6DDD0001_Decolonizing Dinner Transcript

- Sujhey Beisser: I'm Sujhey Beisser. I was born in Venezuela. Cooking has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. 

I remember as a kid, my favorite pastime was kneeling on a chair, watching my grandma cook. In today's program, we're going to learn about corn, also known as maíz. We eat it all the time, from a casual breakfast to lavish dinners. Maíz is one of the most vital foods the world has seen for both animals and humans. As the world's most dominant and productive crop with extensive areas of land dedicated to global production yielding over 1 billion metric tons, corn is for a variety of purposes, including animal feed, grain for human consumption, ethanol, as well as for sweeteners, starch, and for beverages like alcohol. 

Maíz is literally everywhere. It's a superfood, and its seeds could very well be one of the most important foods humanity grows. In marvel of engineering, maíz was invented in Mexico thousands of years ago. It's recognized today as humanity's first genetically engineered food, which has caused experts to reassess their understanding of native history and culture. Today, you're going to meet two chefs who are sharing their knowledge with the world through indigenous cooking and how maíz has shaped their lives and communities. Chef Elena merged her two passions for community building and indigenous cooking to create Wild Berries, an educational community outreach non-profit that strives to bring ancestral foods to communities in a nurturing and nourishing way. Chef Elena will share about the connection she has with the ingredients and the responsibility we all have in the foods we grow and eat. 

- Elena Terry: Cooking is so sensical and beautiful. The act of every part of it is instilled in you when you do it. I can make a meal, or start a fire, and know that, like, my great grandma's there with me. I know that sometimes when a certain animal might show up for us to celebrate or to have a ceremony, that my great-grandma is there, and I can think of those times that she taught me how to clean it or care for it or talk to it. Appreciate that that animal is fulfilling its destiny in some way by showing up and nourishing us. 

It's about that energy and appreciation. Even if you go up to any human and show that energy and appreciation, they brighten up. And so, why wouldn't we treat our foods that way and say, "I'm here to help you grow." And in the end, you know, you're gonna feed my family, and I'll care for you so that you can be everything you need to be, to care for us. 

If you've ever been to a space and it seems familiar, or you've ever had something where you instantly feel this connection or that it's something that is instilled, it's that for me, it's a seed that was planted generations ago that I get to benefit from the harvest of. 

We have stories about the struggles of what we had to endure to preserve those seeds sewing them into our clothes, hiding among our moccasins, and bringing them with us on these journeys of trauma and how we knew how crucial those foods were to continue and how important it was to have those seeds. You have to think of what "colonizing" means. Our entire food systems were taken. 

Socially, we were put in a space that changed the way we ate. We were relocated and moved to spaces where we weren't familiar with the food sources or weren't able to cultivate. Luckily, because of the intentions set forth by our ancestors and the awareness of how crucial that knowledge was, we have it today, and we are able to find those foods, and it's beautiful 'cause they're coming back in ways that I haven't seen before, and we call it "rematriating" back, but it really is, I feel, them saying it's time. Reclaiming this space and being able to say that we can get it to thrive again, it's just one small area that we're able to say is ours again. You know, in this area in Wisconsin Dells, everybody knows it is the waterpark capital of the world, but for us, there's creation stories. There's connections to that part of the river. 

So, the base on a lot of tribes are that these Three Sisters, there's different stories, even across the country on how they came to individual indigenous peoples. It's the corn, the beans, and the squash, and they naturally grow beautifully together. I think if you look at food and where they naturally exist together, and they thrive when you combine those on a plate. You know, there's so much that can be done with the Three Sisters and the different varieties of corn that are grown across, you know, the continent, or the different varieties of squash and beans, and then pairing them up together. I mean, it's endless, what you can do with those Three Sisters and to think that they work so well together. 

It's a perfect example of how those lessons on how these plants came to us, teach us how to live our life. You know, I might have these qualities, and my sister will have these other qualities, and my other sister has these qualities and, but together we're very powerful, and we replenish each other the way we need to or look out for each other the way we need to. 

I just love everything about being in a kitchen and in a restaurant setting. The motion, and the smells, and the sounds, and being able to finally be at a point in time, in our culture, in our communities where our foods are not only appreciated, but they're understood differently. 

For me, the whole process is healing. Comes from the Earth and the places that my ancestors thrived, and it brings me to those spaces of overcoming, resilience, strength, healing. 

- Sujhey Beisser: Next, we are going to meet Chef Anthony Gallarday of Tavo's Signature Cuisine in Milwaukee. Chef Anthony will share the importance that culture plays in innovating and evolving our foods. 
[traditional Aztec music]

- Anthony Gallarday: It takes me back to my culture, you know, to the Aztecs, to everybody who was here before America was discovered. I wanted to learn more about my culture, not necessarily about Mexico or its history, you know, go back in time even more. You know, everybody talks about Pancho Villa, Emiliano Zapata, you know, Mexico's revolution, Cinco de Mayo. I wanted to go way back to the Mexica, the Aztecs. There's a story of how the Aztecs, the Mexica, got the corn and how it came to be. Corn is-- it's what our culture was founded on. Our "yellow gold," that's what we call it. The ceremony represents the first genetic manipulation of corn. It used to be called "huazintle" It was a small little leaf that had little grains, and they brought 'em together. It was a selective process. They started taking out the bigger kernels out of each corn that would grow and just saving the bigger ones, saving the bigger ones, and planting the bigger ones throughout generations. And eventually, we got huge corn and the variations of different colors, tortillas, tamales. Everything that we cooked with, it's corn. 

My mother was actually shocked that I could cook so well. You know, out of all her kids, she never expected me to be the one that, you know, took on her recipes, took on her cooking. I got started when I was 10 years old. I started working in a kitchen, right alongside my father. He was the head chef for many, many well-known restaurants here in Milwaukee. 

When we put Tavo's together and the ideas came together as how to approach it, I told my father, I said, "I want to bring my mom's cooking. I want to use her recipes." Man, I grew up with the best chef in the world. When she makes any traditional dish that you can think of-- tamales, pozole, menudo-- her sauce is so unique that I had to share it with the world. I needed people to experience it. And that's when I told my dad, "Why don't we take my mother's recipes? "You know, what we eat, "take traditional Mexican food and elevate it. Give 'em modern Mexican cuisine." 

And that's how Tavo's came to be Our vegetables. That really meant something to me when I started talking to a lot of farmers. We source for heirloom vegetables. And the reason we did heirloom vegetables was because these have been growing in families for hundreds of years, generation after generation and they don't use pesticides, are organically grown. 

There's a saying that says, "Your body is a temple." Treat your body right and it will treat you good. I do believe it's important to know where your food comes from. 

Understand what you're putting into your body. Who picked the food? How many hands? How was it grown? How it came to be. Respecting each and every one of those steps. We want consumers to connect with food in a way that takes them back to Earth, to Mother Nature. Being able to educate people on what our true culture is, how they lived back then and be able to tell an oral story to live throughout generations, it brings back dignity to our culture and to our people. You know, now, you have people who are actually invested in learning this history and reviving the truth about what happened back then. 
[traditional Aztec music]