Sarah Gailey invited me to be a part of their Personal Canons Cookbook project. I decided to try a recipe for a vegan “Spam” and rice bowl that became a Rae fusion dish sourcing ingredients from my background—gramma’s kitchen in Hilo, PDX punk dumpster kale and Swedish scrambled eggs—to make food to feed future generations.
I think about what my grandparents experienced and what those experiences taught them in the same way I try to imagine what my daughter and the other kids I care about might experience and be taught. We’re in a scary time right now, but history is rife with scary times. Supply chain issues and rising food costs are making precarity visible to people who hadn’t experienced it previously. It’s weird to see empty store shelves in Stockholm. A lot of us who can afford it have become accustomed to getting what we want when we want. We’ve mistaken convenience for efficiency, and selection for choice.
Rae Mariz
Read the entire essay and get the recipe here: