23: Food, Recipes, and Cultural Appreciation | Celeste Noche

MU: 00:03 Hi, my name is Melissa Urban and you’re listening to Do the Thing, a podcast where we explore what’s been missing every time you’ve tried to make a change and make it stick.

Speaker 2: 00:14 Yes.

MU: 00:20 Today my guest Celeste Noche. She’s an editorial and documentary photographer based in Portland, Oregon and San Francisco, California. Through her photos of food, travel and portraits, Celeste advocates for diversity and inclusivity seeking to share stories of underrepresented communities. Her work has appeared on the BBC, the San Francisco Chronicle, and in the New York times and most recently she spoke at our Whole30 certified coach summit leading a workshop on cultural appreciation and food photography. The Whole30 is all about food. We publish work from recipe, creatives, food bloggers and food photographers who capture the vibrant colors, delicious flavors and creative use of whole food ingredients in our Whole30 meals. Our audience is global. This year alone, we featured creatives sharing dishes from their Chinese, Mexican, Dominican, and Thai heritage. We’ve also featured plenty of people cooking food they love from other cultures. Anyone can cook, eat, and share recipes from any culture they like, but there’s a way to do it that creates a true cultural exchange and demonstrates respect for the culture from which that food originated.

MU: 01:35 This is cultural appreciation and it can be seen in the way you style and photograph your dishes, the way you title them, the way you describe them and the way you share the stories behind the dishes and the people from which they came. There’s also a way to get it cringe-worthily wrong and crossed the line from appreciating other’s cultures to appropriating, in essence, stealing their intellectual property, culture and food without giving a darn thing back. It’s not always easy to tell the difference between appreciation and appropriation. There aren’t always hard and fast rules and some might say it’s just some people being overly sensitive or politically correct, but it’s not about politics. It’s about being respectful of other cultures and most important their people. For those of you listening who have food blogs, photography blogs, or create recipes, you also have a global audience with people from diverse backgrounds and cultures supporting your work.

MU: 02:35 In this conversation I want to open the idea that the words you use, the stories you tell and the way you present your work matters. Taking more care, doing more research and simply paying attention to the way you share your creations can have a huge positive impact on your community. Not only is it good for your community, it’s also good for your business. In the world where the cries for diversity, inclusion and representation have never been louder. You will be noticed for making the effort and you’ll be noticed when you don’t. The last thing you should want to do or can afford to do for your growing business is alienate an entire population group with careless words, disrespect for your audience’s culture or the upholding of harmful stereotypes. In this discussion, Celeste and I talk about cultural appropriation of food and recipes, we give examples from her home city of Portland, Oregon, and talk about how our appropriation harms the cultures of the foods we are trying to elevate through our work.

MU: 03:40 We talk about how words, stories, even food styling and photography matter and why it’s so important not to divorce the cultures, people and stories from its food. Finally, she shares strategies for all of us who share food and recipes to be better allies and better agents of appreciation. This episode will challenge you. It challenged me in while I don’t expect anyone to completely get this concept and just one conversation. I’m hoping this exploration will plant the seed for further reflection, self accountability and exploring these concepts more with me and with others. I’ll be sharing extensive resources in the show notes and I am always open to questions and my DMS. Some of you are just here for episodes on hiking or fitness or interviews with Gretchen Rubin. I love sharing those topics here with you, but I invite you and encourage you and challenge you to go a little deeper into this episode and topic as well. This podcast is about what’s been missing in your efforts to do the thing and if your thing is making your community feel respected, valued, and heard, this could be one of those missing pieces. Now onto the episode.

MU: 04:57 All right, Celeste Noche, thank you so much for coming on. Do the thing. It’s so nice to talk to you again.

CN: 05:02 Thank you for having me.

MU: 05:04 So you presented a fantastic workshop at our coach summit on cultural appropriation and food photography and it was such an incredible resource for our community who of course is so full of food bloggers and recipe creatives and chefs that I knew I had to have you on the podcast to talk about this.

MU/CN: 05:22 Um, I had so much fun speaking to everyone. Um, and I’m really happy to be here and to speak further. Well, thank you. So the first question I ask all my guests is, what’s your thing? My thing is making a safer, more equitable place for by POC and arts and media. I love that and we’re going to talk about that here today in the context of not just the whole 30 community, but everyone who listens, who, uh, has something to do with food and recipes, which is a, a large, I think part of what we do at whole, but also anyone in health and wellness. We’re here specifically to talk about cultural appropriation and food recipes and food photography and how food bloggers, chefs and recipe creatives can more respectfully appreciate the cuisines of other cultures. But before we dive in, I think it’s going to be really important to define cultural appropriation. How would you define that? (CN) Um, there are, I would say like a lot of threads for this in its essence, cultural appropriation is someone from one culture borrowing or taking from another culture.

MU: 06:35 And so when you put it like that, it doesn’t sound so bad. There are a lot of different cultures all around the world, all with rich histories and traditions. And in this case, you know, different foods. Why is it problematic for us to borrow and buy us some, I’m really specifically talking about white people.

CN: 06:51 Sure. Um, and I would say predominantly the harm that’s come from cultural appropriation has come from Western or white cultures. The reason right now that it’s such a hot topic, and I hate to call it that cause it’s just an important topic. Um, but the reason it’s, you know, the conversation that we’re having now is because there is an inordinate balance of power between the borrowers and who is being borrowed from more specifically usually is stealing. Um, and there is a lack of agency and permission in that borrowing. And it’s no longer is it a cultural exchange, but something to be profited from without acknowledging or giving back to the community that originated those ideas.

MU: 07:35 So typically appropriation happens at the hands of a culturally dominant group and the people being appropriated are typically marginalized. Is that correct?

CN: 07:47 Yeah, I think that’s a good way to describe it. It’s hard to blanket term everything because of course you’ll find examples outside of those, you know, those terms. But I would say predominantly that’s the case. And predominantly that’s why there are so many issues and why communities especially now are, you know, speaking up about it. It’s not just appropriation, it’s literal harmful stealing.

MU: 08:11 Right, right. I read an article that looked at all of the different recipes featured in one particular area of the New York times. And these were culturally traditional recipes. So Indian recipes, Chinese recipes, and overwhelmingly when you look at the authors or the chefs of these recipes, they were hugely white, but what are the problems when white people become the experts of things like Chinese cooking or Mexican food,

CN: 08:41 So that data is from Intersectional Analysts. Just want to give a shout out to Lorraine who put that together and I think really show the data behind the inordinate power hierarchies within these conversations. The reason this is such an issue is that when we limit who gets to be an authority on those cuisines or on those topics, we’re stripping one those communities of their agency, like of the fact that they’re the people who created these things, who they come from, but then if we’re only using white predominantly men to talk about these topics, then we’re completely erasing the origins of where those come from. We’re saying that people don’t have the knowledge or the, or the background to speak about their own cultures, but instead, let me speak to, let me hear about this from someone who is more palatable or someone else’s decided as the authority on this when we should be going to the source.

MU: 09:39 Yeah. You know, I find in a lot of these situations there is a complete separation. There’s like a divorce of the cuisine from the history and the culture and the stories from where that cuisine emanated.

CN: 09:55 Exactly. I think, not to say that there isn’t a benefit of having an outside perspective because I think that’s something that societies can benefit from and appreciate. But there’s such a deep history of just taking, um, without that acknowledgement that is really harmful, perpetuates erasure or perpetuate stereotypes. Um, and I think overall leads to limited conversations and knowhow about these communities.

CN: 10:23 I was talking to, uh, someone in the Whole30 community who was telling me her story about growing up with her family’s traditional cultural foods and taking it to school. She would be made fun of. She would be told that her food was stinky or it was weird and she so desperately wanted to fit in that she was, you know, begging her mom for like hot pockets and other like kind of Americanized food. Now fast forward 20 years later and some of the hottest chefs in the country are taking this food and taking these recipes and you know, opening these hot loudly acclaimed new restaurants.

CN: 11:01 Yeah, I mean I think a lot of children of immigrants or people who don’t have Western backgrounds can relate to this. I certainly, I mean like Filipino food can often have really strong smells and if the kids all around you are eating, you know, like ham sandwiches and Lunchables and like they turn and look at you and you’re like, why does what you’re eating smells so weird? Like you don’t forget things like that. Um, and so to have something so internalized early on about your culture being bad or you being different, being further othered, so early in life and so you kind of distance yourself from it, but then you know, 15, 20 years later you see white chefs being lauded for their bravery and for their innovation and quote unquote discovering these cuisines when you were made fun of for those very things when you were a little kid. And so it’s like who gets the side, you know, when this is good or not.

MU: 12:01 Yeah, yeah. You’re in Portland, Oregon. Yes. And there was a very popular story that almost seem to sort of represent, it was like the figurehead for cultural appropriation in food, the Kooks burrito cart. Um, are you familiar with the story? Oh yes. Okay. We call it a Burritogate. Burritogate. Yes. It was really, I mean it received lots of national media. They received hate mail and they were forced to shut down. But do you want to talk about kind of the, why this was so problematic and why it was such a clear example of appropriation? Or do you think it was a clear example of appropriation?

CN: 12:40 I mean, to me that’s sort of textbook, um, example of it, and I will preface this by saying I don’t think that, you know, harmful violent threats are ever the appropriate response. When you do see these situations, I think we should have more open conversations about them. But for this piece specifically in this article, he interviews the two girls, sorry, two women who opened the cart. It’s just the, it’s a food cart. They talk about going down to somewhere in Mexico, seeing women making tortillas, asking them if they can share the recipes, the women saying no. And these two Portlanders still taking their recipes.

MU: 13:27 Yeah, it was described as like we, so they said no. So we like peered into windows and watch them behind the scenes to like get as much information as we could.

CN: 13:35 It’s like a blatant admission of their theft because in a lot of instances like maybe there isn’t, it doesn’t feel like there’s one place where you can ask for permission. You know, the cultures are broad. How do you ask one person to be the, is this okay for an entire culture? You know, cultures and communities are not monoliths, but in this specific instance, they had the ability to ask. The locals said no and they still thought that they were entitled to that information. And so that’s what the issue was. It’s interesting now because you know, appropriation is a huge issue in Portland in general. I would say, you know, it’s an issue everywhere. But in Portland it’s especially blatant and by appropriation I mean profiting off of marginalized communities, um, for the white benefit or white communities benefits. Um, so that’s already an issue in Portland. But then to talk about it so casually and local media and have it celebrated as like these girls are so clever, they just got these recipes and let’s celebrate their own food cart. Like the fact that an editor and the writer didn’t think that those were problematic to me is like one, an example of that publication but also Portland.

MU: 14:45 Yeah. These two women took the, you know, the capital, the intellectual property of Mexican abuelas as they were described and took them back to Portland and opened their burrito cart. And essentially were profiting off of the intellectual property they stole. They didn’t give any credit, they didn’t offer to pay for their time or consultation or the recipes. They didn’t give back to the community in any way. They just took the information and began turning a profit.

CN: 15:13 Exactly. And the thing is that when I think the story got picked up and was shared more across, um, the news platforms nationally, it was trivialized. It was, wow, Portland is so PC and sensitive. They’re mad about burritos, but it’s not like that’s, it’s not the burritos itself or not the issue. It’s the fact that there’s the admission of theft and then the normalization of taking it and profiting off of it.

MU: 15:40 Every time I talk about cultural appropriation. I do get that pushback or feedback from people that this is all just like PC, political correctness. And I always push back and say that this is an issue about caring about our fellow humans. And if there’s something I can do, a word I can change or a behavior that I can think about critically so as not to offend an entire population group, that seems like an easy fix for me.

CN: 16:08 Exactly. I think it’s just being more thoughtful. Um, I think if someone is more upset about having to change their actions or reflect on them and that is more important than the harm they could be potentially causing to someone else, then they have a lot more reflection they need to do.

MU: 16:25 Yeah. I’ve heard cultural appropriation described as in an analogy as if you’re working on a school project and you put all this time and energy into a school project and you turn it in and you get an F and then someone else copies your work, presents it as their own and gets an a in all of these awards. How accurate do you feel like that is?

CN: 16:45 I think that’s a good analogy for, I think why it, it’s such an issue. An example in Portland is that, um, you know, there’s like a really well known entire restaurant here that is owned by like a white chef and he’s credited with being like w with bringing Thai food to Portland and just thinking like there is a Thai population here. Do they, do they not bring, you know, Thai food here that they can be so easily dismissed for something that they’ve been doing for S, you know, decades, centuries, and then someone else who has more resources can then present it as their own or as something new and then be applauded and receive accolades and you know, be sold out every night. It’s a huge reflection of the power dynamics that make appropriation harmful.

MU: 17:39 It is, it is. It’s dismissing the people while profiting off their food. It’s paying attention to their food, but not paying attention to the issues that this community might face or the, like you said, the history of their contributions to the community in the past. It’s overshadowed by, like you said, perhaps a more palatable or more popular or simply a more powerful person taking that cuisine over. Yeah, exactly. And then you talk about, you know, things like food gentrification, where we have taken over now quinoa is a great example, right? Quinoa hass become so popular in kind of the clean eating and health community, but Bolivia where most of the quinoa has grown, they can no longer afford their own food staple.

CN: 18:23 Right. And I think that’s just, you know, reflects on the power dynamics of, you know, different societies and cultures. Like especially being in the U S we have an immense amount of privilege and being able to receive know, kind of like anything we want at any time and oftentimes at the disregard of the people that those things are coming from. So there’s a lot of equity issues within food often. I think that people don’t think that food is political, but food intersects with so many things like everyone has to eat and how we get our food, how it’s grown, how we eat it, who has access to it. Those are all reflections of our society or a specific society.

MU: 19:03 Yeah, absolutely. And I want to interject here. It’s not that I can’t enjoy a taco or that as a recipe creator, I can’t, you know, make a Thai dish. That’s not what we’re saying. There is obviously a way to appreciate other cultures, cuisines and food and recipes. But what we’re talking about here really does cross the line and appropriation is that lack of respect is that lack of acknowledgement. It is the theft of intellectual property. It’s the divorcing of the cuisine from the history and culture. Like I won’t say it’s a black and white line, but at some point your behavior does cross the line.

CN: 19:40 Yeah, exactly. And I, I honestly, I wouldn’t say that appropriation itself is the issue. It’s the fact that people with more power and an equal power structures are what allow this misuse, um, and this harmful behavior to continue. And so you should be able to eat whatever you want and you should be able to enjoy it. And hopefully, you know, you’re getting that food from the cultures that created it and you’re giving back to those communities. But it’s when everything is filtered through a very specific, often white, often wealthy, um, lens that we perpetuate the eraser of those communities.

MU: 20:23 You know, there are a lot of chefs who will develop a deep relationship with the country or the culture of the people in which they specialize. They learn the language, they travel for months or years at a time. They know the people they’ve immersed themselves in that culture. Is that enough to get you out of appropriation and into like an actual appreciation and a respect?

CN: 20:48 This is something that, I mean that someone from the outside can’t decide. If I was that person spending all that time, am I giving back to the community and resources that I’m learning and benefiting from? I don’t think that’s a question that someone else can answer. Honestly. I feel like it’s really something you should be asking the community that you’re benefiting from. You know, they’re the ones that are going through all this labor to share their culture with you. Maybe you should be asking them, what can I, what more can I do to give back to you? You know, I don’t think that’s for us to decide. Yeah, that makes sense. Appropriation is in the eyes of the culture. And of course you also can’t expect one person to speak for an entire culture. So if I ask my Mexican friend, is this okay? And they say, yeah, this is fine. I don’t have a problem with it. That doesn’t mean I’m not crossing the line out of out of respect and appreciation.

CN: 21:36 Yeah, exactly. Even with, you know, Burritogate, there was an author based in LA who said, you know, let them have their burritos. And he was like, he’s a Mexican American writer and he’s definitely entitled to like what he thinks. But in Portland we have a huge issue with, with like harmful appropriation or misappropriation. And so having the outside perspective without recognizing why we’re tired of it in Portland and why we’re trying to make it stop or at least have some accountability towards it is completely different. So just a reminder that not all marginalized or traditionally marginalized communities are a monolith. We can all have different opinions and thoughts.

MU: 22:18 Yeah. Which makes it a little bit more complex. Doesn’t it if we’re, if we’re really trying, if white people are really trying to be respectful and do it the right way, it’s not just about taking, I’m a chef and I’m taking recipes from a community and I’m, you know, making them my own and trying to make myself the authority. It’s not just about that. It’s also the way I’m choosing to describe the food that I’m making. So words like ethnic or exotic or authentic are problematic in terms of talking about culturally significant dishes, why are those words problematic?

CN: 22:53 Well, ethnic and exotic specifically, there’s like a lot of articles on this, but ethnic and exotic specifically makes the default white or Western. It means that any cause ethnic doesn’t, that doesn’t come from anything. It’s just that one point someone decided, you know, Western society is the basis for everything and everything outside of Western society is ethnic. So who gets decide that? Why is it that we are other? But Western white culture is the default. Um, and so using words like that, being conscious of like their implications is important. Um, so Leho, the new critic of the San Francisco Chronicle has a whole list of where’s that she actively is not going to be using. She’s a great resource. She gives really great examples of like why she no longer wants to use those in her writing.

MU: 23:44 Yeah, I read that actually. I thought it was very interesting and there were definitely a few that gave me pause, like the word addictive. She’s no longer to use addictive because there are some substances that are seriously addictive and incredibly problematic and to water down. That definition really does, I think disrespect people who are suffering from it truly suffering from addiction. So it’s not just about the recipes, it’s not just about the way you describe them. This I found fascinating because in all my research into cultural appropriation of food, this never came up until I listened to a podcast you had done. This also spills over into food styling and photography.

CN: 24:21 Yes. I think that oftentimes if someone is not from the culture that you know, if someone has made and wants to photograph an Asian dish, but they’re not from that culture, they think that in order to show that it’s Asian, they have to put it on a bamboo mat, have a bottle of soy sauce in the background. I’m use chopsticks. And we don’t do that for, you know, different cuisines within the Western Canon. We aren’t putting olive oil bottles next to pasta or not, you know. And so I think sometimes within food styling and food photography, when there isn’t a lot of thought and research into how, you know, someone wants to portray a dish, people can lean on the stereotypes that they just happen to know and then further perpetuate stereotypes. Like for example, on Andrew’s and Maroons, um, website, he’s the host of bizarre foods, which in itself is a whole other thing. Um, but he has a dish of Filipino short ribs and a pile of chopsticks right next to them, except that in the Philippines we traditionally eat with our hands or with a spoon and a fork. And so why are those there?

MU: 25:35 It demonstrates a lack of understanding or desire to understand the culture from which this dish originated.

CN: 25:42 Exactly. It’s, it’s a perpetuation of stereotypes I think when you aren’t doing the work or if you wouldn’t just photograph it the way you would photograph anything else. Like if you’re going out of your way to show that this is a quote unquote exotic or ethnic thing, you are contributing to the discourse that Western and white is the default and everything else is other.

MU: 26:03 And you know, some people might listen to that and think, Oh my gosh, who cares? Who cares that this one picture has chopsticks when normally it would have a fork and knife. But it’s, it’s not about the one individual issue. It is just about the accumulation of these kind of micro oversights and aggressions. And you know, I read an article that talked about how like people of color are forgotten over and over and over again while they’re food and vocabulary and music and art and hair and clothing are consumed and adopted. That’s the real issue here.

CN: 26:34 Exactly. It’s taking from the culture. I’m benefiting from it, seeing all these different things within a culture as things that you want, but then rejecting the people itself, not supporting those communities themselves.

MU: 26:44 Exactly. So I have a lot of people in the Whole30 community who are recipe creatives. They’re food bloggers, they do food photography and I think they are going to want to know how they can still create dishes based on foods that they perhaps love or based on, you know, cultures that they do appreciate but do it in a way that is respectful. What kind of tips can you provide for someone who wants to appreciate different cultures without crossing that line into appropriation?

CN: 27:22 Sure. I mean I think it’s just being thoughtful. Um, and kind of asking yourself is the way that I’m making this dish different than how I’d make something that I’d make for myself. You know, are you applying a double standard to the things that you’re making? Something isn’t Asian just because you happen to use Sesame seeds or you know, and you can go to restaurants and there’s always like an Asian salad. And I’m like, why is this an Asian salad? Cause it has mandarin oranges. Exactly, exactly. And and it’s, you should be able to have a salad with a Mandarin orange right? Go for it. But think about like why you’re labeling something like the words that you use matter and the way that you’re describing things matter. I think that just reflecting on like if you’re, especially if you’re making some myths inspired from a different culture, be especially critical with yourself, am I doing this or am I choosing to portray this style of this photograph this in any particular way because it’s different. Am I going out of my way? Leaning on stereotypes that I think that I know without researching the culture more,

MU: 28:24 It sometimes can be really easy to just to default to a description of it’s an Asian something or it’s a Mexican something or it’s a Jamaican something. Because when I say that I get a pretty like quick picture of what the flavor profile might be. Sure. Is there a way to get that across?

CN: 28:39 I think it’s just using the ingredients. One thing that happened on Twitter, well maybe it was a couple of years ago, but someone had made a Banh Mi bowl, but Banh Mi means bread. So is it a button? It’s like calling it a chicken Parmesan sandwich bowl is what an a, someone responded. Um, and so, you know, you might want to rely on something cause that’s how you associate it. But if you’re using words that you don’t actually understand, you have to rethink them. And you know, a solution would have been just to say like a lemon grass, chicken ball, you know, just rethinking like maybe just highlight the ingredients that are in it versus putting a label on that doesn’t necessarily need to be there.

MU: 29:17 Absolutely. And if you are from that culture, how can you, uh, you know, say you’re a recipe blogger and you are cooking some of your mom’s Thai recipes. Should you be bringing, you know, that story in that culture, into the description of your recipes, into the photography, into the food itself.

CN: 29:34 As someone who likes to read recipes and read food writing, I always think that there’s a lot more depth and um, nuance to something if I, if there’s like a deeper connection to it, especially by way of their background. So I think I would encourage folks to do that if they’re able to and open to it.

MU: 29:52 Fantastic. And you know, I think another thing that you could do, because one of the things that you can do in terms of elevating had historically marginalized voices is just work with people who come from a culture that you want to learn more about or love. If you’re a recipe creative, you can always wop Instagram takeovers with someone who can share their, you know, Cuban dishes from their heritage or who can talk about Asian inspired food that you love, but from their cultural perspective. And, and I think you can, you know, offer some respect and reciprocity while still sharing the cuisine that you love. You’re just passing the mic.

CN: 30:30 Exactly. It. I think we’re slowly moving away from the idea that we need to be a voice for the voiceless and recognizing that there are other voices that are equally important that we should be hearing from as well.

MU: 30:43 I like that and I love that you talked about photography props. I haven’t going back through some of my old cookbooks now and I’m thinking with this new knowledge like, Ooh, I would’ve done some of that differently. I would. Yeah.

CN: 30:54 Right, and but that’s the thing. It’s not that you can’t make mistakes, but I think it’s learning from them and knowing how in the future you would do differently. Yeah,

MU: 31:02 I think that’s fantastic. You’ve provided me with a ton of resources, some books, some podcasts, and some notes. I have an entire document I’ve compiled in my own research on cultural appropriation when it comes to food, so I’m going to share all of those in the notes so that people can learn a little bit more and dig a little bit deeper for their own practice. But at the end of every episode, I ask all of my guests, what’s one thing you would want someone to know if they were ready to, in this case, do better.

CN: 31:32 I would just say educate yourself. I think that we forget that it takes work for a lot of folks, that we lean on marginalized folks especially. We want them to do the labor for us. So you want them to make things palatable so that you know the things that we accidentally do, we’re not offended by or defensive about, but a lot of it is on us to educate ourselves. There are so many resources out there. The world is your oyster.

CN: 31:56 Yeah, I love that. Thank you, Celeste. Where can people find you and learn more about you and your photography work?

CN: 32:04 I have a very unique name. It’s just celestenoche.com for my website and on Instagram and Twitter. I’m @extracelestial.

MU: 32:12 Fantastic. Celeste Noche, thank you so much for coming on Do the Thing and having this conversation. Before I wrap this episode up, I want to remind you that my newest whole30 recipe book, Whole30 Friends and Family is coming out soon. October 15th, 2019. Socializing has always been a pain point on the Whole30. You want to stay social but you also want to maintain your Whole30 commitment.

MU: 32:40 Whole30 Friends and Family makes that easy with 22 menus for every day. Social occasions like family dinners, movie night, backyard barbecues and kids’ birthday parties. The book contains more than 150 all new recipes sorted by menu and each menu includes my best tips for navigating social challenges, answering questions and inspiring friends and family to learn more about the Whol30. The Whole30 Friends and Family comes out October 15th but it’s available for preorder now and if you preorder, you get a sweet bonus. We’ll send you the entire tailgating menu free just in time for fall and sportsing. Visit whole30.com/friends-family and order your copy today.