Marcus Samuelsson and Fariyal Abdullahi are connected by their Ethiopian heritage. While Samuelsson was adopted by a family in Sweden, Abdullahi was born and raised in Ethiopia through the age of 17. At the 2024 Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, the owner and executive chef of Hav & Mar in New York shared essential ingredients and insights from their shared culture throughout a cooking demonstration of Oxtail Fried Rice and Tuna Kitfo with Injera Chips and Ayib.
“Here’s one of my favorite things about Ethiopian cuisine: We talk about having a good pantry as the basis of flavorful dishes,” said Abdullahi, a Noma alum and finalist for the 2024 James Beard Award for Emerging Chef.
These are the staples she brought or made from the Ethiopian pantry.
Berbere
The spice blend of chili, cinnamon, coriander, cumin, garlic, ginger, nigella, fenugreek, and ajwain is so beloved, Abdullahi brought a bag from Ethiopia to share.
“This is the spice that we use predominantly in essentially 90% of our food,” she explained. “It’s a sun dried chile powder. And the thing that I love about berbere is during the summer, we’re sun drying all the chile in our homes and everybody’s just sneezing cause it’s so spicy and hot, but each family kind of has their own unique recipes.”
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