Cherry Bombe Jubilee Recap
Aka best day ever 🍒
Sara,
Last week’s recipe, peanut butter and gochujang dressing, is genius! I plan to slather this on everything I eat, but first starting with some noodles. Our dressing repertoire just keeps growing!
The latest from New York is that I was really lucky to be able to go to the Cherry Bombe Jubilee on April 20th. It was an awesome day that I’ve been dying to tell you about! Since we’re both big fans of the publication Cherry Bombe, a media brand celebrating women and cool individuals in food, there were so many moments I knew you would love. Despite just being a fan of food and not actually working in the industry, like most in attendence, I was so lucky to be there at their yearly conference. This is due entirely to my wonderful friend, Sophia (pictured below!), who is an an incredible cook and event planning genius. She was running one of the many imaginative pop-ups at the event. More Sophia features are to come - I know it!
To describe the event, I guess conference is not quite the right word. The energy was the opposite of a dingy expo center full of soulless networking. Yes, there were speakers and panels, but all of them were so unique and intentional. There were also a range of big and small food brands, influencers, and non-profits who came to showcase their innovative work and of course some great bites. I’ve been to a few of these conference type gatherings where the goal is always to have everyone mingle but I’ve never felt it be so effortless as it was there. It was such a warm, inviting environment full of both new ideas and old wisdom.
Food is inherently intersectional and touches so many parts of all of our lives. The strength of the event, to me, was how they embraced that intersectionality, gathering food people from all walks of life to meet and share knowledge with each other. While I got to meet some heroes (as promised, pics below!), I was also introduced to so many individuals and initiatives that were totally new to me.
I could do a play by play of the whole day but want to focus on their “Icons Panel,” featuring the stars of the Icons issues of Cherry Bombe that recently went out. The panel featured Dr. Jessica B. Harris, Madhur Jaffrey & Grace Young regaled us with countless learnings and stories. This incredible group of food scholars / historians / activists / chefs / authors (true multi-hyphenates) shared a wealth of wisdom and encouragement for the next generation of food. It was all too brilliant to try to adequately summarize but I wanted to share one quote paraphrased from Jessica B Harris. When asked what the most joyous moments of her life were:
“The joy is today. I’ve had the privilege of eating with Leah Chase and many other food legends. And seeing so many women in the world of food today, working together and supporting each other - today is that joyous moment.”
Additionally, she left us with great words of advice, and words to live by, - “Do and thrive.” I was so moved by her speaking and was even luckier to get the masterpiece, High on the Hog, signed by her. And yes, I black out while it happened and totally forgot to get a picture… Sophia recommended I check out her memoir, My Soul Looks Back and I just finished to it on audiobook. Harris herself narrates and recounts her fascinating life and work as a food scholar in New York and Paris, having eaten with Maya Angelou and drank wine with James Baldwin. Sara, this book is a must!
And in my grand tradition of sending way too many links of things to my friends (also known as my famous Content Recs) I wanted to share a few more discoveries from this really special day below: Note: I’m on a forced break from buying more cookbooks. I’m running out of space in my little New York apartment. The books below were all featured at the event and are now on my endlessly growing wishlist…
Books:
An Invitation to Indian Cooking: 50th Anniversary by Madhur Jaffrey - a legend in the Indian culinary world and hilarious speaker and actor! This 50th Anniversary version of the book holds some of her greatest hits.
Il Sud by Rebekah Peppler - the talk she gave about the personal journey that led her to living in France and writing will break your heart and put it back together. This book looked beautiful beyond words.
Islas by Von Diaz - Diaz read an excerpt about a community of women in Guam passing down traditions of cooking and eating from the land. I can’t wait to revisit it and make the accompanying recipes.
People:
Carolina Gelen - you know I’m a longtime fan! Carolina is Romanian and from Transylvania, a region where many speak Hungarian and share some of our food traditions. The opportunity to thank her for putting Hungarian recipes on the map was a gift! I can’t wait to buy her upcoming cookbook.
Olivia Cheng - I hadn’t heard of her work until she spoke on a Food and Fashion panel and WHOA amazing! She is a designer and visual artist that incorporates food and utensils into her work. Thought provoking and delicious!
Zaynab Issa - We know her, we love her. Zaynab is so chic and her recipes for BA are wonderful. When she spoke, I was really excited to hear about her newest initiative Taste,Good a series of charitable dinner parties based in New York.
Brands:
Inaru Chocolate - The sister team of Erika and Jannett run this chocolate brand and spoke about their journey building a locally grown chocolate company in the DR. This initiative combines their heritage, startup background, and dedication to environmentalism. The vanilla and chamomile chocolate bar rocked my world!
Send Flours - I hadn’t heard of this Denver based brand but oh my god I could not stop thinking about their treats for days. Their Thai Dye For cookies, a peanut butter with Thai spiced pumpkin seed brittle, so unique. I need more!
OmSom - I already loved this brand but hearing one of their co-founders speak just reinforced that. Another sister run brand! Vanessa Pham spoke candidly about their SVB experience. Their sauces are so good and tossing their Spicy Mala Sauce with noodles is a perfect quick and perfectly spicy dinner.
Enjoy this mess of links - things to buy and to make you hungry. Wherever you are in the world next April, you simply have to be in New York so we can go to Jubilee together! 💣 💕
A running letter between long distance friends who love to eat
Do you miss your best friend? Are really hungry you right now? If the answer to either of these is yes, you know what to do.