Taste of Place Episode 10

A Pepper Party

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Jonathan Nunn, a food and city writer based in London, and the founder and co-editor of Vittles.
Chloe-Rose Crabtree, a chef, writer and co-founder of Sourced.
Jenny Lau, a community organizer, writer, and gentle food activist and founder of Celestial Peach.
Pam Brunton, a chef and co-owner of Inver Restaurant in Scotland on Loch Fyne.
Tomas Heale, chef and owner of a London-based vegan restaurant, Naïfs.
Emma Hughes, a journalist and novelist.
Fiona Mowlem, mother to Taste of Place host, Dr. Anna Sulan Masing.

Here are some highlights:

Anna introduces the episode’s festivities by explaining that she is hosting her very own Gawai Batu, or Gawai Whetstone celebrating the release of Taste of Place.
Jonathan describes the nostalgic dish he brought to the celebration, a Goan dish called Xacuti.
Chloe presents the twist on crème brûlée cookies that she brought, made with pepper and cardamom instead of vanilla.
Jenny talks about the Cantonese black pepper beef and its Western-Cantonese fusion origin story.
Emma describes the Scottish-rooted dessert she brought made of strawberries, black pepper, basil and balsamic vinegar.
Tomas talks about the summery salads he made for the party made of Urbinati melon, tomatoes, cucumber—and of course, black pepper.

Anna’s mother, Fiona, recounts her time living in Sarawak in the late 20th century and how pepper was grown back then.

Each guest shares their stories about when and how they learned where pepper comes from and how it’s grown.
The guests reminisce about their nostalgic memories connected to pepper.
Anna and the guests discuss the unwritten rules of which kinds of peppers are used in different dishes and the connotations each kind of pepper carries.
The guests talk about how heritage and culture play into food memories and learning how to cook.

Anna concludes the episode by discussing how using something as small as pepper as a tool for examining nostalgia and the past, can help us begin to re-see history, even if it is our own personal history.