289: The Rise - How the COVID-19 Pandemic Has Affected the Restaurant Industry and Celebrating Black Culture in American Food with Marcus Samuelsson

Hey there, and welcome to the Food Blogger Pro Podcast. My name is Alexa, and I'm part of the Food Blogger Pro team. And we are so excited and honored to have you listening to the show today. So today's episode is one that I am especially excited about, being a Food Network fan and just a general food fanatic, and that's because Chef Marcus Samuelsson is on the podcast today. So if you're not familiar with Marcus, he is a chef, an immigrant, a restaurateur, and an author. And he's here today to talk about the restaurant and food industry, as well as black food culture in America. So first you'll hear about his experiences as a restaurateur and how he has essentially had to start from scratch and reinvent himself during the COVID 19 pandemic. Food is a way that we communicate with and relate to one another. So the pandemic has, you know, really created some interesting and unique challenges in the restaurant and food industry. And then he talks about black food in America and how we can learn and grow in our understanding of black culture through food. He'll encourage you to do the work and immerse yourself in the incredible foods and dishes that celebrate black culture. And then he'll share the story of his new book, the Rise. It's a great episode, and we're honored to have Markus on the podcast. So without any further ado, Bjork, take it away.

Marcus, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you so much for having me. Excited to be here.

Yeah. Excited for you to share a little bit about your story. You found a quiet room in the restaurant. You are in the mix of it. It's amazing to hear kind of those B roll clips in the background of you finding a spot. I want to rewind the tape a little bit to go back to February, that last week of February, in your author's note of your most recent book, the Rise, you have an extremely moving author's note covering a lot of different things. But one of the things you talk about is that last week in February, when all of this kind of the reality of COVID was setting in, was there a specific moment that you remember thinking, this is real and it's going to have a huge impact? And what was that moment?

Well, I. I don't think I'm necessarily out of that moment, because I don't think Covid is in the past. It's very much in the present. And if 2020 has taught me one thing, it's the uncertainty. Living through uncertainty. And, you know, I'm Extremely privileged and lucky. The fact that my wife, my son and I are healthy.

Yeah.

And it made me think that I didn't think about the first thing when I woke up before. Right. But now I always look over, okay, where is he? Was he good? And then you go on with your day. And so I take stock and I will in a completely different way. And I also take and feel and think about gratitude in a completely different way. So it's definitely changed my thought process and made me more humble, but then also made me think about, think how many people in the world that live with that uncertainty. If you're a refugee, immigrant, if you're moving from place to place. And it doesn't have to be that dramatic. It can be you moving jobs, you know, from one part of the country. So there is something there that I'm processing that I think, you know, I'm going through, you know, but certainly of those days in February, I was scared, I was upset. Why is this happening? I can't fundamentally understand it, but March 15th, my friend Jose Andres, he actually talked to me two weeks before, said, you have to be part of World Central Kitchen. I was like, yes, Chef. Well, but just knowing that, didn't know that it would be something that would be a major part of my life and change the trajectory. March 15, we started with closed restrooms, therapy open as a community kitchen. On March 15 to October 15, we served 220,000 meals.

It's interesting, I followed along. In your book, on the COVID on the inside tag, it says 150,000. And then there's a point on your Instagram where you say 200,000 today, 220,000. That number just keeps going up and up. I'm interested to hear you touched on it a little bit in the. Throughout this year, you had to reinvent your restaurants, and it also sounds like you had to reinvent in some ways yourself. Do you think those are happening in tandem? Was one ahead of the other? What did that look like as both things, it sounds like were having some pretty significant evolutions.

Well, I think about that from two points. Right. If I think about that idea from 30,000ft, it sounds exciting. Here I am in mid career and I have the opportunity to reinvent myself. Right. And in, you know, in five years, I might be able to talk about it from that point of view. Right, right. But I also didn't feel those things. I was. I didn't want to become bitter. I was. It took me 25 years to build or we built the restaurants and it took Two weeks to break down.

Yeah.

Right. So I also asked myself, how can it take two weeks to do that? What have I done that haven't built enough doors to keep that open? Right. So it wasn't just Covid. It was also forced me to think, what type of net have I built?

And what do you mean by that when you say net, can you describe that?

Well, one of the blessings of being black and one of the blessings of being an immigrant is that you constantly challenged. You're constantly dealing through the fog of biases against you. So I feel very much geared up for a challenge like this. I had to pivot. I've been an immigrant six times in my life before I was 25 years old.

It was familiar.

You know, I was familiar. I had to make it work in Japan as a kid. I had to make it work in France as a kid. And. But this was bigger than that. This was. And it wasn't just me when I did those things. It was me and my roommate or whatever, and we were going against everybody. But now it was 180 employees at Red Rooster, was 90 employees in Miami, and it was my family. So these challenges were larger, and the questions I had to ask myself were bigger. And it was a puzzle that, yes, I've navigated through it. Not with everything intact. We have to close a lot of restaurants for a lot of people. But on the emotional side, I'm still going through it. I'm not on the other side. And I just want to be very honest to you. I don't want to sit here and act like, yeah, we're great, because we're not. I'm very passionate about every. I'm sure you are very passionate about everything that you've built. So we're dealing. There is a professional side and a personal side. And on the personal side, we're going through it.

Yeah. It feels like 25 years of shoveling coal into the engine of a train. And a year ago today, it was probably at the maximum speed it's ever been going for your career. TV shows, books, restaurants, acclaim in multiple different ways. And those things, some of those things don't go away. Right. There's a legacy piece. There's your work that exists in the world, but some of them do, especially the restaurants. And there is just the reality of that existing. And then there's also the reality of working through that in your head, which it sounds like that's a piece of what you're processing. And I think one of the most important things for anybody who is Building something in the world. What are the tools that you've started to assemble or maybe already had from your 25 years immigrating to six different places in your life? What do you think were some of the tools that you had developed that would be helpful for other people to know or be aware of or advice, I guess would be kind of the broad category. But more specifically, you know, gratitude was an example. Others that you can think of.

Yeah, I mean, absolutely. I know. I feel I can share the upside and the downside. Right. So the upside is that I am completely passionate about everything in my field. It is my field, and it's never bored me, not one day. And the fact that we can always evolve in it and even Covid has forced us to evolve and think about it in a different way. And that is fascinating by itself. And I'm here for that. Right. What I want my son and the next generation to do is to diversify. So I bet it everything on food. If this would be Vegas, I bet it everything on that red button food.

Yeah. Yeah.

And, you know, when you're 24, you don't start thinking about your 401k or da da, da da, all of those things. Maybe I should have, but I probably should have invested in a different way, maybe more in real estate and all of the stuff. But it's just my field is also not a field that yields a lot of net profit. It's a field that you get a lot of joy from, that you have incredible camaraderie, and you have other takeaways from a journey that is amazing. But in order to get on the other side, I. A lot of my friends and I should have. Could have diversified earlier, and that's something that I now need to think about.

Yeah. And what is. So my dad is an art teacher and he's a potter. And so in our backyard, we have a ceramic studio and a. A kiln. And so part of my frame of reference in the world is art. And I think what you do is the ultimate manifestation of art. And I think in order to be the greatest artist you can be, in some ways, you have. Have to have reckless abandon towards that. And I think the story of your career is one where when you look back at it and moving forward, this will be true as well. But, you know, there's impact from the art that you've created in the world in a very real way. What advice do you have for other artists? And maybe it is diversification, but what advice do you have for other artists who want to like manifest their art in the greatest way in the world, but also to have maybe that safety net. I think of John Cage, I think was the composer who was like an insurance agent full time and then this famous composer as well doing these radical songs. But you know, that I think seems kind of soul sucking to the artist in some way. Where do you stand on that right now?

Yeah, no, I agree with you. To be the fullest creative, you have to run your race your way. But I also think as society, safety means very different things. I mean, I come from on the outside looking in one of the safest place in the world in terms of structure and so on. Sweden. Right. And. But I do think each one have to figure out what that thing is. Right. Like not only did I bet on it as a chef, but also coming as an immigrant means also you're not connected to institutional money the same way you don't have access to generational wealth. And I'm not a network.

You don't have a network that's pre built in.

No. And I'm not one to complain. I've been extremely lucky and fortunate. Sure. And I've been able to push through. I'm just saying being an immigrant, it's just not a line. There's stuff that comes with that strength of you can move anywhere, but then there's another side. And when you have a time like Covid, it made you think about all of these things. And I think that safety or diversifying in terms of how you build things, you know, like I give you an example on a very high level and I think has to do with the artistry. Lenny Kravitz also has a design company. Not because Lenny Kravitz needs to make that money from the design company, but there's another outlet for him to do clearly about expression. Right. And you know, I always look at my books not from a monetary, but it's part of my process. I look at TV as part of when I do. No passport required. We probably lose money, you know, but I don't care because it's part of my process of searching for my curiosity.

Yeah.

So we all have to build in the ways that make sense for you.

Yeah. No passport required. For those who are unfamiliar, usually what we do, Markus, is we do kind of like, hey, tell us a little bit about your story. My assumption in this interview is that because we are speaking to food people, they will, they will know your story. But I also don't want to glaze over it. So. No, no passport required. Obviously near and dear to your heart. You've referenced it a few times. Can you. Can you. Do you know your. We could do hours and write books on. On story and your steps along the way. For those who aren't familiar, can you give them maybe a taste of that as kind of an introduction into the rise and this. In this, the book. And. But for those who aren't familiar, you know, your. Your story is rich and layered.

Yeah.

And would be interested if you could share that. Yeah.

I mean, I was born in Ethiopia. I was born in a small village called Upper Kodana. My mother, my sister and I, we had Tuvakalosa when I was a small child. And we got adopted. She died. We got adopted. So this idea of the worst that can happen to you actually became a different projector in my life, which I actually took in as a strength during this moment of COVID Like I've been. Even if it wasn't I was a kid, but I've been around something that was very trauma, traumatic and, you know, navigated with the help of others. Of course.

Yeah.

And grew up in Sweden, where my grandparents, my parents, my uncles very much we were around food. Like my grandmother's only way of communicating was through food, I would say. She said very little, she cooked a lot and we had to cook with her, which was amazing. And then, you know, when I wanted to become a chef, there was a mentor of mine that said, hey, I grew up in Gothenburg, which is the second biggest city in Sweden, but for culinary and if you had real ambition, you have to go to Stockholm. And I felt like, well, if I have to go to Stockholm, I might as well go to abroad. And I got a scholarship. I went to Japan as a teenager. I worked in France, a three star Michelin. I worked in Switzerland and Austria. And then eventually I came to America. And when I started working in America, I started working at restaurant Aquavit, Became a chef at 23 and just, you know, got this incredible write up from Ruth Reichel that gave us three stars in New York Times.

Yeah. And I really feel like youngest ever.

Yeah, yeah, sure. But I think it, I'll say it.

So you don't have to. Yeah.

But it took me to a trajectory of, wow, New York is this place that food lives everywhere. And I don't think before then, actually, because it opened doors for me that I hadn't seen. Sure. And I feel like I've been running in this happy, difficult, but challenging and up for the challenge ever since. And opening Red Rooster in 2010 was a major, major milestone in my life and change the projector in my life again. You know.

Your story is one that in our. So Minnesota's home for us and we live in a small town north of the. Grew up in a small town north of the Twin Cities, Scandinavian Swedish heritage. And for both my wife and I come from families of adoption. And so your story is one of this great inspiration and connection for us. And your cookbooks have been. Are kind of a staple of Christmas gifts at the Ostrom House. But one of the things that's inspiring is when I looked back at the interviews that you've done, you talked about how growing up in Sweden around high school, you knew you wanted to be a chef. That was something that you knew you wanted to pursue. For people who listen to this podcast, a lot of those people know that they want to be, grow into something, to build something, or they are doing it and they want to continue doing it and to continue doing it better. You talk about that, your experiences, the 25 years that you've built this thing. How much of that for you was inevitable. You had to do it. How much of it was you saying, I'm going to grind every day and show up? How much of it was you being you? If, if you reflect back on where you've been and what, what you've grown, and then we'll look forward after this. How would you. What, what were the most essential parts of it along the way that other creators can understand and, and adopt as part of their mindset with building? Yeah.

Well, I really appreciated one thing with my father so much because he came from a fishing village and he was the son of a fisherman and he became a geologist. So watching my father, both from education but also class, go through this elevator, this ladder, you know, up and down. Right. I, I saw that with my own eyes. You know, when we came back to the village, he was a fisherman. His clothing changed. The car he picked to go back was always the shittiest car.

Yeah.

You know what I mean? The fact that he had several cars.

Right.

That we lived in a different house in the city versus what we lived in the country house. He never really wanted to repair the country house fully. Right. So he was this sort of half embarrassed that he left the village because that meant his father, fisherman business also died. But also extremely successful, you know, geologist with PhD in the city and watching that life where you go to his office, it could be somebody from American office. There was very often somebody from Italy or Japan in the office, this international. And he didn't know that much about cooking, but he's like, if you're going to do this, you have to do it at the highest level. That was basically. He gave me that as an advice, and then he gave me the advice of always, you know, keep aiming high. Right. So he never blocked me going somewhere for the money or something like that. And he was also. The last thing about this was that he was extremely passionate culturally about what it meant to come from a fisherman, like, hard work, what you're doing, your course, all that. But he was also equally passionate about his job as a geologist. And he loved going to work. I never heard my father said, damn, I gotta go to work tomorrow. Never, never, never, never. And so he said, pick something that you would know you're gonna love to do. And I never experience going to work, as I say, as a burden. Never.

Yeah.

And I think that's something that the work ethic piece is there, the guidance, but also the passion about the craftsmanship, the artistry, whatever that is with a field, you pick. So that would be the only advice to finding that balance. Know for yourself.

Yeah. I remember having a conversation with my wife, Lindsay. So Lindsay is the kind of front face of the site Pinch of Yum, which she publishes content to recipe, does recipe development photography. And I said, if not, if not recipe development photography, what would it be? You can't do that. And she said, well, I would, I'd probably. And she kind of reflected a little bit. She's like, maybe start site. And it. She got into it and eventually she just described what she's currently doing every day. And it sounds like that could be the case for you, where if you take everything away, what would you do? And it's like you would probably describe something similar to what you're doing, um, which is such, such, such a great thing to be able to. To do that every day. Uh, I want to shift gears a little bit and shine a light on the rise. This book, at what point did you know? My guess was it was some point this year or had it been in the works before that to work on the rise. Can you talk a little bit about kind of the backstory with that? I'm holding it here in my hands. Nobody can actually see that. But beautiful book. And want to hear a little bit about the origin story of that?

Yeah, I mean, I felt that it was time to celebrate black excellence in American food. And, you know, so much about black history is not correct. The way it's told, the way it's spoken to us in Institutions and food history is no different.

Yeah.

And I felt like we have this opportunity here to have a much more delicious entry point to American food.

Yeah. What do you mean by that?

Well, I mean, you don't just like American music. You don't have to be black to enjoy all the incredible fruits of the labor of incredible African American musicians. Right. You live in Minneapolis. Well, close to Mini. Well, Prince. You don't have to be black to enjoy everything that Prince gave us. And food can be very similar. Right. And you can talk about when you go through Prince's words, what is he talking about inside of the type, what is he talking about and these songs, Right. Same thing with foods you can have with your. With your black friends or non black friends. You can have very fruit. Great discussions and understand a different narrative that is might. Might not be yours, but guess what? It is yours because it's America. You're part of that. You're. You're a citizen, you're a neighbor, you're a friend, and all of those different things. Right. And food, until we've acknowledge the authorship, we cannot really have correct memories with this. And therefore you cannot build the right really aspirations. So for me, it was important to do a look back. Okay, what's the link between sort of the west coast of Africa and the Carolinas?

Yeah.

What are the foods and how enter it. Enter the conversation around race in a completely different way. It's a little bit uncomfortable when you start, but once you get going, yes, we can do this.

Yeah. You know, one of the things that really stood out to me was when you talk about, you know, I think French coffee is one example. And it's like. Well, it's kind of like when Apple, you know, says on the back of their iPhone, like, you know, designed in California, but it's like it's assembled somewhere else. And French coffee, like, those are Ethiopian beans. You know, there's. There's a couple of other examples that.

You gave Belgian chocolate.

Yeah, Belgian chocolate. It's like, that's not where the. That's not where the. The bean is coming from. What, you know, I think of music and the example that you gave, which I think is such a understandable because people listen to reggae and it sounds different and people listen to hip hop and it sounds different. They know that there's these genres. And you can also go to genius.com and you can look at people pulling apart the lyrics and tying them back. Like, you know, you go, and what does this song on, you know, Kanye saying at Sunday service Mean, well, go to genius.com, peel back the layers. It feels like the book the Rise is kind of addressing the lack of that as a resource as it relates to food. So along with purchasing the book, which I would like to plug and encourage people to do, because it's an incredible book, how do you enter into that and how do you start to understand what is the regean to an entree that you're eating that you maybe don't have the language to describe or understand?

Yes. Well, I think. I think it's an excellent starting point, and I think it's a lot of people that. Why I think it's. It's important to talk about. Right. And if you think about food in America the way as a. As a medium, it's pretty young, and we invested 50 if it's been around for 80 years. 70 of those we spent on focusing on French food.

Yeah. Right.

So not only American food, French food, and then maybe five of those we spent on French and Italian food. So that gives you five years of then everything other worldly food, including our own.

And when you say that focusing on it, do you mean, what do you mean by that? Like, generally speaking, if people are experiencing food, it's within the context of if.

If you went to cooking school, you want the terms of French, if you wanted to buy a pot of pants, if they put a French word on it, right away, that it's better.

Yeah, yeah.

So. So it's. We are programmed in a way that. And rightfully so, France has given us tremendously in terms of food. So has other countries. And then even to the point of why it's important to address that the coffee beans come from Ethiopia or the cocoa beans come from Ghana, and it's not Belgian chocolate and so on, because most Western Europe have other cultural way to engage in front of you, whether through an app or through music or culture. There are many different ways. But guess what? Black culture has not had the same opportunity to get in front of you. Right. So if we want to beat up on France, guess what? France could come back in literature. France can come back in so many different other ways. Right. And here's the point. When even blackness, that word doesn't cover the experience, we talk about France versus Black. Well, wait a minute. Eric Gastel in my book, worked for Eric Ripert. He's French black, Caribbean. I'm Ethiopian black. You can be black through the great migration and the food from. Through that experience, through the American experience, that you can also be from, you know, from a Completely different experience. So our food cannot be monolithic when our journeys are so different. And that is the underbelly of this, is that we haven't done enough media storytelling about the black experience around food to even understand what it looks like and tastes like. There are five original cuisines, American cuisines that all stemmed from black culture. Barbecue, low country, southern food that we refer to very often as soul food. Right. Cajun and Creole. These are five original cuisines. I bet you the majority of people knows all these cuisines, but maybe after that, don't even think about where that came from historically. And therefore you don't think about who should get credited for that, you know, the way we, we should. And therefore it's important to reference it and bring it up.

Yeah, I think it's great. And I think that that playlist or, you know, you talk about a listening party and this idea of having a listening party and much like you wouldn't say, like, oh, this is black music, you know, well, there's so many different layers to that. And it's, you know, as is with food, complex, diverse and not monolithic and the same being true. What I hear you saying is, you know, when you talk about black food, if people, the book being a great entry point to that, do you have other places to point people to that they can, they can start to fill this picture out a little bit more? My guess is a lot of people, this will be a podcast where there'll be some realizations of like, wow, I never thought of that or I did didn't take action on it. Where do, where. How do you step into that? What are some of the resources? Obviously reading the stories within the book and the nuances to the foods and the recipes that people are describing. A great place to start and the first place that I would point people towards. Would you have another step or another place that you could point people to?

Absolutely. And I think thank you for opening the door for people to do the work. You know what I mean? And even I'm going to give you an example during MLK weekend or Black History Month. Just, just activate yourself that week. Think about it differently. It's just not something that, oh, it's Black History Month. What does that mean for you as a family? Yeah, well, maybe order in from if there is a black owned restaurant or Jamaican restaurant around the corner or there's a Southern restaurant spy restaurant around the corner, or buy a book from a black author. Right. There's enough things in the food world that has black experiences that you can participate in. And one of the reasons why we put 200 black chefs in the back and we put all their Instagram handles on there too, is because I want this conversation exactly what you're talking about to happen. So if you live in a smaller town, there might be a little bit more work you gotta do. You might have to drive to Minneapolis, you might have to go to Milwaukee, you closest. Or you can order it online, right? Because. So connect. If you want to order pre order Mashama Bailey's book, or if you want to go on Netflix and check out Rodney Scott, the next time you go to South Carolina, you might go there. For me, it's about take this opportunity to reactivate yourself in a space that you may or may not be that familiar with and do the work. And guess what? It's going to be delicious because you're going to discover something and you're going to eat well and have a great conversation about it.

And what a great connection to, to doing the work, but also what an enjoyable way to do the work. Like if, if the conduit for that is food, which is one of the things that, that I, that I so appreciate about. You know, kind of some of the points that you touched on in the book is like, hey, this is a, this is awesome that you can do this and you can experience this through food, because food is a great way to have that conversation. And maybe a good point to end on. You know, you talk about racism being the biggest wound in America and how important it is to heal it, and how food and learning about our food can help heal our nation, which is so inspiring. And I think that the book plays a part in that, but it won't unless people engage with it. And so that would be my encouragement to anybody who listens to this podcast who's gotten anything out of this interview or anything out of the conversations we've had in the past would be to as a real. We do online marketing as well. Here's our call to action. Marcus, we don't do this on the podcast is to pick up the book and to engage with it, to read it. And it's clear, it's concise, and that's something that people can do moving forward. Markus, obviously people can find you in all different forms of medium. Their tv, their bookstore, their phone on Instagram, their neighborhood. If they're traveling in a season where restaurants are open again and we can check out the different restaurants you have around the U.S. where would you say would be the best place for people to Connect with you. And obviously we'll link to all of these resources you've shared in the show notes as well.

I mean, I think that following me on Marcus Cooks, you get a sort of a taste of our world. But also I love when people reach out to us either on the DM me or they, you know, go on our website on marcushamsongroup.com and just shoot something to us that you're passionate about. We will read it. It might take a while, but it always informs me of another conversation. Right. That when I'm in my restaurants or when I'm doing something that I might not be able to pick up at that moment, especially now during COVID I'm not as intimate. You know, before I could go up to tables, take pictures, talk to people for a long time. I can't do that. I just can't. But I want to be connected. So I love if you guys DM us or follow us because we take great pride in the content that we do. I also started a podcast this year called this Moment with my friend Jason Diacute.

Awesome.

And we have great conversations about race diversity and how we can all learn what are the tools that we navigate through this because it's important and we all going through so much right now and it was important to document this journey.

Yeah, that's great. We'll link to the podcast as well because obviously everybody here is podcast or podcast listeners, so they can follow along with you there. Marcus, thanks so much for taking time out of your undoubtedly busy day to have this conversation. I know that I'm better because of it. I think our listeners will be as well. Thanks.

Thank you. And the best of holidays to you and your family. Thank you so much for having me.

And that's a wrap on this episode of the Food Blogger Pro Podcast. Thanks again for tuning in today. Again, if you want to visit any of the links and resources that were mentioned in this episode, you can get them all at the show Notes for this episode@foodbloggerpro.com 289. There you'll find links to Marcus's podcast, the World Central Kitchen website, and the link to purchase the Rise, Marcus's new book. We hope you enjoyed this episode. We'll see you next time next Tuesday. And until then, make it a great week.

Sam.