, pork-free. And, you know, it's a really amazing, healthy food base, but it also is just really modern indigenous. and we continue to just, you know, utilize that challenge.

8:47And I just think there's a ton of room out there for more and more indigenous restaurants to feature region and, you know, feature the different chefs' interpretations of what they want to portray, you know, because we cut out things like fry bread because for us it just didn't fit in the philosophy that we're utilizing. But that doesn't mean like things like those components can't be there for other people. It's just we were kind of doing our own thing. Yeah, I think having that kind of focus, Focus, it seems to be really kind of creatively exciting because it's not just about removing ingredients.

9:16It's about making space to bring in other indigenous ingredients. And I think as a restaurant, you have this ability to be, you know, building relationships with suppliers and providing them with a economic base as well. I don't know. You spoke a little bit about working with seed keepers. if there are any ingredients that often appear in a Womni's kitchen that you maybe, you know, got to seek out a special supplier for or kind of like develop that kind of relationship with. Well, part of our work, you know, is really just trying to create more food access to normalize more indigenous foods to secure and steward a lot of indigenous knowledge and education.

9:55And so everything we do has gone through the nonprofit that I also founded called Natives, which is North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems or NATIFS. And under Natives, the restaurant Awamany is a part of that group also because we wanted to utilize the restaurant as a tool because restaurants don't really serve a purpose for food access or food relief, but they create a lot of jobs because we have over 120 employees at that one restaurant. And we're able to move a ton of food product because we intentionally purchased from indigenous producers locally, regionally first, and then nationally.

10:30And we've created an online market too. So we have under Natives, if people followed our website, they could find our online store where we feature a whole bunch of retail stuff because we have over 80 different indigenous food producers that we've been able to connect with over the years and feature on the online market depending on availability. And so part of the work was just trying to push a lot of money towards indigenous producers around us first and then supporting indigenous producers nationally. So we build our menus with those kinds of availability. So we have a lot of true wild rice coming from the Minnesota lakes.

11:05We have a lot of pure maple and honey coming from the tribes. We work with some indigenous farms close by. We buy some indigenous raised bison. We work with some native fisheries in Minnesota and Wisconsin. And we, you know, just try to utilize as much as we can. People bring us a lot of wild harvested foods. So we're using a lot of berries and different kinds of greens and tree pieces that we utilize in our foods like conifers, especially with cedars and balsam fir and birch and all these other kinds of things that come from just where we happen to be, you know. So that was kind of the challenge was just trying to make food taste like a place, you know, and creating dishes that reflected that, that also reflected culture.

11:47and we don't primarily stick with just where we are in the Midwest here in the Great Lakes region. We kind of will build dishes from other parts of North America, kind of like you find in the books. We might have a dish that represents the Pacific Northwest or the Southwest or even Mexico from an indigenous lens or Alaska from an indigenous lens. So it's been a lot of fun just to kind of like rove around and feature all these different dishes that really speak to places, but also have indigenous components, you know, coming from indigenous producers and knowing that every dish you buy has food dollars going towards those producers.

12:22Yeah, it's a really nice web of interconnectivity, I think, between Natives and Awamni and then now this book, Turtle Island, as well. Hi there, it's Matt, co-host of the show. We are currently running a This Is Taste listener survey, and we'd love to hear from you. Do you have a guest request, a restaurant you wish we'd visit to talk about on Three Things. What about a lesser-known cookbook author who deserves a spot in our studio chair? You can let us know by clicking the link in our show notes to complete the survey. It will only take a couple minutes, I swear, and will help us continue to make the best show possible.

13:01That's the This Is Taste listener survey, link in our show notes. From February 20th to March 7th, dive into Canada's biggest culinary festival, Montreal en Lumière, an exclusive partnership with the McCord Stewart Museum and its exhibition, On the Menu Montreal, a restaurant story. The 2026 festival invites food lovers on a flavorful journey through time. Montreal's top restaurateurs will reimagine 65 years of the city's iconic astronomy, crafting inventive, nostalgia-inspired dishes with a modern twist. Prepare your palate. World-renowned chefs, including several Michelin-starred talents, will team up with over 80 of Montreal's finest local chefs to create unforgettable, one-of-a-kind menus.

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15:07That's A-U-R-A frames dot com, promo code TASTE. The deal is exclusive to listeners and frame sell out fast, so order yours now to get in time for the holidays. Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply. I want to kind of speak about this book more because it just seems like it required so much beautiful effort and time to put together. It's so thorough and expansive. Can you maybe speak to a little bit about what was the inspiration for this book and what kind of food ways it encompasses? Well, after the success of the very first book, which originally I didn't think it was going to be anything too big, I wanted to create a book to utilize for a lot of the education, for a lot of the travel, and events that I was doing early on, and that kind of became its own thing.

15:57but um so i wanted to obviously do something more robust and um so i wrote out a couple of different book proposals but this one was an idea of just like trying to highlight and showcase to people like the vast diversity of indigenous cultures erasing colonial borders and looking at north america as a whole and understanding like there's so much amazing beauty and diversity when it comes to food and agriculture and culture and people and animals um and that we can be you know considered that a lot of these things you're not going to find in your local whole foods you know so a lot of that some of these recipes you'll be lucky to have if you happen to be in the right region with the right people at the right time you know and so we wanted to showcase something special and different to kind of highlight that and you know and there's so much out there like all we could really do is barely scratch the surface because every single chapter in the book could really literally be its own book if you wanted to dig down deep and so there's so much to explore.

16:54There's so much to understand. There's so much to regain when it comes to indigenous knowledges. And that's what the book was kind of written with that purpose of just highlighting that beautiful tapestry of diversity. Yeah, it kind of spans from north to south from, you know, up in the Arctic down to like what is today, southern Mexico. I'm curious how you handled the kind of like research and development process. Did you work regionally or how did you kind of like, you know, do the work to make this book kind of span everything that it does today? Yeah. So I'd already, you know, with the career, with my company starting in 2014, like right away, I started traveling around and visiting indigenous communities because I was being asked to come and talk about the work, to come and do pop-up dinners and come and like do trainings and education and things like that.

17:44And so over the span of the past decade, I've been able to travel to basically every region of the U.S., parts of Canada, many different places in Mexico, up in Alaska, and really connect with a lot of indigenous peoples all over the place. Not only even in the U.S., but globally, too, because we've connected with indigenous peoples in South America and Africa and India and Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, places like that. I'm in Hawaii, of course. And so for, you know, for me, I had that background already. And so I'd already had a lot of the connections across the continental U.S. I had some really strong connections in Mexico because I lived on the Pacific Northwest in the state of Nairit for a while when I kind of launched my career into this direction.

18:32and we've spent a lot of time in different parts of Mexico and being lucky to be able to be up really kind of exploring like indigenous Alaska and stuff like that and talking with a lot of indigenous chefs in Canada. So there was already kind of a base work and it was really nice to bring on the two co-authors with Kate Nelson and Kristen Donnelly because Kate Nelson is also from Minnesota. She's Alaskan native and she grew up here in Minnesota but she's also a journalist. And it was really wonderful to work with her to be able to utilize her journalistic skills to kind of go out there and really help to find some of the storytelling in the various regions, you know, when we're kind of putting this whole thing together.

19:13And for Kristen, just working with me, especially on a lot of the recipes and trying to get them all out there and trying to keep everything balanced and, you know, just wrangling everything that was putting together a really complex book. Yeah. You mentioned earlier, just the wide expanse of proteins that appear in this book when you were working on the recipes, like how did that go for you to be, you know, trying to like access all of these ingredients? I mean, we had a lot of proteins, especially because we had more recipes than we were able to fit in, you know, because we turned in a massive manuscript when we put this down.

19:47And, but we were, when we were doing recipe testing, you know, we were able to find things and we had a lot of this because my partner Mecca, Bas, was doing a lot of the recipe test in the beginning days. And then her friend Tess Puschka came in and helped out towards the end because there was a lot. And so we, for a while, we just had all sorts of random stuff coming in to the house with, you know, iguana meat and bear meat and moose meat and beaver meat and all of these things coming in from everywhere, you know, and being down in Mexico where there's just obviously a lot of insect proteins, especially if you're like way down in Oaxaca and stuff like that.

20:21And so it was really interesting just to be able to not only dream up a lot of these recipes, and again, because the large majority of these recipes were really kind of, you know, fitting into the challenge of trying to, you know, how can we make some indigenous recipes that really represent these various regions and, you know, kind of decolonizing a lot of these pieces everywhere. And, you know, even, you know, some of the Mexican recipes, because we're not using a lot of things that people might typically, you know, just there's a lot of colonial ingredients added on Mexican food, even though it's largely indigenous, we still had to decolonize some of it, you know, so we're removing pork and pork fat and cheese and cilantro and even citrus, you know, so there was a lot of challenges creating some of these recipes to be balanced and to still tell a story and to still, you know, highlight indigenous producers and all this diversity with plants and protein.

21:13Yeah, it's so interesting. I didn't realize that cilantro is not indigenous to Mexico, but I think that just shows kind of the globalization of the foods that we have today, that things that we think of as being so core to a cuisine originally were not. Yeah, absolutely. And there's a lot of things that might surprise people, but, you know, we've been working on this challenge because we've been running Awamany for four and a half years now straight. And, you know, there's, we've learned how to adapt pretty easily over time, just with what might seem as kind of limiting, but like we have way more plant and protein diversity on our menu than basically any restaurant around us, you know?

21:50Yeah. So I feel like there's so much to explore out there. And, you know, and there's other things that I have likes because there's a different herb called culantro that's down in Mexico that has a very similar, you know, profile of cilantro. And so there's like, we're always finding little pieces like that to balance out that because we need, you know, sweet and tart and salty and all these things to make food fun and taste good. And, you know, so it's, but, you know, that's just the challenge we've been working with for a long time. And we just see so much opportunity out there to see more and more of these kinds of indigenous focused restaurants everywhere.

22:22Definitely. I'm curious as a chef, if you felt that it was different to be developing recipes for food that's going to be in the restaurant versus a recipe in a cookbook for a home cushion. Yeah. I mean, cause you know, some things like there's some gray areas when it comes to some of the proteins we're legally able to utilize in the United States, you know, so it can be really difficult to, if you're considering to try to put something like beaver or iguana on the menu because they aren't classified as the proteins that we are supposed to use, you know, from a governmental perspective. But from indigenous perspectives, people have been eating all sorts of protein diversity because literally anything moving around, you know, can be protein if you want it to be.

23:06And, you know, but, you know, for a lot of our education, it's really focused on plants because there are a lot of plant-based recipes throughout the book and you know and we're not using dairy and cheese and cream so a lot of thing is completely plant-based and there's just you know and again an immense amount of plant diversity and also again it's just that it was really hard to pick and choose which ones to feature because and which tribal communities to feature because there's so much diversity out there you know we have 573 tribes across the U.S. 622 in Canada I believe and you know well over 20 percent of Mexico identifies as indigenous.

23:40And there's just so much indigenous diversity out there. Yeah. How did you kind of approach that narrowing down of what to include in the book? You know, it was just tough choices. A lot of it came to some of the connections and networks and stories that we've already had. And so a lot of it just came to experience, you know, of who we had already worked with in various regions, knowing that there's so many more tribes in a lot of these areas, you know, and trying to acknowledge as many as we can. But it's just, it's almost impossible with the amount of diversity that's out there. And so again, unless you like made a book out of every single chapter and featured every single region distinctly, then maybe you could start to highlight and share a lot more of the various cultures in each region.

24:21And so, and you know, and kind of intentionally, I broke up the book into 13 chapters because Turtle Island is kind of a notion for a lot of tribes. So there's kind of a multicultural notion of the world being born on the back of a turtle shell. And, you know, if you look at the back of a turtle shell, turtle shells are oftentimes used in many different indigenous cultures for ceremonial pieces and stuff like that, because there's 13 segments on the back of a turtle shell. And those were also used as moon calendars because there's 13 moons. And so it seemed really fitting to be able to utilize that number 13 for the chapters to break up North America in this book titled Turtle Island.

25:03Yeah, I think it's a perfect name. And I didn't know about the 13 significance with the chapters, but I really like that from an organizing perspective. It's a nice symbolism. When you're developing the recipes, I think for Turtle Island, maybe for just Awamni as well, how do you approach wanting to be preserving traditions versus offering your own kind of personal or like contemporary adaptation of something? Well, I think it's a little bit of balance. I think it's nice to show some traditional recipes that are still really wonderful and easy to recreate, you know. But I think it's also important to remember that we weren't trying to be traditionalists.

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25:44We weren't trying to cook like we're a museum, you know, because we're often portrayed in museum settings as indigenous peoples as an extinct race, you know. But obviously that's not the case because there's massive populations of indigenous peoples across Turtle Island still today. And so we wanted to, you know, we're futurists. We wanted to be able to envision a future of what do we want our kids and grandkids to think about when they think about indigenous foods. And, you know, we're trying to normalize the notion of that because it's almost ridiculous that we don't have native restaurants everywhere across the country, you know, especially with massive food capitals.

26:22like in New York City, where you can find food from all over the planet and just not food that represents the land you're standing on. Yeah, absolutely. I just think it's important to have that awareness there. I want to kind of drill into the recipes in the book a little bit more. Is there a recipe that you would kind of encourage people to make first as a starting point? Oh, there's so many recipes. So I guess I would just encourage people to start with their own region. So if you're on the East Coast or if you're on the West Coast, to kind of look and start there because then you can start to see some of the wild plants of that particular region, you know, so you can think about the seasons a little bit differently, like when you're hitting spring and summer and fall and winter, and like what are the various points that you can utilize there.

27:06So I think that's kind of the fun part of it is that you can look at every region in a different lens, you know, and kind of just think about what are the flavors that really represent that region and the cultures that are still there. And again, I think that's where people should really kind of consider the starting point. Because again, there's so many recipes in this book. Yeah, I think that is such a great way to navigate it. And that's exactly what I did as someone who's, you know, here in New York is go to that section. And I think especially today when because of the globalization of grocery stores, you can get, you know, so many cultivated things from all over the world any time of year, any season to look and think about like, what are the wild ingredients where I am?

27:47Could I even find those? If not, like, how would I go about finding them is such a kind of orienting exercise to do. Absolutely. But I think it's going to be fun for people. And again, especially if you're traveling down into Mexico, you know, you can start to see like there's this invisible border that really doesn't mean that much historically, you know, and, you know, even though there's people speaking Spanish on one side of the border and English on the other side of the border, those are both European colonial languages. Like that shouldn't divide us, you know? And so we should really understand like celebrating diversity instead of trying to fear monger and be afraid of things that are different from us.

28:26And so I hope that people can start to see the beauty in diversity through this lens also. I mean, because we live in such a weird age, right? You know, with all of this, you know, dehumanization of people, especially coming from Mexico, it's just so intense, you know, and there's really no reason for it at all because there's so much amazing and beautiful culture and we should really be focused on centering our dials towards just being humans and wanting to, you know, not have to focus on division and the notion that there's one race that's superior to other races, you know, because we're all human together.

29:01Yeah, absolutely. I completely agree with that. Something you mentioned a little earlier was just about how it is so uncommon to have Native American indigenous restaurants here. I know you've been doing this work for a long time. I'm curious if you've seen any kind of like evolution in like the amount of like pop-ups or indigenous restaurants that do exist or if it seems that there hasn't been a lot of kind of shifts there yet. I know. I think there's been a lot of movement. And, you know, because in the very beginning days, there was just a couple of us that were kind of focused as chefs on indigenous foods across the country.

29:37There was like myself, Nephi Craig in Arizona, Lois Allen Frank. And there was just a handful of us, you know. But nowadays, like, there's just so much. We're seeing more and more indigenous operations happening. We're starting to see more indigenous restaurants starting to appear, like in Portland and San Francisco and, you know, in other places. And we're starting to just see more chefs starting to come out. Because we're having a big Native Nutritional Conference in a few days here in Minneapolis. And we're bringing in about 14 different Native chefs from all over the country to kind of all work together for a couple of days.

30:13And so it's been exciting to see how much movement and just how much attention our work has created, especially that first book has over 100 ,000 copies out there today. And I just have a lot of high expectations for this new book, which I think is obviously a lot broader and I think can reach a much larger audience also. Yeah, I think your first book, which was The Sous Chef, right? In 2017. 2019. Exactly. It was such a, I remember I was working at Bon Appetit at the time. And when the book came out, getting an early copy and getting to sit down with it, I think it did kind of raise so much awareness.

30:52And now to be able to be kind of expanding your own books you've written and also expanding the focus of what the topics are is just really like heartening. And I think you're right that it will kind of have its own moment as well. Yeah. And it's just beautiful too. Like, I'm just really happy the way it turned out with everything, with the artwork. You know, we found a wonderful indigenous artist to be able to put this together, Jimmy Dean. He did an amazing job in the photography. And, you know, because we used my friend David Alvarado, who lives in Mexico City. And we also used my friend Jada Gray Eagle, who lives here in Minneapolis and is also from Pine Ridge.

31:29And it was really fun just to put together this team to create something. And I don't think any of us could be happier with just the way it turned out and just how beautiful it looks. Yeah. I want to ask you about something that you did recently, which is like a lifetime dream of mine, which is you got to go on Sesame Street. Right. That was super fun. Yeah. What was that like? How was Grover in person? It was super cool. And the gentleman playing Grover said he'd been Grover for nearly 20 years or something like that. And it was a lot of fun. I hope that, I guess any kid could only dream of something like that.

32:01But I grew up with Sesame Street because growing up on Pine Ridge, TV wasn't much of an option and we had maybe two channels that would reach us. And one of those was our PBS channel. So we grew up with a lot of Sesame Street and it really helped a lot. And I hope people can really see the beauty and just the education that PBS and Sesame Street in particular brought out there, especially to areas where we couldn't afford cable growing up because that wasn't the option for us. And it was really important to have that outside perspective and the way they showcase diversity and just morals and values in general.

32:41So I think it's really important. I think it's really crazy that people are trying to dismantle something like PBS and Sesame Street. Right. Yeah, it is exactly the opposite of what should be happening with a program like that. And I think it must be so meaningful to grow up with that and then be able to be on it as an adult, kind of sharing your own work. And I think Grover was trying to come work at the restaurant, right? Yeah, exactly. It would have been fun to do one with Cookie Monster, too, but Grover was pretty awesome. Yeah, I think Cookie Monster would be a whole other, maybe for the next time you go on.

33:14Hopefully, I can cross my fingers. I don't want to be like breaking the fourth wall too much, but I'm just curious, like logistically when you're shooting with Grover, like do you see the puppeteer or is he like out of sight? No, he's just like right down below you. He's just like kneeling? Because he's got his hands down there. So he's just kind of down there on the floor below you and you're in the frame with Grover and stuff, you know, but he's right there and his voice is there. But, you know, you just focus on the puppet and you're like, you're talking to that puppet. You're talking to Grover.

33:44Like literally, he's got the voice. He's got everything. And, you know, so it was pretty easy because it felt like you're just talking to Grover. Yeah. It's like seeing a celebrity. Yeah, exactly. I also was wondering, like one of the things I really loved reading in this book was these kind of memories of your teenage self working at this, like, I don't want to say cursed, but it seemed like a very chaotic, like steak restaurant. Right. Yeah. I mean, that's restaurants are chaotic in general, but yeah, it was fun to put down some of those old like kitchen memories, you know, because it was such a different time back.

34:17That was like in the, I don't know, late 80s, early 90s, somewhere in that time frame. But things were just different back then, you know? Yeah. You're like 17 years old grilling like 100 orders of filet mignon a night blasting Black Sabbath. It was pretty weird in some, I feel like, because it was like$4.95 for a filet mignon. Because back in the day, the casinos used to have those kind of really crazy food specials to draw people in. But there was no infrastructure support systems. It was just me and a dishwasher. Rocking it out, listening to Black Sabbath. And I was curious, when you're in the kitchen today, either in the restaurant or at home, what kind of music you're listening to?

34:58Oh, I've always loved music. So I have way too many albums, especially vinyl, you know, and so I've been collecting vinyl since I was born. And so it's always, I've always had a vinyl collection. And so I just, my music taste is all over the board because I just really, really love music. And so I just, for me, music is like food. It's just kind of a matter of taste and what's going on at the moment. And there's kind of a time and place for so much, you know, and I love having a diversified list. So, you know, I play a lot of classical in the morning, a lot of jazz throughout the day. Sometimes I'll play something really heavy.

35:33Sometimes I'll play something a little, you know, psychedelic or just kind of out there. It just depends on the mood, you know, so it's just a lot of fun. How do you organize your vinyl? I try to alphabetically the best I can, but it's always hard to put everything back in order. So that's a constant challenge when you have, you know, because I don't know how much vinyl I have, but probably 1 ,500 pieces or something, you know. So it's a lot to keep it organized all the time. Wow. I can't even imagine having that much. I feel like I have a hard time putting mine away, and I have much, much, much less than that.

36:08I know. And I just put it off because it'll just have a stack of records that should be going back in order, and they just sit there waiting for their day. yeah but I think that's you know part of the perk of having such a big collection is um you know it's hard to put everything back maybe yeah exactly because you have some favorites that just kind of stay out on rotation for a while too so yeah that makes sense it's seasonal yeah to close today I want to play a rapid fire game with you so I'm going to ask you some questions and you'll just kind of give me the first answer that comes to mind okay okay um your favorite season for cooking?

36:44That's kind of a tough one. I'm going to say I really enjoy winter cooking, actually, because I have a fireplace at my house in Minnesota, and I have a setup so I can just cook a pot right over the fire inside. And it's fun to do some of those slow cooking recipes that just last the whole long day, and you just kind of fill the house up with whatever the smells of what you're cooking, you know? So I really enjoy, I really enjoy that piece. So I'll say winter just to start. Yeah. It sounds really cozy. Okay. Your favorite cookbook right now, that's not one of your own. Oh, that's another tough question.

37:23I feel like I'm getting a cookbook every day almost. Yeah. It's that season. The one that I really liked this last year was actually Black Food by Brian Terry. I just really liked the storytelling throughout there. And I liked kind of felt like a community almost, you know, with the way they put that book together. And I just thought it was really, really super cool. Yeah, it's a great book. Okay, your go-to late night snack? I just like popcorn, you know, it is indigenous. I just like keeping it simple. So I don't really have much of a sweet tooth. Like I might eat like a single square of dark chocolate sometimes.

38:00But I really, you know, I think popcorn's probably been more of a go-to snack for me when I'm just kind of hanging out. Do you use any kind of seasoning with it? I particularly like just really good olive oil and salt. I like to keep it really simple. Yum. Okay. Your favorite item on the menu at Awamni right now? You know, well, we have some really amazing giant bison steaks that people really like, but the go-to favorite at Awamni has always been just these roasted and grilled sweet potatoes with this maple chili crisp oil. It's so simple, but it's so good. And, you know, we put that, that's the one piece that's been on the menu from the very beginning for four and a half years because we've pretty much swapped everything else out because we changed that menu four times a year.

38:43I mean, that one's just been a lasting staple. And, you know, that recipe came about just for my time living down in Mexico and a lot of the flavors that were down there. And just, you know, seeing the comote wander around town with their little steam carts, And that really, really loud whistle that they'll just blow some of the steam out and let them know you're coming. But you can hear them roving the streets. And you get the big roasted steamed sweet potato with some chili and salt and maple. Or not maple, sorry, some chili and salt usually down in Mexico. But we added the maple to it to kind of give it a little roundness and sweetness.

39:19And it's just a cool dish. Yeah, it sounds so delicious. And the comote whistle, the first time I heard that, I will never forget. what is that usually early in the evening when dinner's starting you know but yeah you can't miss it that's so good your favorite ice cream flavor oh you know again like I don't have a massive sweet tooth and so I always lean into just kind of a darker chocolate if I can because I like a little bit of that bitter your most used utensil or cooking tool besides a knife you could say knife yeah probably a knife I mean I always have a knife in my pocket just because I've always carried a pocket knife just since I was a kid.

39:59And I always have, you know, I have a lot of knives because I'm a chef. And so, yeah, it has to be a knife. Okay. An indigenous American ingredient that you think is like underrated or like more people should be using? Oh, I think there's a lot of cool stuff out there. You know, maybe like West, I mean, almost every region's got something that's underutilized. Why don't we say pawpaw because it's one of the coolest fruits in North America and people rarely know what it is unless you, you know, there's definitely a handful of people that have obviously know what it is, but like so many Americans are just completely unaware that there's this massive like mango banana, almost like fruit that's growing in places like New York and Michigan and Ohio and that whole upper area, you know?

40:46Yeah. And it's about to be in season, I believe. Yeah. It should be in season right now if it hadn't just passed somewhere right, around now, I suppose. We don't have them out here in the Great Lakes, so I'm not as familiar with the exact season, but I know. And plus, climate change is switching things slightly, but it should be about now-ish. Yeah, it's like a custard apple almost. I haven't tried one yet, but I have recently encountered somebody who is sourcing them here in New York, so I'm eagerly awaiting. They're beautiful. There's a guy up on the, I guess it's just Hudson River up there, just on the west side.

41:23And he's growing kind of like a forgotten fruit farm. And so that's one of them that he has there. So a lot of papas up there. That's so cool. Do you remember the name of that farm? I don't. I would have to look it up. You're all good. But he has things like American persimmon and stuff like that. Yeah, I love that. Okay, final question. Is a fictional food scene, like from a book or movie or something, made up that you wish you could magically eat in real life? Oh, that's a tough one. You know, I watch a lot of sci-fi, so I'd have to go with trying those weird techno boxes where you just dial something and a little laser zap some meal in front of you.

41:59Because why not? Because I feel like if you had that technology, you could do anything you wanted to. So I think that would be super fun to play with. Yeah, you could be sourcing all kinds of ingredients with that, too. Why not? Yeah. There's a whole bunch of moral issues packed into that somewhere, I'm sure. But I think it sounds pretty cool to try. Yeah, we can, in our fantasy, have it be perfectly ethical. Right. Well, I wish you could get one of those boxes because I would love to know what you would make with it. But in the meantime, there's a lot of great recipes in this book to explore.

42:31And thank you so much for coming on the show, Sean. It's been so fun talking with you. Absolutely. Thanks again for having me.

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44:03Visit butcherbox.com slash taste to get this limited-time offer and free shipping always. That's butcherbox.com slash taste. Don't forget to use our link so they know we sent you. Natalia Rudin, welcome. This is Taste. Great to meet you. Great to be here. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to chat about your book and your life online and offline. Can we go there? Let's do it. Well, first I want to know, you are in the States for a few days. In New York, where are you dining out right now? Well, my list is extensive. And honestly, I don't have enough time here to get through all of it. But the first night I went to Isodi, which is one of my favorites downtown.

44:45Oh, it's so good. The lasagna. I really love Italian food. So that really hits the spot for me. Another place around the corner is Via Corotta. I also really love that. Places that I haven't been able to get to that I'm going to have to do on another trip is the Four Horsemen. Dying to go there. And then Malatesta. Yeah, Malatesta. Sure. Good choice. Yeah. Those are a couple of where I've been dining out. And then obviously heading up the bagel spots. Yeah. Did Russ and Daughters, Apollo Bagels, and a third one, which is completely escaping me now. Are you missing bagels in London? What's the story like right now?

45:19It's not so much that we're missing bagels. They're just not as good. They just aren't. I don't know. Apollo Bagels is by far the best, I think, for me that I've had in New York. I just think it's so good. But the toasting of them, they're just so... The bagel hype is slowly manifesting in London. I've heard. I've heard there's some spots. Are you going to hit Courage in LA? Yes. Yes. I figured you were. I am. I absolutely am. Yeah. What is it about bagels with you? Why do you love them so much? I don't know. I just think a sandwich for breakfast is kind of perfect. It's like on the go. It's quick.

45:51I love bread as well. I'm a big carbs girl. And if you look in my cookbook, you'll know that about me. So starting with like some heavy carbs at breakfast is perfect for me. And so in London, are you in your home kitchen mostly? Are you like a restaurant hound? What's your balance like there? I'm in my kitchen during the day. And ideally at nighttime, I'm in a restaurant. Love that. Or I'm eating from a takeout box. I think there's a lot of people who work in the food industry, cooking all day. By the time it comes to the evening, you really just don't want to be cooking for yourself. So it's either going out, eating takeout or like pot noodle over the sink.

46:30So what's the rotation like in London? I was there in January. So things change. Restaurant-wise. Yeah, restaurant-wise. Things change. there's lots of hot spots i would say my favorite restaurants at the moment as you say it does change is the place called berenjak which does incredible persian food i'm a big persian food lover um and then there's a place that i went to recently called the fat badger which just recently opened as part of a group of pubs that are kind of like notoriously famed for their sort of modern british pub food it's really delicious there's the head chef is a guy called george and And he's just a bit of a magician with food.

47:07And I love it because you sit down and there's no menu. So they just come over and they say like, okay, allergies, intolerances, anything you really don't like. And then you just let them know that and then they'll just bring food to your table. So it's like a tasting menu. Delicious. So you pay a fixed price. Fixed price, yeah. So what defines modern British pub food? I'm curious. I guess it's kind of a lot of it. I suppose now I would say there's a huge experimentation with nose to tail dining. So a lot of offal, like, you know, liver, tallow, all of these kind of things that people wouldn't necessarily always incorporate in their food.

47:43But then putting a bit of a modern twist on it, for example, one of the dishes that we had there was like a taco. And the taco was made of celeriac, which is obviously like quite a very common British vegetable that you'd get in the winter. And inside it was like a steak tartare that had been sort of drenched in beef tallow. And it was honestly the most divine thing I've ever eaten. But just very British ingredients, but with an interesting twist. Yeah, tallow on the celery root, little shave, and then this tartare is cool. Stunning. Very cool. Now, like, what about the classics in London? When you think about classics.

48:21Well, what do you consider a classic? I mean, there's like the bagel shops on Brick Lane. The bagel shops on Brick Lane, yeah. Beagle, bagel, whatever it's called. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you know what? I've actually never been there. You haven't been there? I've never been there. The brick beef is tough, tough hang for me, must be honest. I mean, right now, like I think St. John bread is... St. John is, I think, a classic and it will always remain a classic. It's so good. And actually, even though that's a very sort of nose to tail restaurant, I think their vegetarian food, they really nail it. And I think that's such a good sign of a restaurant.

48:57One of my sort of indicators for a good restaurant is if they can nail the house salad. Agree. Because I think if you can't nail your house salad, you're stuffed. That's so simple. It's a delicacy. If you can't do it right, then you've got to pay attention. It should be an item that people order all the time. Absolutely. Every table has a salad. Exactly. If it's a good house salad. Yes, absolutely. If it's special. Absolutely. There's actually a restaurant that opened maybe last year or the year before called Josephine Bouchon. It's French, and they just opened a second branch, and they do a lovely house salad.

49:30Very sort of like bitter leaves, nice mustardy dressing. kind of creamy but tangy and it's yeah really really good what's your take about rochelle canteen i've actually never been and i have heard a lot of mixed reviews so i'm not running very negative for me yeah really not to go there but yeah i didn't have a great meal there i was bummed what did you eat um what did i have um it was a 10 months ago so i remember the fish was great so that was the one thing i enjoyed tremendously um but what i didn't like was the veg courses they were really throwaway. Anyways, that's just one meal. I've heard it's great though.

50:04I just had a bad... Yeah, I have heard a lot of mixed reviews for that place. Well, it's got a lot of hype, you know, being in that family of restaurants. Often, the more you see it on Instagram, the less you kind of want to go sometimes. You feel that way? I feel that way sometimes. A little bit. I think often people will hype things up for clout just to get views because other people are talking about it and it doesn't always follow through it's not always the case obviously um but yeah i'm it's on my list if someone was like oh we've got a reservation let's go then i'd be like okay great i'm going but i haven't been sort of like i want to make the reservation there yeah i feel bad i'm slating them now they're gonna hate me i can never walk in there i agree i i i love london it's such a great restaurant city it's like truly one of the best there's a restaurant that um have you heard of Manteca in Shoreditch.

50:56No. Oh, that's really good. It's like Northern Italian. Very, very good pasta, good meats, good cheeses. It's really, it's a good, so you should put that on your list. It's a very good one. It's a good segue to talk about your career as a personal chef. Yes. I really want to talk about it because we have had personal chefs on. They're always signing NDAs and stuff. I get a feeling you're going to shed some light in it a little bit. Oh, I don't know. Your face is, your face. I always want to be clear. I just want to first get, like, how did you get into personal chefing? Easy question first. Easy question first.

51:30How did I get into personal chefing? I harassed a lady to hire me. I had no credentials, no qualifications, just a hell of a lot of life experience in the kitchen. I've always been around food, always been cooking. I'm half Russian on my father's side and my Russian grandma didn't really speak English and I didn't really speak that much Russian. So we used to kind of communicate through eating and food and spending time in the gardens in the countryside in Russia, you know, picking vegetables. And she used to make this thing called compote, which is basically just like a raspberry juice. And I would learn all of these things from spending time with her in the kitchen.

52:05I had an Italian godmother who taught me a lot about cooking pasta from scratch. And, you know, Italians love simple flavors done well. And that is something that really speaks to me. And I always knew I wanted to be around food. I always knew I didn't want to be in an office really and I had just such a it just felt like a calling to kind of cook for people and and be someone who can advise on different sort of dietary lifestyles for different lifestyle well different diets for different lifestyles because I think everyone's a little bit different and what works for one person might not work for someone else and I found that very interesting I have a diploma as a health and nutrition coach So I can, you know, kind of advise on nutrition.

52:49You can do the macro math. I can do the macro math just about. I mean, it's been a while, so don't test me. No, no, no macro pop test here. So, yeah. And yeah, as I said, I harassed this lady and she eventually gave me a job and I worked with her and we worked so well together. I did a five week stint. She had a few goals, health goals, and we reached all of them. And then it was just sort of word of mouth and it kind of snowballed from there. So you started cooking for private clients and traveling a bit with them. What's it like when you're on the road cooking as a private chef? It is interesting.

53:24Yeah, I bet it's challenging. Yeah, it's fun. It's a lot of fun. I mean, I got to experience things that I probably never would have experienced had I done another, had I gone through another career. You kind of have to, something that I used to struggle with, and eventually you get better at it. but it's going to a country where you don't know the ingredients so you don't know what brand of harissa is this spicy or it's not spicy or which brand of tahini to get that's going to be really nice and runny and like liquid gold that you want or like the dairy brands that you have to sort of trial and error and then something i've actually experienced working in america is the difference in the produce, the flavor is wild.

54:09I feel like in Europe and London, we are spoiled. Yeah. And then the flavor here, it just feels very bland almost. Yeah, true. So what's the setup? What are you doing in America? Do you travel over here with like a family? Was it like a corporate client? So I spent a little bit of time in Georgia in America. And actually, that's the only place in America that I've worked. But I spent a lot of time working in the Bahamas and also in Canada. Yeah. um so and in the bahamas they pretty much ship everything from the states over um and it's just yeah i don't know it's just it and even last night i did a supper club at lee's on canal with just to celebrate the launch of my cookbook and i was cooking this food and i was just like heavily throwing salt into everything because i was like i can't it doesn't taste how it tastes in london but i'm doing exactly the same thing just cooking it well give me an example Was it produce last night that wasn't quite?

55:05I had butternut squash. Oh, yeah. And normally in London, it's just really sweet, very nutty. Yeah. And last night, like, it's almost as though, you know when you burn your tongue and then you try food and you can't really taste it as well? Yeah, totally. It kind of felt like that. Man. Yeah, it's interesting. We're letting you down. I know. Our farmer's markets in New York. I was freaking out. I was like, oh, my God, people are going to think I'm actually a terrible cook. No, you had to adjust it. everyone here is I suppose used to that so what's it seemed like last night it was very eclectic there were I mean I unfortunately didn't really get to speak to too many people because I was it was a one-man show and I was in the kitchen doing all the food but it was sweet I mean I just put up on my story on social media like I'm hosting a supper club buy tickets if you want so I guess the die-hard sort of Nats Nourishments people came through and it was very sweet a lot of girls a lot of women i have a lot of women in my uh following which i really love so it was nice it was nice yeah it is connect but you're like working so you didn't have to like walk around yeah i mean you say hi and then you get to talk a little bit and they will tell you their names and it's very sweet and like signed a few books at the end and and you know some people are like oh i've followed you for so long yeah it's a really lovely experience very heartwarming very nice and also you know i wouldn't be here without them so it's really nice to actually just meet people and have conversation and yeah back to the private cooking so but like bahamas georgia canada like who are the clients are they like actors are they no never actors unfortunately or maybe fortunately um but i did work with an athlete and then most of it was actually just sort of ceos of major companies or founders entrepreneurs yeah um kind of behind the scenes people who are quite, I suppose, not sort of public figures, but very well known in their industries, you know?

56:59So like what, how do you work with like a private client to get them, get the menu to their likes? Liking. So prior to the first day of, of working with them, I would send them a little form, not long at all, very basic, very simple, just saying like intolerances, allergies, and anything that you just really don't like. And once they give me that I then just work around it. Nine times out of 10, they would give you the freedom to just say like, I don't really want to think about it. I just want to eat it. So I'm not going to put in requests or say like, I want this and that and this. Sometimes they might turn around and be like, I'm really craving a steak tonight.

57:36Can we have that? And I would just work around that. The first week is always really awkward because you're kind of learning their likes and dislikes. And it can be a little bit disheartening sometimes because you might make something that someone else would really love, but because this person doesn't quite like that flavor, you know, and you're just figuring it out. The shug isn't hitting for somebody. Yeah, exactly. But once you figure it out, it's kind of smooth running and then it's really, really easy. So, I mean, these are individuals who probably get their way because they're CEOs. And now food is involved and it's got to be challenging for you to take those notes.

58:14I mean, is the behavior pretty good? um yeah I would say that I was very lucky I seemed to attract very kind people so I had a lot of clients who were just very very sweet uh enjoyed my food and also I think I I had the upper hand because a lot of my clients hired me because they had specific health goals so they were sort of just willing to do what I was saying so that they could achieve those goals um but yeah I never I had like one or two clients that were a little bit annoying, but it was more just that they had very strict diets. Yeah, and you definitely had to work around these diets and these health goals.

58:55But I guess it puts you in a good position if you're telling them what to eat. Yeah, exactly. And then if they do annoy me, I can be like, right, just salad for dinner for you then. So I had Meredith from Wishbone Kitchen in here a few weeks ago. And, you know, I think it's a similar trajectory, like private chefing and cooking for clients. and then at some point you realize that social media needs to happen. What's your journey like with that? Because I think it's different for all folks. Yeah, I mean, I kind of started posting pictures of food when I started my career as a personal chef, more just because I wanted my friends to see what I was up to.

59:31Because as I said, I was always traveling, so I was never at home. And it's just a nice way to keep up with, you know, your community. And then I would say about two years ago, after doing six years as a personal chef and six years of travel and six years of not spending time with my friends I was like I really need to figure out a way to be in one place more often and I just started posting very consistently and I guess in a way manifested just this is going to happen it has to happen and it did and it all kicked off but it was rapid it was so quick I I could barely keep control of it. I mean, I had two years ago, 5 ,000 followers, and now I have 1.5 million.

1:00:12And that growth more or less happened in a year. And it's been great. I mean, you just, it's, every day is different. It's really fun. Credit to you. Really fun. What's the special sauce for you to get to that follow count? Beans. I mean, people really like my bean recipes. But I think the consistency. Yeah. What's it about the bean recipes? And are these bean recipes in the book? Yes. A lot of them are in the book. Of course they're in the book. It's funny. The first time I ever got recognized in the street, this girl came up to me and was like, you're the bean girl. It's like, oh, I don't know how I feel about that nickname.

1:00:52But it was good. It's sweet. Yeah. I think beans are making a bit of a comeback. People are looking to eat healthy foods. Beans are really high in fiber. They're a good swap for, you know, simple carbs. And you can have so much fun with them. And also, I mean, I eat all of my beans with bread. I do a lot of sort of like swirling, buttery bread and saucy beans. And it's delicious and it works really well. I love that beans, that you're the bean girl. Claire Danutz had a similar story. Yeah. She was called the condiment girl on the street. It's something about the streets of London. People calling you the girl.

1:01:32I know. Well, I did once graduate to the Bean Queen. Oh, even better. Even better. I like that better. I was like, I'll take that. Okay, cool. We can run with that one. Yeah. Are you recording and producing videos every week? So I post three times a week. I am not always doing it every week, but I always have stuff in the bank, you know, archived, ready to go. So I will plan pretty consistently. I like to usually be a month ahead of schedule. so I have always got about a month's worth of content to post in case I'm traveling or I get sick or you know for unforeseen circumstances so the 15 minute recipe you tackle it and that's really hard like the 15 minute recipe is a feat and you have a whole section there what makes a perfect 15 minute recipe?

1:02:18I think a perfect 15 minute recipe heavily relies on what I would call a flavor booster So something that lives in a jar, in a cupboard that packs a punch is kind of quite vital because realistically in 15 minutes you can't build loads of layers of flavor. So having something that does all of the work for you is great. One of my most popular ones is my speedy sun-dried tomato pasta. And it's literally sun-dried tomatoes in a blender with a few other ingredients. You blitz it up. There's no chopping. There's no cooking. You just, well, you cook the pasta and then pour the sauce over it. Yeah, but the sauce is a rice sauce.

1:02:53And it's done. And then also, like, one of my – something I often say my favorite tip and trick is to have interesting shaped pastas at home. Yeah. Because if you put a very simple sauce over an interesting shape of pasta, people are like, oh, this is really fancy. Yeah. You know? I mean, I like the, like, coxcomb shape. That's a favorite of mine. Yeah. Yeah, that's good. So when you're going through the cookbook, you start with 15 minutes, but then you slow it down a bit. Yes. And that's the title of the book. Interesting. So your idea is that you have these core recipes that are for fast, but then there's other times for slower cooking.

1:03:26How did you come across that? Well, I think, you know, my community on social media are people who love food. And I think anyone who loves food often experiences times where they need something really quick and they're in a hurry, but they want something nutritional that's going to fill them up and make them feel good. but equally in the same breath they might on the weekend want to relax in the kitchen with food slow it down pour a glass of wine spend a couple hours in the kitchen have some jazz music on in the background or whatever it is that they're into and I think so many people can relate to that and I think also it is we live in such a fast-paced world and it's really important to slow down and be present and enjoy the moment and so it felt important to put both in and then also on the flip side, I just, there was nothing else on the market that had all of the timeframes in them.

1:04:16And I thought this is a book for every day of the week, not just one moment. Very cool. So take us to the slow, the slow roll, the slow, the slow jams in the back. What's your favorite recipe? Slow jams in the back. So I'm English, so I love a curry. I really love a curry. One of my favorite recipes in there is a black dahl. And it's kind of inspired by, have you been to Dishoom? Yeah. Yes, for breakfast. I haven't actually been for breakfast. I've only ever been for mains. I need to try it. I've heard it's very good. It's good. But they have a black dal. And in India, it's called dal makhani or makhani.

1:04:51I don't know exactly how you pronounce it, but hopefully I didn't butcher that. And it's just this really delicious, slow cooked, very, very creamy dal made with beluga lentils. And it is so flavorsome and delicious. I feel like I've said delicious a lot. You know what? That's your food. It's really good. Live your truth, Natalia. Live your truth. But yeah, it's wonderful. And also it's the kind of thing that you can make. And then the longer it stays in the fridge, the more flavorsome it becomes. Like the depth of flavor. I can't. Flavor, delicious. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, you're doing good. But yeah.

1:05:25And again, I also like stuff that you can make and then put in the freezer for a rainy day. And it's perfect for that. That's perfect for the freezer. I like that. Absolutely. Is it all vegetarian in the book? So the core of the book is vegetarian. There are a lot of suggestions to how you can make it more flexible for anyone. But yeah, the core is vegetarian. It's vegetarian, but you can always flex in animal proteins. Yeah, and it says that there will be recipes where it will say sort of like in the tip section, like this works really well with grilled fish or grilled chicken. Nice, I like that.

1:05:58It's a smart way to do the book. Yeah, something for everyone. I'm into that. So what do you do next? You've got this book. You've got yoga. I are you not are you the recovering yoga instructor yeah well I fell out of love with it to be honest let's go there I like I'm wondering because you know your bio says yoga instructor I'm like okay well you got food and yoga you gotta like maybe pick a lane I mean I'm not saying that yoga instructors can't be chefs but you fell out of love with yoga I think you're right yeah I don't think you're wrong I think you're right I think you do pick a lane I think I like you I liked yoga but I if I'm being brutally honest I acquired my yoga teacher training because it gave me more of a standout when I was working as a personal chef because I would offer those services as well.

1:06:43And it was like a USP of mine was to basically give people a health retreat, but in their own home to factor it around their lifestyle. And I did it as a means to an end to get myself further in my career. If I'm being honest, you're being greatly, frankly, honest and the best. There's a lot about yoga that I think is really magical and really wonderful but i'm from london i'm a very fast-paced person i'm extremely impatient and like i actually don't enjoy yoga i'm more i like walking and i like playing you know racket sports and stuff like that but like doing an hour of stretching in my living room i would rather do something else i love this so let's let's edit the the bio let's like put like a little recovery yoga instructor I love that you're being honest.

1:07:33It's good because I feel like you have to be honest with these things. Listen, sometimes you've got to do things you don't want to do to get to where you want to be. Agree. And like you were smart to set up your business to have like multiple offerings. If you're going to do a retreat, let's do some yoga. But now, I mean, right now it's mostly online work that you're doing. Is that right? More or less. What about a restaurant? I don't think I could ever do a restaurant. I feel like it's a completely different kettle of fish that I have no experience in. And I have a lot of respect for restauranteurs.

1:08:06But the shelf life of a restaurant terrifies me. It's a really hard industry. And also, you get stuck in one place. I quite like having variety. That's why when I was working as a personal chef, I only ever did short-term clients. I would work between a month and three months with someone and then move on. Because I like to have diversity and variety. I get bored very easily. As I said, I'm a fast-paced, impatient person. So I need things to be moving and changing. Seems like New York would be a great fit for you. I would love to live in New York. I would love to live in New York. Can this happen?

1:08:40I don't know. Maybe. Maybe, maybe. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Wait, back to the, I have to ask about personal chefing. So you end a one-month cycle. Yes. And then you like travel somewhere else. So you were kind of like a traveling. Yeah, traveling chef. You weren't doing it based in London. so you would like live with the client dude like this memoir of yours oh could out a lot of people no joking um no it was great yeah i would move in i would i would go so i'd go somewhere stay there for a month to three months and then come back spend a week in london at home kind of try and recoup and then go somewhere else spend time somewhere else and it was fab i mean i'm a really nosy person i love looking at people's houses and i loved being able to sort of see all these different houses and obviously you're working for very wealthy people so the houses are pretty nice yeah and yeah it was great it was really really good fun so the idea was like you were going in and like helping make change yes in in their cooking and eating lifestyles more yeah eating habits and lifestyle habits so i mean you get all of these people who will go sort of like to places like the shah or like the viva maya center and they're gone for a week and they don't have to think about the job, the dog, the kids, and they're waking up and doing a long walk and then having a breakfast shot and then going and doing yoga and X, Y, and Z, and they feel great and super chill afterwards.

1:10:02But then the second they come home, those habits may continue for a day or two, but life gets in the way and you can't keep all of those things up. So my USP was that I'm going to bring it to you, fit it into your lifestyle so that you can carry on having those healthy habits and feeling good about yourself and, you know, having that sort of mind body connection where you feel like your dopamine levels are steady rather than, you know, up and down. And obviously, I would go be with them for X amount of time, incorporate all of this. And then when I would leave, it would continue for maybe three, four or five months.

1:10:35And then they'd hire me again, because they'd fallen off the wagon. And yeah, interesting model. This is so cool. Like, it seems like you helped a lot of people. Well, I tried. Yeah, yeah, I tried. I just wanted to be I felt like as someone who had no credentials in personal chefing or the cooking industry, I needed to set myself apart from the average personal chef and give myself a bit of a difference so that I would stand out. I love it. I mean, it's it's but are you is those kind of in the past? Yes. Those days? Yeah, it is. I don't think I would ever go back to personal chefing now that I've got, you know, I'm juggling quite a few things at once right now.

1:11:17and I just wouldn't be able to fit it in. And also I need to be in my kitchen to do my content. And if I was in someone else's kitchen, I can't be like, do you mind just waiting five minutes where to get the perfect picture of your food? You know, that's not going to fly. Yeah, it's not going to work for a client. What do you plan on right now? What are you working on? So I've just launched my long form YouTube recipe content career. I don't know if that's the right word. It's a lot, but you said it well, yeah. Yeah, thank you. Long form YouTube content career. Long form YouTube, yes, exactly.

1:11:45So cooking slow with Natalia. I'm working with a really wonderful videographer, editor called Joss Roberts, who's a friend of mine. And we have a really great synergy. And it's been really fun. And I'm excited to see where that goes. And then, yeah, I've got a few other things in the pipeline that I can't talk about. Sign some NDAs. Yeah. But watch this space. Yeah. We definitely love to honor the NDAs on the show. Talia Rudin, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for having me.

1:12:18This is Taste is hosted and produced by Matt Rodbard and me, Eliza Abarbanil. The show is edited by lead producer Clayton Gumbert and supervised by Pat Stango, director of media production and development at Penguin Random House. Thanks to Shalia Harris and the production team at Penguin Random House. Theme music by Steve Rydell, logo and guest illustrations by Ellie Skrzat. Visit Taste online at tastecooking.com and make sure to subscribe to our newsletter to keep updated on all cool things in the world of taste.

From the publisher

Sean Sherman is an award-winning chef, educator, author, and activist. A member of the Oglala Lakota Sioux tribe, he is dedicated to reviving Indigenous food traditions through his Minneapolis restaurant Owamni, the nonprofit NATIFS, and cookbooks like the fantastic new book Turtle Island. Today on the show, we talk about the years of research that resulted in Turtle Island, decolonizing Indigenous food traditions, and much more.

Also on the show Matt has a great conversation with Natalia Rudin, author of the new cookbook, Cooking Fast and Slow.
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