Ramin Ganeshram - FutureChefs: Recipes by Tomorrows Cooks Across the Nation and the World

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2014 by Ramin Ganeshram

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any other information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

Book design by Christina Gaugler

Photographs by Jean Paul Vellotti

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file with the publisher.

ISBN-13: 9781623362065

eISBN: 9781623362072

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Contents

Introduction

F our years ago I wrote what I thought was a fantastical piece of fiction about a 13-year-old chef who gets to participate in a competition cooking show on Food Network. Based on my own youthful fantasies of becoming a famous chef, I thought my premise in the middle-grade novel, Stir It Up!, was a neat bit of storytelling and nothing more.

But soon after the book was published, I found out how wrong I was. I started receiving emails, letters, tweets, and Facebook posts from kids who told me they were just like the main character and that they felt like I had told their life story in the pages of my book.

At first, I thought nothing of this early fan mail. The book, I thought with satisfaction, had found its niche. It wasnt until monthsand then yearspassed with letters still coming in that I started to really pay attention. Maybe these kid-chefs werent a niche or an anomaly. Maybe they just were.

I decided to test this theory out and do a little digging. Were kid-chefs really that common? One of the first responses I got to my queries was from Alison Catanese. Her niece, Georgia, had turned her lifelong love of cooking to practical end when her mom died the year before and her dad suffered a stroke 2 months later. Georgia was 11.

I heard from the mom of young Tyler Trainer in Florida who was also 11 and couldnt get enough of being in the kitchen. His mom wasnt sure why, because neither she nor her husband liked to cook.

One young man I met, Rusty Schindler, spent the summer of his 16th year building a brick oven in his parents backyard so he could bake bread with the wild yeast starter he had been keeping for a few months.

Young Eeshan Chakrabarti was the pickiest eater arounduntil he got on a step stool and started cooking for himself at age 6. Then there was Jack Witherspoon, who cooked to keep his mind off his leukemia treatments. Jack was 10 then. Since then, the 13-year-old has been on The Tonight Show, a contestant on Food Networks Rachael vs. Guy, and the author of his own cookbook. And Samantha Pecoraro, who is 16, cant even eat what she cooks, because of a rare medical condition.

The more kids I spoke with, the more stories emergedtoo many to ignore as a passing fad. FutureChefs was born.

As I wrote this book, telling the stories of these young chefs, they became the teachers and I the student. I learned that while all of them are impressive, none are that unusual. Like their peers, they are being raised in a food-aware world where whole ingredients, respect for the earth and environment, and the desire to explore beyond their physical borders is the norm. These kids are vegetarians, farmers, travelers, activists, healthy eaters, and compassionate thinkers. And they are not alone.

While the stories youll find in this book are dramatic and moving, exuberant and joyful, hopeful and determined, not every kid here is a cooking prodigyin fact most arentbut every story speaks to a deep and abiding passion for food.

And every story speaks to a generation poised to take back American Food from industry and restore it to its rightful place in home kitchens, in the fields of small farmers, and on the tables of everyone, regardless of income or education.

At first blush, its easy to discount these young people as unusual in some wayoddities in size small chefs jackets or farmers overallsbut nothing could be further from the truth. FutureChefs is just a taste of a vast network of people 18 and under who are poised to change the way we as Americans and as members of the international community think about, cook, and consume food.

Theirs is a way that honors the return to scratch cooking, the value of real food, and the importance of cultural connections. They are clear on how they want to see the food world evolve and they are taking action to make it soto the ongoing benefit of us all.

More than anything, perhaps, these young chefs are the leaders of a new tomorrow. Consider them the forward flank of a changing American food scene that reflects the color and fabric of what we call our national food. Their love of real ingredients, their willingness to experiment with multiethnic flavor profiles, and their eye toward food justice and other issues of food reform are but a glimpse into a culinary future that they are changing with every step forward into tomorrow.

Ramin Ganeshram
Westport, Connecticut
August 2014

Acknowledgments

T he greatest measure of my thanks goes to the young people who made this book possible with their amazing, inspiring, and sometimes astounding, stories of life in the kitchen.

Gratitude to Georgia Catanese and her dad, Joe, for the generosity of spirit they showed me by sharing Georgias remarkable story when this book was merely a germ of an idea and allowing me to continue to share it with them through the years. Even more thanks go to Donna Catanese for raising such an extraordinary daughter. I never knew you, Donna, because you left this world too soon, but I thank you for all youve done.

My biggest cheerleader for this project has always been the inimitable Chef Kashia Cave, founder of My City Kitchen. Thank you for your faith and for helping to test the recipes in this book with your amazing group of teen chefs: John Alvarez, Jonathan Ancrum, Ebony Brown, Alana Brown, Tiera Burch, Randy McKinney, and Alex Woodworth.

Testing thanks also goes to Chef Cecily Gans and the class of 2014 culinary team at Staples High School in my hometown of Westport, Connecticut: Zachary Reiser, Sarah Rountree, Allyssa McGahern, Rayna Weiser, Nathan Francis, and Cecilia Kiker. And to Chef Bob McIntosh and his students at the Concord Regional Technical Center in New Hampshire: Michael Filides, Henry Hochberg, Daiquiri Przybyla, Randi Houle, Jeremy Kelly, Damian Woodard, and Samantha Bruce.