Edible Michiana Holiday 2022

her recipes with us at the table to satisfy our curiosity when it was voiced. Still, the practical principles she instilled in us boiled down to this: “No one should expect you to cook as women, but you may want to know what’s on your plate. Your physical and emotional well-being depend on it, and you may want to budget for what you eat, because your financial health rests on it, too. Nurture an inquisitive palate, experiment and share. Now, step out of my kitchen, my darlings, will you?” In the rural village where I was raised, biking to school taught any curious kid who grew what and when. Simone, the lunch lady in our elementary school, single-handedly cooked almost every meal from scratch. Even though her salad dressing was often too oily, we knew to give her a forced smile for fear of offending her. Food wore the faces of those who grew it and served it to us. And yet for all that, we stayed indoors when the farmers sprayed the crops that surrounded our homes heavily with pesticide. We cursed the traditional candied fruit factory that was largely responsible for our meager local river, le Calavon, being labeled one of the most polluted rivers in France in the early 1980s. Heritage food danced awkwardly with economic imperatives, and there was

something unsettling about this. One of my friends tells me that in recent years, seasonal folkloric festivities in the South of France have opted for roasted pork instead of the traditional roasted mutton in some villages where the Muslim population has increased. Paradoxically, I came to rethink the notion of heritage food through food sovereignty, an international food justice movement that calls for a radical shift in our food system. one may wonder: Is heritage food always sustainably produced and inclusive? More recently, I came to rethink the notion of heritage food through food sovereignty, an international food justice movement that calls for a radical shift in our food system, including food production and consumption. More specifically, I chose to rethink my own food heritage and what I wish to pass down to my daughter by exploring the visionary stance of Indigenous chefs,

growers and thinkers such as Chef Sean Sherman ( The Sioux Chef ’s Indigenous Kitchen ), Chef Monique Fiso ( HIAKAI: Modern Māori Cuisine ), Dr. Jessica Hutchings ( Te Mahi Māra Hua Parakore: A Māori Food Sovereignty Handbook ) and African-American Jewish culinary historian Michael W. Twitty ( The Cooking Gene, Kosher Soul and Rice ). Their teachings and practices are far too rich to detail here. Sherman, Fiso and Hutchings provide access to pre-colonial Indigenous food and knowledge by tracing them back into culinary history. In a similar fashion, Twitty uncovers African and African-American foodways. Collectively, they aim to rectify historical and structural injustices. Chefs Sherman and Fiso revitalize Indigenous foodways, which, in turn, impact the physical and mental health of the communities they cater to, expand their knowledge and provide business opportunities. In this world, where chefs have risen to the status of celebrities, Sherman and Fiso have become spokespersons who debunk the notion of an ego-driven, technique oriented cuisine to propose instead an ideologically immersed kitchen that thrives with the community and supply chain around whom and for whom it was built to sustain. While I know where I stand intellectually on food heritage, the

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