Carrie Omegna co-owns Fonda la Catrina and El Sirenito–a vibrant restaurant and bar that serves as a colorful oasis amid the engines and industry of Georgetown: a Seattle neighborhood of approximately 1,800 residents and 28,000 workers. Carrie talks to us about what good, clean, and fair food means to her as an independent restaurateur, and how employee happiness is the key not only to a healthy restaurant but also a strong community.

Georgetown has remained fiercely independent over the years--with only one chain store (a Starbucks) amid several local restaurants and bars. We talked to Carrie about what it will need to thrive in independence going forward (like, it currently has neither a grocery store nor farmers market), and we venture into what’s possible in this most unique of Seattle neighborhoods. 

We also talked about what makes a healthy restaurant and how a healthy restaurant is an important cornerstone of a healthy neighborhood. It comes down to these values:

Advocacy: Often the cultural significance of Mexican food is completely overlooked in restaurants: many think there’s only one kind of Mexican food out there. Catrina works with staff to be vocal about the cultural significance of the Mexican cuisine they serve. Staff is educated and empowered to talk about the good, clean, fair food it serves by listing farmers and purveyors on the menu, speaking to customers about the quality and provenance of dishes, and  by presenting fresh ingredients consistently and carefully.

Retention: Employees are more satisfied to work at Catrina, and Catrina has an unprecedented number of long term employees. Paying well above minimum wage and offering the same benefits to all staff members. “It's all about keeping staff around: listening to them, supporting them, valuing their input and recognizing their contribution,” Carrie says.

Regular customers: It’s easy to see how invested employees are in the restaurant’s success, conveying a sense of ownership that underlies the restaurant’s vibrant scene. Catrina staff understand and communicate the cultural significance of the Mexican cuisine they serve. They educate customers. And customers, in turn, are proud to know the menu and the employees.

Community: Regular customers, especially when they’re proud of a place, start to build a community, where customers themselves become vocal advocates who come together around the restaurant and feel invested in its whole.

Action: This sense of community leads to opportunities for action. for speaking out about what good, clean, fair food means for the community, speaking out about what the community needs from government and civic entities to make this possible and to help it grow to other parts of the community. 

Have you been to Beacon Food Forest? It’s magic! Especially at this time of year. What used to be a 7-acre hillside of intractable grass is now a verdant, climate change-mitigating ecosystem with a diverse pollinator habitat, rich, healthy soil, and more than 1000 different edible plants. It's a demonstration site and a learning community that reimagines what urban green spaces can offer. It’s public food on public land.

On this episode of the Umami Podcast, we talk to Elise Evans, Core Volunteer and former Board President of Beacon Food Forest. We’ll dig into how this grassroots organization has empowered a community of volunteers to create a unique, thriving, sustainable solution to food insecurity, land access, and food and ecology education.  

Beacon Food Forest offers a blueprint for any community looking to create opportunities for its citizens to participate in creating local food ecosystems. Elise talks to us about how it got started, how it has evolved over the 15 years since the project began, and how community keeps it thriving.

The produce that grows on Beacon Food Forest land is available to anyone to harvest. Show up to volunteer on any third Saturday work party and you’ll learn about soil, indigenous plants, and garden care (you might even get a free lunch!). Or take a class to learn about everything from cultivating mushrooms, to attracting pollinators, to growing natural remedies. 

Intrigued? Listen to this episode of the Umami Podcast to learn more about Beacon Food Forest and the ways you can get involved in this community. 

Every city needs a food center. The Pike Place Market is a Seattle's democratic platform for local business, and a community, and exists around it. This episode is an argument for the importance of the Pike Place Market. Michela Tartaglia is chef-owner of Pasta Casalinga, a shining example of the creative expression the market fosters. The Pasta Casalinga lunch counter serves handmade pasta with seasonal flavors from the farmers, fishers and foragers of the Pacific Northwest. On this episode, we go deep with Michela on the tradition and technique of pasta, on being a restaurateur in the Pike Place Market, and on finding a culinary voice. 

Michela estimates 40 to 45% of her clientele is regular / local, which surprised and delighted us to hear. After all, the Pike Place Market reports a staggering 15 million visitors every year, and I’ve heard more than one friend say they avoid it because of tourists.

That is why we made this episode. 

If you haven’t been to Pike Place Market in a while, now’s a great time to reconnect with this vital part of our city. The more local patronage, the more vibrant and sustainable that food center can be for our city and for the hundreds of restaurateurs, farmers, and purveyors who base their independent businesses here. Michela talks to us about what it takes to build a business with Pike Place Market PDA, how to build and frequently change a menu, how to have seasonal flare and be frugal at the same time, how to market, and how to collaborate with your team.

Photo credit: Charity Burggraaf

Author Langdon Cook has been leading foraging expeditions for  more than 30 years in the Pacific Northwest. We learn about foraging mountains to sound, in the wild and in our own backyard on this episode of the Umami Podcast: everything from clams, to nettles, to morels and chanterelles. 

Umami Podcast is about examining our food selves—how what we consume is an essential expression of who we are--personally, culturally, and civically. The subject of food is daunting: It’s different for every person, and many of us never had the privilege of feeling nourished by or connected to it. Some of us are downright alienated by it.

Part of getting to know our food selves is to examine what grows around us. There is empowerment in learning about how nature continues to nourishes us; how we benefit most by working in concert with its rhythms.  On this episode we touch on  foods in the wild, like salmon, mushrooms, seaweeds, clams, and nuts, to those in our backyards, like berries, nuts, and weeds.

More information on Langdon's events and classes: https://langdoncook.com/events/

Langdon's books: Fat of the Land, Upstream, The Mushroom Hunters

This week’s conversation is with Eiko Vojkovich of Skagit River Ranch. Theirs is a small but mighty family ranch she and her daughter, Nicole, run together. They sell grass-fed and -finished cattle, pastured hogs, pasture-raised poultry and eggs at Seattle Neighborhood Farmers Markets and some co-ops around the Puget Sound. 

When I came to Seattle in the late 90’s, I was ecstatic to learn about the existence of farmers markets, something that didn't exist in the suburban area of my upbringing (but more and more are popping up everywhere!). I met Eiko at her stall at the University Farmers Market around the turn of the century, where she introduced me to the taste of grass-fed cows and acorn-fed pigs. I fell in love and wanted to know more, so I took a trip to their ranch where they taught me about rotational grazing, regenerative agriculture, and happy animals.
 

The majority of the meat we consume in America is produced by large-scale farms and sold at multinational chain supermarkets, where it is virtually impossible to tell how people, places, and animals in their care are treated. Factory farms, concentrated animal feeding operations and massive processing plants compromise human and animal welfare as they leave huge carbon footprints. 

But small-scale farms like Skagit River Ranch do still exist in every state in the country, and it makes sense to find them: they are more likely to employ regenerative and sustainable practices, they're often family run, and they sell their products directly or via area farmers markets. 

You can't get this stuff in a supermarket!

Marc Papineau has been filling our wine glasses in Seattle for decades. Marc is the proprietor of Cantina Sauvage — a wine shop he opened last year in Melrose Market, alongside Cafe Suliman in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle. There, he curates a unique selection of independent wines that are, as he coins, “unfuctwith”: wines that have been only minimally altered by human intervention, which happens at the behest of a person, not a corporate entity. 

Wine is in the revelries of a renaissance in Seattle, fueled by the natural wine craze: those “pet nat”, “skin contact”, “orange” bottles with colorful labels. Those bottles from grapes you never heard of (good) and a frequent sidestepping of traditional labeling standards. Some are delicious. Some are...challenging. However you feel about them, their impact on drinking patterns here and in other urban centers deserves a closer look. Natural wine's popularity presents an alluring contrast from big-name, mass-produced wines manipulated into homogeneity. It demonstrates savvy and awareness that it does matter where what you eat comes from. 

Stick with this episode: at first it may sound like its more of a conversation for wine nerds, but it is a study on this city's consumption patterns and how they've changed (rather radically!) over the past decade. 

At about minute 2:24, where Chris asks, “um, which one of them is dry?” and we all crack up because his question cuts through our heavy conversation like an acidic wine through fatty cheese. It's a funny question because “dry” is one of those words people often use when pressured to describe what they’re looking for in a wine. It's a question that, to a wine purveyor, can signal a lack of knowledge about or interest in wine. 

Which patrons sound most knowledgeable to servers and winesellers? People who ask questions. People who are willing to place trust in their purveyor to guide them on a discourse about the right wine for that moment in time. 

This episode is just that: a casual conversation with a guy who knows wine. Chris and I ask things we always wanted to know but were afraid to ask, for fear of sounding clueless. I’ve been in that position, Chris has been in that position, and a casual survey among friends indicates that many of us have been in that position. 

We talk about what makes a good wine good and what makes a tank wine industrial. We’ll talk about how to identify the differences among all the degrees between those two ends of a spectrum. (Hint: if you’re buying it at the supermarket, it is probably industrial). 

“If you care, then you’re probably not in a grocery store buying wine. You should go to a place where they know their wine.” --Marc Papineau

The foods that sustain us are becoming less nutritious (via National Geographic), reduced to commodities and cheaply mass-produced to feed a growing global population of nearly 8 billion. Along the way, we’ve lost touch with the planet’s provisions. Yet real food — both nourishing and delicious — is often as close as our own neighborhoods, and our guest Valerie Segrest knows how to find it.

Valerie Segrest is an author, Native nutrition educator, and member of the Muckleshoot tribe. Her work focuses on foods that are endemic to North America. In the book Valerie co-authored with Indigenous Food Lab, Indigenous Home Cooking: Menus Inspired by the Ancestors, you’ll find wisdom about wild plants and familiar, accessible ingredients like bison, salmon, berries, squash, sweet potatoes, and more.

This episode will make you hungry for knowledge about the world around you. Valerie talks about the elusive and charismatic morel mushroom, the ubiquitous and recognizable dandelion, and the softer side of stinging nettles. She praises the nationwide movement of tribes restoring ecosystems in the form of fisheries management and other projects. You’ll learn about “weeds” that are both food and medicine, telling time according to nature’s rhythms, the many names for the moon, how there are never just four seasons, and sweet birthday gifts that make Valerie want to eat mountains. 

Valerie also underscores the importance of food sovereignty. This is crucial for Native communities, who are disproportionately affected by food insecurity and related health conditions, according to Feeding America.  Valerie’s efforts contribute to the reclamation of traditional foodways and the re-emergence of an Indigenous cuisine, in which local, seasonal, and sustainable ingredients are front and center. In a time when so much of our food comes from somewhere far away, honoring Indigenous foods is an action that all of us can take to recognize that we are still a part of nature — and always will be. 

At the intersection of wine and art, you’ll find Jarad Hadi: vigneron, winemaker, and owner of Grape Ink in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. Grape Ink’s wines celebrate the creativity, diligence, and connection to nature that farmers and winemakers share. Their wine labels in themselves express this relationship; each one is a unique artwork by Italian artist Giulia Schiavon — paintings printed on the bottles. Grape Ink’s wine emphasizes small-scale production and personality, growing at altitudes as high as 1500 feet in the Valley’s northernmost climes, with rich mineral soil over volcanic deposits. 

Jarad earned his master’s degree in viticulture and winemaking at the source: The University of Bordeaux and studied under French masters. He also learned hands-on in the Bordeaux region, Parisian vineyards, and South America. While farming and making wine for Grape Ink, he’s also working on high elevation vineyards in California and elsewhere in Oregon.

During our time with Jarad, we learn about farming in Oregon’s fickle snow zone, where weather is often cloudy and cold and one must “follow the sun and watch out for the rain.” Jarad understands the ecosystem of his land, including how wild animals like birds and elk interact with his crop and the “acceptable casualties” caused by predation and disease. He farms with serenity, even when conditions are difficult — which they often are, in the hills above 800 feet.

Pinot noir wine grapes.

Jarad describes the musical interplay of soil, temperature, the day/night cycle, the wind, and the countless other natural elements that sculpt the expression and composition of his plants. Forces as great as the pull of the moon and atmospheric pressure and organisms as miniscule as the nematode in the soil all affect the grape vines. Among the defining factors of viticulture and winemaking, Jarad says, are the where and when — representing a significant investment of time in a specific geographical area and undertaking a long, slow process of which the actual production of the wine — from picking to processing — is the shortest period.

Jarad’s other passions include art and poetry, and he draws a parallel between pianists and winemakers. You’ll also hear about winemaking wizardry, Jarad’s sundial watch, companion plants for grapevines, why viticulturists play awful radio stations, and the difficult task pairing wine with radishes and artichokes. 

Jarad shares a love for wines that elude standardized terms and definitions, contributing to a paradigm shift from prioritizing how wine is expected to taste to experiencing the artfulness threaded throughout the process. Jarad encourages a younger generation of the “wine-curious” in their capacity to support small growers and businesses, instead of large companies who churn out bottles by the millions. After listening to Jarad, you’ll be inspired to enjoy the fruits of the labor of artists like him.

Krishnendu talks to us a out the role of ethnic food in American culture past, present, and future. He draws upon his upbringing in India and his studies of food in anthropology to present a compelling case for dining with not just an open mouth, but an open mind.

Krishnendu takes us around the world and through time in this episode. He explains how shifting immigration patterns affect our food economy and sociology as tastes and populations change, citing African American, European, Asian, and Latino influences and the assimilation of extrinsic food traditions into the American palate. Krishnendu’s book The Ethnic Restaurateur traces the psychology of the restaurant owner and their patrons, and what world cuisines are experiencing a renaissance. 

This episode is a call to action for us to eat, as he says, with curiosity and generosity: to get to know foreign cuisines by paying attention to complex histories, regional differences, and the people who cook it.

Instead of othering, generalizing, and oversimplifying, we have an opportunity to experience the richness and abundance they bring to our contemporary foodscape. 

1/2 billion pounds of sea creatures are harvested every DAY as 3 billion people worldwide depend on it as a primary source of protein, according to the United Nations. Many fish populations are 10% of what they were a hundred years ago, including salmon, tuna, and shrimp.

Consequences are dire if we don’t figure out how to make rapid and significant changes to the way we consume seafood. So how can we continue to eat fish in good conscience? Is there any fishing that could actually be good for our oceans? Is there a way to source from healthy, thriving fisheries that prioritize preservation over profit?

Mariah Kmitta is chef and co-owner of Seattle’s Mashiko Restaurant, where she began working 23 years ago. In 2009, Mashiko made a public commitment to serve only sustainable seafood, regardless of cost. Mashiko’s menu changes daily, as seasons change and definitions of what is sustainable continually shift. Mashiko’s website does a fine job of articulating what that commitment means to them, and staying true to that commitment is Mariah’s life’s work. Chris and I both know Mariah, so it felt natural to begin our conversation with her.

Mariah has learned to navigate the vast, complex, and often convoluted information out there about sustainable seafood as she has developed her knowledge and practice of Japanese cuisine over the past two decades. She has forged reciprocal relationships with fishers, processors, and maritime scholars that help her make elegant and intelligent choices in responsible sourcing.

The omakase service at Mashiko unapologetically eschews “classics” like ahi tuna while featuring less popular, more abundant varieties. With seasonal fare like Japanese firefly squid, uni (sea urchin), and wild Pacific yellowtail, Mashiko’s cuisine revels in eco-culinary details that create an intimate and intentional connection to the fish we eat.

Chef Mariah gives us an overview of some of the most pressing topics affecting traceability and transparency in the seafood supply chain. She breaks down fishing and harvesting methods, farming (aquaculture) practices, labor standards, and governance. We also praise the mollusk—oysters, clams, mussels and other bivalves that are hands down the most sustainable thing we can eat from the sea because they actively clean the ocean (a single oyster filters up to fifty gallons of water per day!) and they don’t eat other fish. 

 Our hope is that this episode and its accompanying information will give you a clearer sense of what to buy and what to avoid next time you’re at the point of purchase.