The RiseBlack Cooks and the Soul of American Food: A Cookbook

Marcus Samuelsson is the acclaimed chef behind many restaurants worldwide. He has won multiple James Beard Foundation awards for his work as a chef and as host of No Passport Required, his public television series with Vox/Eater. Samuelsson was crowned champion of Top Chef Masters and Chopped All Stars, and was the guest chef for President Obama’s first state dinner. A committed philanthropist, Samuelsson is co-chair of Careers through Culinary Arts Program (C-CAP), which focuses on underserved youth. Author of several cookbooks in addition to the NewYork Times bestselling memoir Yes, Chef, Samuelsson also co-produces the annual Harlem EatUp! festival, which celebrates the food, art, and culture of Harlem. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Samuelsson converted his restaurants Red Rooster Harlem, Marcus B&P in Newark, and Red Rooster Overtown in Miami into community kitchens in partnership with World Central Kitchen, serving well over 150,000 meals to those in need. Follow him on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter at @MarcusCooks.

Osayi Endolyn is a James Beard Award–winning writer with work in Time, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, Eater, Food & Wine, Condé Nast Traveler, and the Oxford American. She appears in Chef’s Table and Ugly Delicious on Netflix, and has been featured on NPR’s 1A, Splendid Table, Special Sauce with Ed Levine, and the Sporkful podcast, for which she won a Webby. She is a recipient of the UC Berkeley-11th Hour Food & Farming Journalism Fellowship, and Southern Living named her one of thirty women moving Southern food forward. In addition to other book collaborations, Endolyn is working on a narrative about the history of systemic racism in American restaurant and dining culture. Follow her @osayiendolyn on Twitter and Instagram.

Yewande Komolafe is a writer, recipe developer, and food stylist from Lagos, Nigeria. She develops recipes that lend taste and texture to her experience as an immigrant in the United States. A regular contributor to the New York Times, her work has also appeared in Whetstone, Taste Cooking, Food + Wine, Saveur, and several other platforms and publications. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, daughter, and many jars of spices.

[The Rise] is an invigorating, joyous, and deeply nuanced illustration of the complexity of Black foodways, one that weaves together conversations about history, artistry, authorship, race, class, and culture with 150 recipes that incorporate ingredients and techniques from around the globe… [It] doesn’t claim to be an encyclopedic compendium of Black cooking; instead, it’s a celebration, one that honors the past while looking ahead, challenging assumptions even as it feeds you well. —Rebecca Flint Marx, Eater

This book is a celebration of Black excellence in cooking — something that is always important, and feels essential for 2020. With 150 recipes, Marcus Samuelsson illustrates how “Black cooking is the engine of what we commonly understand to be American food.” Each recipe in the book honors various chefs, activists, artists, authors, and historians who “illuminate the space we share”… It’s a book you’ll want to cook from, but also sit down and read.—The Kitchn

By about book thirty of my preparation for this story, I start going through a checklist for each option. Does this book inspire me? Teach me a new technique? Does it actually feed me: is it a book I’ll cook from, and not just read? The Rise, written by Marcus Samuelsson and Osayi Endolyn, with recipes by Yewande Komolafe and Tamie Cook, does all three. It’s a book about Black excellence in the food world; the recipes have roots in the Caribbean, the American South, and Africa. They are both nostalgic and forward-thinking. —Epicurious

While years in the making, The Rise reads like a response to the racial awakening that has defined the tumultuous spring and summer of 2020… [It] joins other recent cookbooks, notably by Toni Tipton-Martin, in celebrating the diversity of Black American food, and by making Black chefs and cooks the center of the story of American cuisine. The book also suggests a strategy for responding proactively to this moment: read, cook, reflect. Now repeat.—The New York Times

Along with James Beard Award–winning author Osayi Endolyn and recipe developers Yewande Komolafe and Tamie Cook, [Marcus Samuelsson] takes readers on a culinary journey to discuss the diversity, history, culture, and spirituality that Black food and Black chefs express. Among biographies highlighting the culinary contributions of dozens of contemporary Black chefs including Shakirah Smiley, Nina Compton, and Eric Gestel, readers will find more than 150 delicious recipes, each shared in tribute to their work… This book is a celebration of Black culture through food, and a must for all readers of culinary history. An amazing addition to any library collection.—Booklist Starred Review

This book is gumbo for your soul. A perfect storm of food, family, love, sharing of space and storytelling, it’s the only gift I’ll be giving this holiday season. Marcus has combined all of my favorite things: lineage, love and delicious cuisine. This melanated masterpiece is both delicious and nutritious.—Activist, writer, and filmmaker Kimberly Jones

Co-written with Osayi Endolyn, Chef Marcus Samuelsson’s long-awaited cookbook, The Rise: Black Cooks and the Soul of American Food, profiles the next generation of Black chefs and creators like Kwame Onwuachi and Adrienne Cheatham shaping America’s culinary future. We cannot recommend this book highly enough.—Food & Wine

The book challenges the notion that Black cooking has one monochromatic definition and puts the chefs who create it on their proper pedestal. The authors argue that there is no American food without Black food and offer over 150 recipes to prove their point…It’s shameful I’ve never tried cooking something as simple and filling as rice and peas (learning also that peas’ actually means red beans in this traditional dish.) Sad, too, that I’d never heard of most of these chefs, but “The Rise” offers help for the ignorant like me with easy-to-follow recipes combined.—CNN Travel

Flaky Andouille and Callaloo Hand Pies (with) Red Pepper Sambal

Crab Curry (with) Yams and Mustard Greens

In honor of Adrian Miller 

Flaky Andouille and Callaloo Hand Pies (with) Red Pepper Sambal

In the Caribbean, callaloo can refer to the leaves of particular plants like the taro or amaranth, and the dish of greens stewed with broth or coconut milk and meat or fish as seasoning in the way many eat collard, mustard, or turnip greens.

These hand pies are flexible. You can fill them with anything you have on hand—sausage, fish, ham, veggies, even ingredients like fresh crab and chopped pumpkin.

ACTiVE TiME: 45 minutes START TO FiNiSH: About 1 hour MAKES ABOUT 24 PiES

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

10 ounces andouille sausage, cut into 1⁄4-inch pieces

1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped

1⁄2 teaspoon kosher salt

1⁄4 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper

4 cloves roasted garlic, minced

1 teaspoon ground cumin

6 cups chopped fresh callaloo leaves and tender stems (from 1 bunch, or 3 cups frozen)

1⁄4 cup unsweetened coconut milk

2 sheets puff pastry, defrosted

1 egg plus 1 teaspoon water, lightly beaten

Roasted Red Pepper Sambal (page 288)

Line a cooling rack with paper towels, set inside a bak- ing sheet, and set aside.

Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan set over me- dium heat. Once the oil shimmers, add the andouille and cook until warmed through and golden brown, about 3 minutes. Remove the andouille to a paper towel–lined plate.

Add the onion, salt, and pepper to the pan and cook until translucent, 3 to 4 minutes. Add the garlic and cumin and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the callaloo and cook until softened and wilted, about 5 minutes.

Add the coconut milk and simmer until the greens are softened and the liquid reduces completely, about 5 minutes. Transfer the cooked greens to the prepared cooling rack and allow to drain until completely cool. Once cooled, combine the greens with the cooked an- douille sausage.

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Unfold one sheet of puff pastry onto a lightly floured surface. Use a lightly floured rolling pin to roll out to a rectangle, approximately 12 by 16 inches.

Cut the rectangle into three 4- by 16-inch strips us- ing a sharp knife, then cut each strip into 4-inch squares. Place a heaped tablespoon of the filing a little off-center on each square. Fold each square over to form a triangle and press the edges together to seal tightly. Use a fork to crimp around the edges to further seal. Place the sealed pies on the prepared baking sheet.

Repeat the process of rolling, cutting, filling, and sealing with the remaining puff pastry sheet and cal- laloo filling.

Brush the tops of the hand pies with the beaten egg and use the fork to poke tiny holes in the top of each. Bake the pies until a deep golden brown, 15 to 20 minutes. Serve the pies warm with the red pepper sambal for dipping.

In honor of Nyesha Arrington

Crab Curry (with)Yams and Mustard Greens

Bring this dish to a park cookout and pull out your bib. Get your groove on. Imagine someone is play- ing “Outstanding” by the Gap Band in the back- ground. This dish is delicious—it will make you want to move.

ACTiVE TiME: 40 minutes

START TO FiNiSH: 1 hour 20 minutes SERvES 4

Heat the oil into a large 6-quart Dutch oven set over medium-high heat. When the oil shimmers, add the on- ion, garlic, ginger, turmeric, and salt and cook, stirring often and scraping up browned bits, until the onion is translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the cumin, cayenne, curry leaves, and tomato paste and cook until the paste darkens in color, about 3 minutes.

Add the coconut milk, water, Scotch bonnet chile, and sweet potatoes and bring to simmer. Decrease the heat, cover, and cook for 15 minutes, or until potatoes are almost tender.

Add the greens and continue cooking for 2 to 3 min- utes. Add the crab and cook until heated through and the greens are wilted, 2 to 3 minutes more.

Serve over rice, topped with cilantro, sliced Fresno chile, and lime wedges.

 

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 large red onion, julienned

6 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

2-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped

2 teaspoons ground turmeric

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1⁄4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 curry leaves

2 tablespoons tomato paste

2 cans unsweetened coconut milk

1 cup water

1 Scotch bonnet

(or habanero) chile, stemmed and finely chopped

2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces

2 cups packed mustard greens, chopped

2 1⁄2 to 3 pounds crabs, cleaned, cooked, and cut into 3- to 4-inch pieces, or 1 pound lump crabmeat

FOR SERVING

2 cups cooked broken rice

2 tablespoons fresh cilantro leaves

1 Fresno chile, thinly sliced

Lime wedges

Heat the oil into a large 6-quart Dutch oven set over medium-high heat. When the oil shimmers, add the on- ion, garlic, ginger, turmeric, and salt and cook, stirring often and scraping up browned bits, until the onion is translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the cumin, cayenne, curry leaves, and tomato paste and cook until the paste darkens in color, about 3 minutes.

Add the coconut milk, water, Scotch bonnet chile, and sweet potatoes and bring to simmer. Decrease the heat, cover, and cook for 15 minutes, or until potatoes are almost tender.

Add the greens and continue cooking for 2 to 3 min- utes. Add the crab and cook until heated through and the greens are wilted, 2 to 3 minutes more.

Serve over rice, topped with cilantro, sliced Fresno chile, and lime wedges.

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Excerpted from THE RISE by Marcus Samuelsson with Osayi Endolyn. Recipes with Yewande Komolafe and Tamie Cook. Copyright (c) 2020 by Marcus Samuelsson. Photographs by Angie Mosier. Used with permission of Voracious, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company. New York, NY. All rights reserved.