Indigenous chef and restaurant owner Chef Crystal Wahpepah shared the experience and culture of Native American cuisine with students in the Otter Student Union (OSU) Ballroom last Tuesday at the multi-hosted event, Food is Medicine.
The Otter Cross Cultural Center, IndigenOtters Club and newly founded Indigenous Peoples Committee, also referred to as The Native Council, worked collaboratively to host the Food is Medicine event, highlighting Indigenous and Native American cuisine and culture with keynote speaker and celebrated chef Crystal Wahpepah. “We really want to bring culture to this campus, so this was a way to bring that here, and to start building relationships also with local communities,” said Indigenous People’s Committee member and Project Rebound coordinator Juan Barkley. Abraham Allison, a third-year humanities and communication major and member of The Native Council, said the event is just one of many projects that the committee plans to host in efforts to cement more aspects of Indigenous spaces into campus culture. “We’re planning more things in the future. Hopefully a native market for like Otter Thursday or the like, the farmer’s market days. I heard that there’s also talks, or there might be a native affinity center opening,” said Allison.
The event began with an addressment from The Native Council members Amber Gomez and Allison as they welcomed attendees into the ballroom, followed by a luncheon where guests served themselves soup and bread pudding provided by Chef Crystal Wahpepah’s restaurant, Wahpepah’s Kitchen, located in Oakland.
“It means ‘the one to entice the enemy,’and that’s what Wahpepah means in the Kickapoo language,” said Wahpepah, who has been recognized as one of the first Native American women to own a catering business. “Wahpepah is my family’s last name, so I really wanted to pay homage to them and to our ancestors at Wahpepah’s kitchen, and I want everybody to come to the restaurant and feel like they’re at home,” said Wahpepah. Wahpepah’s keynote presentation honed in on her overall mission both as a chef and a restaurant owner: crafting sustainable Native American cuisine to honor Indigenous culture and promote overall wellness. “If you ever see where it comes into Native American foods up to how to harvest an animal, up to harvesting your squash and everything, everything is implemented into health and wellness coming to that part,” said Wahpepah. Wahpepah’s presentation was not only educational, but also inspiring, noting her impressive professional culinary career with appearances on the Food Network, as a White House caterer and her current position as the chef-in residence at Cal Poly Humboldt’s Rou Dalagurr Food Sovereignty Lab. “I want people to know, like, our foods are very much alive, and we were here, so always think about whose land that you’re on and what food you’re eating and where it comes from,” said Wahpepah.
Wahpepah continues to share her food and culture through her Oakland-based restaurant with a new location opening in the San Francisco Bay Area, which will continue to serve and share the sustainably conscious and culturally significant cuisine Wahpepah celebrates and honors.