"You always hear how Native Americans died from starvation and disease, but people were intentionally mutilated, murdered and killed brutally. "History books were written by the US government," said Sherman. The wheels are already in motion to replicate the Indigenous Food Lab across the country, with immediate plans for locations in Montana and Alaska, and, eventually, into more than 45 satellite locations across the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and South America.īut what that history is and isn't makes their work all the more challenging. Their business started with catering and pop-ups and now includes a food truck, the non-profit North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems (NATIFS) – from which the Indigenous Food Lab, a professional indigenous kitchen and training centre in Minneapolis' Midtown Global Market is based – and, of course, Owamni. It's a thoughtful entry point for conversations about indigenous history – something inherent to the mission of The Sioux Chef, the company Sherman, an Oglala Lakota chef, founded in 2014, and co-owns with Thompson. The food, while beautiful, is so much more than a plate of art. As a child, he'd gather buckets full of fresh chokecherries to make it but uses many different berries today. A pool of maple syrup lay in wait at the bottom of the dish, and its sweetness, combined with the tender grit of the corn meal, the crunch of the hazelnuts and soft, tart berries, felt like a hug from my grandma.Īnd that glistening berry topping on the maple chaga cake? It's a Lakota berry soup called wojape, which Sherman uses as a sauce in both sweet and savoury dishes. But then I wouldn't have had room for the blue corn mush – a hazelnut and berry porridge – from the Ute Mountain Ute tribe in Colorado. It was so addictive I could have eaten an entire bowl of it. And though I can only imagine what a molten sunset absorbing a field of pumpkins into its hot, sticky flow would taste like, I feel certain nothing would come closer than the ethereal squash-agave caramel painted on top. While I've had sunflower seeds and honey before, I never expected that, with the addition of water, such simple ingredients could become a cake befitting any pastry shop. It's an investment that has already paid off in powerful ways. You feel this in the dining room, perched on the second floor of two abandoned flour mills, restored after the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board and Parks Foundation raised more than $19 million to honour the indigenous history of the area by creating a park with Owamni as its inspiration. One of Owamni's many strengths is its ability to bridge the past to the present, knowing one can only exist because of the other. Thompson's grandfather, who contributed historical knowledge to the book Where the Waters Gather and the Rivers Meet, an atlas of the Eastern Sioux published in 1994, made it possible for this important piece of indigenous history to live on. Spirit Island was the most sacred of the four islands here, and the Dakota and Anishinaabe communities would take their canoes there for ceremony, and women would come from far away just to give birth there." "It was said to be as beautiful as Niagara Falls. "We named this restaurant Owamni from the Dakota name OwamniYomni, for the waterfall that used to surround this area," said Thompson, a descendant of the Wahpeton Sisseton and Mdewakanton Dakota tribes. The connection to nature is palpable here, where sweeping views of the Mississippi River, along with curated indigenous plants like prairie dropseed – whose high-protein seeds can be eaten raw or ground into a flour – etch themselves into the landscape like a painting. Marigold-coloured agave squash caramel cascaded slowly down the sides of a sunflower-seed cake the colour of sandstone, and a deep red berry sauce shimmered atop a maple chaga cake so earthy in tone, it felt as though it were plucked from the forest floor. On the back patio at Owamni – the Minneapolis, Minnesota, restaurant owned by Sean Sherman and Dana Thompson – the late-evening sun cast my dessert in a natural spotlight.
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