Rachel Askinasi
Marcus Samuelsson has spent decades in the restaurant business, is a mainstay on several TV food shows and is constantly thinking about how he can give back to his community and help others on their own path to chefdom.
During a recently conversation with The Messenger ahead of his dinner with Heinz’s Black Kitchen Initiative on Dec. 6, Samuelsson shared his advice for today’s young chefs.
For anyone looking to build a career in the kitchen, he said, take advantage of the stage social media provides.
“Whether you post on TikTok or Instagram or whatever channel you choose to use, if you [create connectivity] with your vendors and guests, people will see you,” he said. “And that community will push your message forward.”
Digital platforms allow chefs anywhere to find an audience and build a following, which he notes is not how it worked when he was starting out.
“It doesn’t matter where you’re cooking in New York or where you’re cooking in a town, you can create connection with your community as an establishment,” he says. “That’s really something that, before, was harder because we weren’t connected in the same way.”
Passion is also key, he said. “If you hold onto that dream, ambition, emission, people are gonna see you.”
There are an abundance of touch points and avenues for connection with industry leaders now, Samuelsson says, which is also vital.
“Networking — don’t stop networking,” he said. “Everyone that has arrived got a break from somebody.”
A huge career-booster for Samuelsson happened when lawyers, bankers and other business people came to his restaurant early on in his career.
Not only were they big spenders, but being in the room with them allowed him to form rewarding relationships.
Now, Samuelsson hopes to be that guy for others and facilitate even more connections — especially among his Black peers.
“As a chef, I cannot sit on the sideline, I have a platform, several platforms,” Samuelsson told The Messenger. “I have a responsibility as a Black chef.”
And while he doesn’t believe “we have arrived, that we’re done” when it comes to achieving meaningful diversity, equity and inclusion in the industry, he said these values are at the forefront of even some of the biggest corporations in ways they weren’t before.
“These are real conversations happening,” he said, adding that he continues to push for this in his own restaurants including Red Rooster in Harlem, which will host the Open Kitchen event, and Hav & Mar in Manhattan, where there’s a focus on women in leadership positions — including its executive chef Fariyal Abdullahi.
“Culinary arts is something that, obviously, people of color have always worked in and contributed to tremendously,” he said. “And yet in terms of the wealth gap and getting access into institutional money, it’s always harder [for people of color] to start a business.”
Creating ways to help the next generation partner with established industry players and access resources is a strategy Samuelsson said is built into his businesses.
“For me,” he said, “this is not one thing that we do, and then we’re done.”
Which is why he says he likes working with Kraft Heinz.
The company started it’s Black Kitchen Initiative in 2020, which lead to the Open Kitchen dinner series kicking off with Samuelsson’s event featuring chefs Joy Crump and Beth Black of Foode + Mercantile in Fredericksburg, Va.
“It’s been super rewarding,” he said of his partnership, adding that he’s excited to get into the kitchen. “It’s always great to cook with people that I haven’t cooked with before.”
“That popup will be very meaningful,” he said, for both his own team and for the diners from his local Harlem community.
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