BORN AND RAISED: FOOD

EPISODE FOUR: MOM’S COOKING

ANGELYN​​: I’m Angelyn Francis.

AL​​: And I’m Al Donato.

ANGELYN​​: From HuffPost Canada, you’re listening to Born and Raised, a podcast about
second-generation Canadians

Today, we’re talking about the boss of the kitchen. The Queen of the Culinary. The Ruler of Our
Bellies. It’s our mom’s cooking episode!

TASHA​​: My mom is a badass. Honestly. I can’t really put it any other way.

When I started getting into punk and alternative and metal music, and I was like, I dunno, 15,
16; she was kind of weirded out by it at first. But then suddenly, the more we listened to it the
car, cause I was always DJ as she was driving, she just started liking it. She’s the one who
follows all the blogs and figures out where all the shows are.

And now she listens to more heavy stuff than I do. I think she just appreciates the raw emotion
of it, and the honesty of it, which fits for her. She’s very upfront, what you see is what you get.
She’ll tell you what she thinks all the time, if something pisses her off she’ll talk about it.

AL​​: TASHA STANSBURY’s mom comes from Lebanon and has an Armenian background. Her
dad is Anglo-Québécois. Tasha grew up eating what her mother whipped up in the kitchen,
which was mostly Lebanese cuisine. A few years back, Tasha made a dietary choice that has
forever changed how her mom cooks.

TASHA​​: I couldn’t reconcile my interpretation of myself as an animal lover with being a

meat eater at the same time. So I gave up meat when I was 13. I thought veganism was
a little bit extreme — at first.

AL: ​Tasha became vegan — but she didn’t realize giving up meat, eggs and dairy also meant
giving up her favourite Lebanese dishes.

TASHA​​: It wasn’t a conscious decision, where I was like, “OK if I go vegan, I’m never going to
eat Lebanese food again.” It was just kind of a slow realization after I had made that decision.
Like, “Oh, wait, next time we go over to teta’s, I’m not going to be able to eat this and this and
this.” My grandmother would ask me, “Oh, do you want me to make your old favourite dishes?”
It was suddenly, “Wait. That has eggs and dairy in it? And that was my favourite thing.” That just
kept happening again and again, it was really upsetting at the beginning, but I had made that
decision, and I committed to it. I just thought it was something to accept and it was a loss I had
to bear.

AL: ​Tasha's new diet didn’t go unnoticed by her mom.

TASHA​​: My mom came downstairs, and she was like, “I noticed you haven’t really been drinking
milk recently.”

I was kind of like, “Oh god, busted! I’ve been vegan for like, four minutes, and my mom’s
already caught me.”

She was really upset originally.

She was like, “Well, where are you going to get your protein and calcium and how are we going
to do this and it’s going to be so difficult for us!”

She just kinda kept going and I just kinda let her go. And about five or 10 minutes later, she was
suddenly, “OK, well, we can go to the store and check out to see if there’s any vegan cheese.
We can try to find some more alternatives.”

And I was like, “I don’t really know what just happened, but I’m OK with it. I didn’t even have to
say anything.” It was wicked.

So, suddenly it kind of shifted and we were all eating the same thing at dinner. And cooking for
four people, I think my mom started to get a little more creative in the kitchen and started trying
to explore new alternatives and cooking with tofu and just trying new things.

AL: ​Adapting Lebanese-Armenian food for vegans wasn’t easy for Tasha’s mom.

TASHA​​: There’s a lot of dishes where meat is infused into it, like there will be ground beef in a
stew, which is really common, or like, chicken in a soup.

AL: ​Two of Tasha’s favourite dishes are vine rolls and cabbage rolls, where ground beef plays a
starring role.

TASHA​​: And that's like the one thing where it was like rice and meat and a leaf, and that’s it.
So, without the meat, it was just like, eh. Like it was fine and flavourful, it was cooked in spices,
whatever.

AL: ​But as soon as her mom got her hands on soy-based imitation meat, everything changed.

TASHA​​: It was like, oh my god! The possibilities! The flavour explosion! This is incredible!
AL:​​. It turned out her mother’s cooking and her adaptations of Lebanese-Armenian dishes were
so good, they convinced the entire family to go vegan.

TASHA​​: It went from me being able to eat very little as a vegetarian to me being able to eat a lot
more as a vegan. Did not expect that. [Laughs]

People think that you can only be vegan if you are wealthy and white. When people say that,
they erase my mom, who comes from that culture and that stuff is important to her and she’s
found a way to reconcile those things.

Because my mom had been so much more directly connected to it and because she had grown
up learning how to make these things, and she had grown up actually in Lebanon, I felt like she
was in a much better position to adapt those recipes.

And even when she went vegan, a lot of times I would wait for her to adapt something rather
than be like, “Hey, can we try this and make this vegan?” I would wait for her to do that.
Because I still felt like it didn't really belong to me.

I’m starting to get out of that now and I’m starting to explore new recipes on my own, but I think
that’s another thing that a lot of second-gens experience, you know, that kind of reluctance to
adapt. You’re stuck trying to figure out which parts of your culture you want to keep, and which
ones you want to adapt or reject completely.

ANGELYN​​: I’ve had this exact conversation with my aunt recently.

AL​​: Oh yeah?

ANGELYN​​: ‘Cause I said that my family’s Jamaican. My family’s also Chinese, my mom’s
Chinese-Jamaican and so is my aunt. And I said to them, “Oh yeah sure, vegetarian, I could
probably do it, but then I would never be able to eat Jamaican or Chinese food ever again
because it’s all pork, chicken, and beef.” And now I just feel like I’m not thinking hard enough.

AL​​: Yeah, you just got to be a little bit creative.

ANGELYN​​: Yeah, vegan oxtail.

AL​​: Mhmm. As we were collecting food stories for the podcast, we kept hearing about mommas.
Everybody had a mom story.

ANGELYN​​: And it was it was ​the way​ mom cooked that really got the kids talking.
ANGELYN​​: You know, every mom is different, but I think we can all agree they all have some
universal quirks.

AL​​: Mhmm, yep! That’s true. And you know you grew up on immigrant mom cooking when you
always finish your plate and you never waste food. Like if you had a speck of rice she would
come down on you with the dishonour of 20 generations. She always had a, “Back home, we
would only dream of this!” speech, you know?

ANGELYN​​: My mom does not know how to make just for two, just for three, she can only make
for six to 20.

AL​​: Yep, serves 250. Well, that and your grocery shopping always takes time.

ANGELYN​​: Oh my gosh.

AL​​: Right? ‘Cause you had to get specific ingredients, and brands, and she also taught you how
to compare fruits and vegetables right. Like, not just the prices, but picking them. I always felt
like a weirdo in No Frills going [thwapping sounds] on everything.

ANGELYN​​: And the containers in the fridge are never what you actually think they are.

AL​​: You think yogurt is yogurt, but it’s a lie.

ANGELYN​​: The “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter” just isn’t--

AL​​: You can’t believe it, ‘cause it’s not!

ANGELYN​​: Open it up and you just see leftovers from last night.

AL​​: Did your mom do this? Did she stop you from stealing meat from the pot?

ANGELYN​​: Oh yeah, that was like James Bond, you know?

AL​​: Now these habits might sound weird, but they were a part of our moms’ culinary traditions.

ANGELYN​​: Exactly, everyone has a role in their family. Maybe you’re the one all the babies
adore, or you’re the storyteller and you know everyone’s embarrassing moments.

AL​​: Oh, that’s definitely me. And through their cooking and their recipes, moms become
keepers of tradition.
ANGELYN​​: It’s kind of like a portable link to home because you go to a new country and you
can’t walk around your old neighbourhoods and see the landscape where you grew up for our
moms, but you can always make the food that you ate back home.

AL​​: Mmhmm. And a lot of times it’s because of those recipes that they hold onto. It’s actually
also another accessible way they can keep culture with their kids, you know? Because recipes
aren’t just directions to make food. They can also become stories about, “I made this with your
dad,” or, “I made this with my grandma.”

I think we should actually be keeping more of an active role though, in keeping their traditions
alive. Maybe that means learning their recipes.

So Angelyn, do you have a recipe your mom taught you?

ANGELYN​​: Well, the thing about my mom is, she’s an amazing cook, but she doesn’t like to
cook.

AL​​: Aw.

ANGELYN​​: Yeah. So when I was growing up, she didn’t make me come in and help. I actually
slowed her down a lot. So I got shooed out of the kitchen more often than not.

AL​​: [Laughs]

ANGELYN​​: But she has definitely put me to shame sometimes, like when I was trying to make
dumplings for the first time.

AL​​: What happened?

ANGELYN​​: She was just insulted that I was trying to put it in the pot.

AL​​: [Laughs] Oooh. Moms roast like no other.

ANGELYN​​: No, but still, I love how in families that moms are still the keepers of tradition.

AL:​​ Me too! But this next story kind of turns that on its head.

ANGELYN​​: How so?

AL​​: Well instead of sticking to authentic methods, this mom is the queen of shortcuts.

Her daughter is PREENA CHAUHAN. They co-founded Arvinda’s, named after Preena’s mom.
They teach the classes together, but they don’t always see eye-to-eye.
PREENA​​: My mom is all about really getting people to actually do the cooking. So it’s one
thing to learn it, but are you actually do it after that? If it’s easy, she knows that people will
actually do it.

When we’re creating a curry from scratch, the main labour, where the time goes to create that,
is actually in caramelizing the onions. It needs to be done a particularly way, it can’t be rushed.
This is something that needs to be slowly caramelized so all of the golden colour comes
through. No burnt onions, otherwise it’s going to come through in the actual taste of the curry.
So there’s definitely a lot of technique involved in getting that onion right.

If we have the onion done in advance, we can make any curry probably in about 15 minutes.
Maybe some of them, vegetable curries, maybe in 10 minutes.

One of the tips she likes to share, if perhaps, you know, if somebody has some extra time on
the weekend, they can caramelize their onions in a large batch and then they can freeze it. And
when they want to make a chickpea curry, chana masala, on a weeknight, then they will pull that
out and then just wake it up, heat it up a little bit, add tomatoes, add a can of chickpeas, the
masala, simmer, it’s done in 10 minutes.

And so, I would always come in and say, “Well, you can do that if you’re strapped for time, but if
you really want to achieve that really great flavour, I don’t advise freezing it because I always
notice a little taste that I don’t like and I’m very particular on flavour. And so, if something sort of
deviates or takes away from that flavour, then I would more likely want to do it fresh and take
the extra time to do it.

When we share these types of tips and things like that in the class, I’ll maybe intervene and just
give my opinion. And they all start laughing because they can see the differences in our styles,
our cooking, or what we sort of value more, I think.

“If you’re looking for that flavour, this is how you can achieve it. Go the traditional route.” And
my mom would kind of slap me on the wrist and go, “Why would you do that when we can do it
this way and we can still make it really tasty?”

My mom has probably cooked every single day of her life. She’s learned how to make cooking
really efficient.

I’m a little bit more striving for authenticity and I think one of the reasons why is probably
because I’m born in Canada and I’m trying to grasp and hold onto a lot of that tradition, in the
sense of I want to pass that onto my future kids and my future generations and I want to give
them those recipes.
At the end of the day, my mom, anytime that we’re cooking together, anytime that we’re
teaching together, my mom is the boss in the kitchen.

She kind of has the final say, no matter what!

ANGELYN​​: I guess momma knows best after all.

AL​​: [Laugh] Yep. Class dismissed.

Our next mom knows a lot of things but her son reveals that cooking was not one of her
strengths. Let’s meet BEN LOOTENS. He’s been a sous chef, he’s been in agriculture, and he
really cares about the whole process of cooking, from farm to stove to table.

ANGELYN​​: Sounds like a guy who lives and breathes the food industry.

AL​​: Definitely. So what he says next about his momma and this meal she made for him as a kid,
know that it comes from a good place.

BEN: ​My mom used to boil everything. Just, put it all in a pot, boil it together. Just put the lid on
and just basically let it steam itself to death.

So a really classic Dutch dish that everybody I know who has Dutch background knows this dish
and can smell it a mile away if it’s cooking, is boerenkool.

B-O-E-R-E-N-K-O-O-L which roughly translates to farmer’s kale. And it’s this … oh it’s awful. It’s
so bad. It’s so bad!

It’s potatoes and kale from a can — I don’t think you’ve ever seen kale from a can, but it’s really
gross. They like pack this kale in, and it’s in this brown, like watery syrup, like all this liquid that’s
been compressed out of the kale, and then onions, and some mustard and some stuff like that.
You boil that in a pan together, strain off the water and then mash it all together with salt and
pepper and a little bit more mustard, and stuff like that. So very mustard heavy. But it’s also just
like, it’s--it’s simultaneously mushy and stringy and like, sour and salty and oh man! As a kid, I’d
just push it around my plate, I would just like, try and make like a mashed potato volcano or
like--make like a nice landscape. Oh, it was brutal. Oh, it was so brutal.

It’s not that my mom’s a bad cook. They were young, they were freshly married, they were in a
totally new country, they knew very few people. So my mom, I think was trying to make the most
of--yeah, the most out of what she knew about cooking. She didn’t really have anyone to teach
her cooking while she was an adult. So she did the best she could, she tried to figure it out on
her own.
But I think those ingredients don’t lend themselves super well to being treated quickly or being
boiled to death or being oversalted. It was just like a match made in hell.

AL​​: Ben thinks he knows why his mom’s cooking might have emphasized sustenance over
flavour.

BEN: ​My parents were born in the fifties, post-war, so they were born in the very early fifties and
the Netherlands was kind of reacting to all of these shortages that they had during the war. The
Netherlands was occupied by the German invasion.

AL​​: The Nazi regime drastically cut food supplies in the Netherlands during the Second World
War, leading to a months-long famine. The Dutch survived on hardy vegetables, and even
potato peels and tulip bulbs. Thousands starved to death before help came.

BEN: ​As an adult I realized that she was trying to hand us a cultural heritage, and say “OK, this
is where we come from, this is who we were, this is who we are. This is the place we inhabited
at that point in time, like, this food is a segment of our history as people and we’re trying to hand
it down.”

And as I learned a little more about cooking, my imagination started to go and try and see how I
could take all of those component parts of the dishes my mom would cook, so this boerenkool
dish, and do them in a little bit of a different way, but still in the same combinations and treat
them with a little bit more love and a little bit more, you know, browning and not boil anything
and be a little more reserved with the salt.

So I remade this dish for my family once, and I was like, “Hey, see if you like it, see if it’s better
than you’ve ever had before.”

They were so nonplussed. They were like, “Mhm. I like Mom’s better.”

I did all this work to try and bring something into a realm where it’s actually a really solid dish.
Like a really, really great dish. So my family was just kind of like, “Ehhh. Ehhh. It’s OK. Eh. It’s
all right.”

It’s never as good as when your mom makes it. So I think there’s something about mom’s
cooking, that it’s just better when it’s made by somebody that loves you inside and out. It
just--the food just tastes better when it’s coming from your mom.

ANGELYN​​: See, food can really take on your energy. Have you ever heard that you should sing
to your food to make it taste better?

AL​​: What?! No!

ANGELYN​​: I swear--

AL​​: I have never heard this!

ANGELYN​​: It’s a Tiffany Haddish thing, she makes like these happy greens. She sings while
she’s cooking it and then she makes them happy greens.

AL​​: And it tastes better?!

ANGELYN​​: And it tastes better! So that’s why when your mom is making it, it’s full of love, when
you sing to it, it’s full of music.

AL​​: Oooh, OK! Well, I hope if Mama Lootens is listening, I hope she knows that her love and
her care did not go unnoticed.

ANGELYN​​: That’s all Born and Raised is serving up for today. I’m Anglyn Francis.

AL​​: And I’m Al Donato. If you’ve got room for seconds, mom ​insists​ you have some more. To
see photos of our guests, read show notes and the episode’s transcript, you can visit
huffpost.ca

ANGELYN: ​Born and Raised is produced by Al Donato and Stephanie Werner for HuffPost
Canada. Executive producers Andree Lau and Lisa Yeung. Stay tuned for our next episode,
where we tackle the classic second-gen dilemma of fitting in.

JUSEP​​: I had to go to Seoul, Korea, to visit family. And while there, I had probably the most
ridiculous food experience of my life.

ANGELYN: ​Until our next episode,​ ​thanks for listening. Stay hungry.