Meet the Moment is sponsored by Vanguard. Welcome back. Throughout his 30 years in America, Chef Marcus Samuelson has made a name for himself in the kitchen and on your TV screen. From his prestigious James Beard Awards to helming the first state dinner of the Obama administration, Samuelson has been a key voice in bringing African and black cuisine to the forefront in America.
I sat down with Samuelson in his brand new restaurant, Marcus D.C., right here in the nation's capital. In our Meet the Moment conversation, I talked to him about his journey from being born in a hut in Ethiopia to becoming one of the most renowned chefs in the world. Marcus Samuelson, welcome to Meet the Press. Welcome to Marcus D.C.
Thank you. It is such an honor to be here and to be sitting with you. You have an absolutely extraordinary story. You came to the United States 30 years ago.
You were born in... 30 years ago. Yes, yes. I can't even believe it.
When you hear that, it really hits you, right? You were born in Ethiopia in the middle of the Civil War. You were adopted by parents in Sweden. You grew up there.
You have now become a renowned chef who really puts a focus on black and African cooking. Why is this your life's work? Well, I would say even before that, you know, being born in Ethiopia in a hut, basically the size of two restaurant tables. I would say that's like, I was born in a hut the size of two four tots in my restaurant.
And I say that because even to my, you know, my kids, like just to have some grasp, the idea that being American and our family, we come from a very simple background. But we do everything every day to work really, really hard and show that you can make it different. And with that, I've also been extremely lucky and fortunate, right? And I have a lot of gratitude to my Ethiopian mother that in the middle of Tumaculosa, a sister and myself and her had TB.
She walked us to a hospital. She didn't survive. My sister and I survived. And the other thing, part of my journey is also the goodness of others, random people that just are pure love or care to care of us.
In that hospital, when we were cured, the nurse took us in. She had three kids of her own. And she just took us and set us up for adoption because she knew she would just put us on the street. What happened to these two kids?
So my story, I wouldn't be here sitting with you if it wouldn't be for so many people that we have both sacrificed but also helped me. So I do realize I'm extremely fortunate as well. And as I listen to you tell that story, I just think about the strength and power of your mother who, in the midst of facing a deadly illness, walked you to the hospital. Energy she probably didn't have, but she found it to save your life.
There's so many days when I see a young mother with two kids, particularly when I'm in Africa or Ethiopia. But then also, you know, there's a lot of joy. You know, adoption is a story by itself. And I grew up in Sweden.
I went from the warmest country in the world to the coldest country in the world. But there's a lot of joy in my story. I went from being a guy to Martin Sanderson. I went from trading and eating with my hands to herring.
But it was a lot of love in my story. And that's what I always want to convey. Being adopted does not mean that me and my sister didn't have parents. We had amazing parents.
We were raised around love and compassion and hard work ethic. And without my Swedish parents, I also wouldn't be here, right? So when someone says, oh, you've done so much, no one has done anything on their own. And I'm an example of that.
Well, you have done so much. Let's talk a little bit about what you've done in 30 years, 12 restaurants all around the world. You just opened up this beautiful restaurant, Marcus D.C., here in the nation's capital. Why has it been so important to you to build on that goal of showcasing African and black food to the world?
I think it's an evolution. You know, sometimes when you are adopted, my experience of being adopted, it's almost like your identity, you can live backwards, right? When I decided to be a chef, it was really for my Swedish grandmother, Helga, she raised us all around good cooking. And I fell in love with it.
The deliciousness of our cooking, but also the storytelling. When I became a French chef, there was only one cuisine in the world that people told us was important. It was French cooking. And as a young black chef, I never saw anyone looking like me.
So I found more identity around black excellence, whether it was Prince or whether it was Basquiat or whether it was incredible American pop culture, right? So I studied these French books. I traveled. I worked in Japan.
I worked in Switzerland. I worked in three-star Michelin in France. And I had to learn several different languages. And everywhere I was, I was only a person of color.
And I had a lot of questions around that. What do I fit in? What is my restaurant going to look like? Do I cook African food?
Do I cook Swedish food? Do I cook French food? And, you know, as a young 20-something that wanted to cook and understand my identity, it was a journey. And I was told many times that, don't even think about opening a restaurant, because no one's going to come to support a black restaurant.
And there was many examples told me. Chef told me many times, do you know any black-owned restaurant? I said, no, I don't. Do you know anyone in Europe?
No, I don't. So for me, I knew I had to go to America. You know, and I was very fortunate because it was being Swedish, it was a Swedish restaurant called Aquavit in New York City. And therefore, I had an opportunity to come to America in the mid-90s.
And as I was becoming, you know, a three-star chef, being just 24 years old, I cooked Swedish food, which was deeply rooted in my identity. But I also wanted to know about the non-most monolithic journey of black culinary, right? So the heart of that, for me, was to learn about African-American cooking, what we consider soul food, right? Which was, for me, the foundation of American food, black cooking in general.
But the black experience is obviously not monolithic. You can be black from Haiti, you can be black from Jamaica, you can be black from American from Africa. And for me, searching for my Ethiopian identity through food, through the place I was living in Harlem, New York City, what would that taste like? That was a journey for me.
I wonder, you were told that it would be nearly impossible for someone who had your skin color to actually own a restaurant. How do you push past that kind of pessimism, quite frankly, and accomplish everything that you've accomplished? Well, many experiences, right? I know that, again, I go back to the huts.
I come from an extraordinary environment. My Swedish grandmother was a living maid, so I know we come from hard work ethic. My father was a geologist, so he could transcend coming from a fishing village. So I grew from all of those experiences.
I'm like, Jeff, that might be your small, narrow experience from where you are. That's not mine. So I always say that you have to have work ethic and humility on this shoulder, and arrogance and excellence of that children. So I knew, once I came to America, I was the richest guy in the world.
I had a job, $300, five roommates. I knew I would be successful. The richest person in the world with $300 in your pocket. Yes, you could not tell me wrong, you know?
It speaks to the strength that your ancestors, that your parents, your grandmother gave you. But it also speaks to the possibilities of the beacon that America is for so many, specifically immigrants. Like, we never stop believing in this idea of what an imperfect and a perfect America can look like. And every immigrant, whether you come here by boat, whether you come here by boat, we believe that we can add that, just get me in, and I'm going to work hard.
And sometimes that message doesn't get across. But my lived experience is that once I get in, once I become American, I'm going to do this. And I did. I want to talk more about your grandmother and your start in cooking in just a moment.
But I just wanted to lay out everything you've accomplished. This is just some of it, by the way. But I have to read my notes, because there's so many things. You've won the James Beard Award for Rising Star Chef.
In 2009, you were selected as the guest chef for President Obama's first state dinner. You've competed in, you've won multiple cooking competitions, some of my favorite shows, Tough Chef, also Chopped. When you think back to that little boy who was born in a hut in Ethiopia, could you have ever dreamed this big? No, I couldn't.
But I do know that my parents truly invested in getting experience of excellence. And they also, in their Swedish middle class idea, knew that raising black kids would not always be easy to the outside world, even the way with my father, our names. They picked Marcus instead of Kasahun. We spoke English at home a lot, because my parents always thought that maybe the kids are not going to stay in Sweden.
So you have this late 70s, early 80s kids experience, but growing up with my parents envisioning a global experience. That's not normal, but that was my parents' understanding of that the kids that we're raising are for the world. And excellence was always part of it. You know, my father comes from a fishing village, pretty poor fishing village, poor background, but not poor in identity and culture and ambition.
So from his fishing village to becoming a world-class geologist that worked all over the world, that for me made it clear that he didn't know anything about cooking, but he knew about excellence. He always told me, if you would have picked this profession, treat it like a Harvard PhD, right? How long does it take? He had a PhD, so he's like, okay, he thinks about between seven and nine years.
So your journey of being a student is going to be around seven to nine years. If you work really hard, maybe you can do it in six. And that's what we did. I was sent to Japan.
I was sent to Austria. I was sent to Switzerland. So excellence and understanding as a person of color, that my level of excellence might have to be higher. That was not something that was not talked about in the household.
That was actually something that was talked about in the household. And you talk about your grandmother, the fact that she really introduced you to food and your love of food. What was it about your grandmother that showed you the power of cooking and food? Humbleness and deliciousness combined, right?
Very simple ingredients, but oh boy, would it hurt? Dinner tastes good, right? And I have really measurements, right? In Sweden, you get lunch, school lunches.
They're very good lunches, right? So for example, Swedish meatballs. If my mom made Swedish meatballs, they were good. If I had meatballs in school, they were okay.
But if we had meatballs with grandma, they were delicious. So right there, the most iconic Swedish dish, I could measure whatever she was doing to it. And of course, it was care. But this was also a lived experience, like for poverty is in the root of it.
Because, you know, this is a messed over dish, right? Mixed the pork with a little bit of beef with a lot of bread crumbs. Why was the bread crumbs in there, right? Because I didn't have that much meat, right?
So in a simple dish like that, you can really taste our journey. So for me, understanding black food and American food, there's a couple of things in here that I want to identify. A, our journey is not monolithic, right? So we talk so much about culture and identity, and most people don't understand that culture, food, identity is not a monolithic journey just because you say something is black.
It's, you know, for me, how much on my Ethiopian side can I introduce to my guests? How much of that culture, this push and pull, does my guests want to taste, right? When you come to an Italian restaurant, that restaurant makes it clear from the get-go that we're Italian restaurant, we're really proud of it, as they should. When you come to, the restaurant is Italian, but for everybody, right?
When it comes to black cooking, we, this generation of black chefs, want to show that we, American chefs, the most exciting food in the world right now is happening in America, but it's not necessarily only French. It's the way America looks like. It's Latin, it's Asian-American, it's African-American, it's European-American, but it cooks from a sense of place and identity. So as a black immigrant, as an African immigrant, I want to share and tell those stories.
It's normal. If you go to a Japanese restaurant, you want Japanese-American food, right? So that we shouldn't hide our identities. We should welcome our guests.
We should welcome the culture and bring it to the place. You speak with such pride about being an immigrant. And you've said one of your most memorable experiences of all of these remarkable experiences you've had is the day that you were sworn in as a U.S. citizen.
Why was that so meaningful for you? And why is that so much a part of what you bring to every dish, every restaurant? I would say besides my kids being born and the day we got married, I would say that's the most important day of my life because it was also a sign of a journey that I do belong. I have a place because I wanted immigrants to choose to come to America, especially for me.
I could live in a very comfortable country and I love Sweden as well. But in America, I was allowed to hold on to my Ethiopian identity, my Swedish culture, but also at the same time being American. And as a chef, I can cook from all of these experiences, right? And that's one of the unique, incredible things about being American is that we as people, we are multi, we are layered, we have complex journeys.
And through food, I identify that and I can share that with you. Not only to talk about it, I can make it delicious and I can make you feel and taste my story. One of the most powerful things you can actually possibly do. Do you think the American dream is still available to immigrants today in the way that it was for you when you first got here?
I definitely think the American dream, I want to believe and I do believe in the American dream. I am an example of that. You know, one of the things that is incredible with America is that American dream is living out loud. It lives on social media, it's noisy, the way the most iconic things that are true American, right?
Hip hop, music, it's noisy, but it's from a place, but it's truly American, right? It's, you know, rock and roll, whatever it is, right? Whatever period of American pop culture is noisy, but it's what the rest of the world aspires to, right? And now, I think the American dream is a lie.
You just have to fight and battle for it more than ever. And I know we will because the American dream, it's not a four year cycle. It's much larger than that. It's something that, you know, the imperfection of the perfection of my American journey doesn't have an end to it.
You know, my kids are born and raised in Harlem. They are truly born in America, but they're equally proud of the Swedish and Ethiopian background. And that's what it means to be American. You've also talked extensively about the racism that you faced in this country when you were trying to get your start.
How did you push past that? How did you find the strength? And did you ever feel dissuaded? Did you ever feel like, I can't make it here?
Well, this is going to face everybody in any journey. And I think the way I was raised, we talked about it early. My parents, both my mom and dad knew that sending these kids out to the world is not easy. It's not part of being black, right?
It's something, and we dealt with that early. Like any black household, any household, we spoke about excellence in working with it. Racism happened since I was a child. But did it discourage my journey and purpose of being the best that I could be in cooking?
Absolutely not. It made me stronger in a way. Not the fact that I wanted it, but I knew it would happen. Because you were so determined.
I'm determined, of course. I mean, you know, that separates becoming American and easy. It's not combined, ever. And becoming great at anything and easy.
I mean, you are one of one. You are doing a job that millions of people aspire and try to get. Well, without knowing you well, I know easy was not part of that journey. You were the best in your class many, many times.
So was I. By far. You had to be. Had to be, of course.
But it's like you're an athlete. And yes, it's a hard thing to overcome. And sometimes you want to give up. But that's part of the journey, right?
So when I got three stars as a 24-year-old, right? Younger chef ever. That wasn't the end of the story. That was the handshake.
Welcome, New York City. Or every one of these milestone winning James Beard Awards many, many times over. That wasn't big. You know, that's not the starting of the journey.
that opens a new door right you have part of being american is that you constantly have to evolve right you constantly have to what does it mean to be an immigrant in the mid-90s in new york during giviani easy not so much what does it mean to be uh becoming american in the mid-2000s many difficult things i mean for me being a chef post 9-11 it's one of the emotional and one of the hardest things i've ever experienced i worked in the tower a week before 9-11 happened so for both from emotional but also from a practical point of view you're never the same after that right so probably one of the toughest things we the toughest thing in your city and we have the country has come through and then you run a restaurant at the same time not easy at all or i had only a high-end restaurant in midtown during uh 2008 extremely difficult to navigate through that or through the pandemic right but would i stop would i give up that's not what the hospitality community is about right we are an incredible large tent of hard-working people from and by all colors all ethnicities but we're proud to be americans whether you are picking the vegetables whether you're the customers whether you're the line cook or the server i actually think the american experience can be seen best through hospitality and restaurants because all aspects of our communities our country is touched by the restaurant and hospitality community so what would you tell young chefs of color today who are starting out who might feel dissuaded who might feel like the hurdles are too high what would your message be to them well you know for me i've dedicated my whole life to make sure that chefs of color is going to have options you know when i write a cookbook it's very often in response to when i was coming up i didn't see it was very hard to get cookbooks uh by chefs of colors but first of all you know so when i wrote the rise it was a look back of past incredible african-american chefs like leah jace like sylvia woods that's with a look back of who was before us it's also in the present here are the chefs going to hear now and also peeking into the future right and for me it's really about you gotta my journey was set because of chefs like leah jace patrick clark and sylvia woods the next generation young chefs are coming up now i want to give them options right that's why i started something like the rice residency program where young chefs can work with artists and have residencies right so our work through the restaurants is really about setting up the next generation but this correctment um being any creative and then figuring out that audience around that right is a challenge no matter who you are no matter what identity and that journey where you what yourself fits into that how do you share that it's extremely complex but there lies the deliciousness right well i think uh the fact that today we can say not only new york that you have someone like mishama in savannah you have nina um content in new orleans that you have chef kwameh that you have greg gaudet in portland that chefs of color that are all of the countries are setting up opportunities and platform and setting the standard for audiences and guests but also workplaces for young chefs and when you work for a chef of color it's just like when i work for a french chef or when i work for japanese chef it's that chef's take on their particular journey now what can be more american than that so i think the day today if you turn on news can be challenging but you got to have the capability to see beyond that and see yourself project yourself in the future when i was training for a chef i never saw myself just being in this moment peeling the tomatoes i saw myself driving the kitchen that was in a major city that was relevant and that's what i was that's what i'm doing so it's not about where you are today it's really about where you want to go one of the biggest issues that you have taken on is the issue of food insecurity one of the greatest crises that we face as a country and quite frankly as a global community um what is your current focus in terms of trying to make sure that more kids in this country have full meals are able to go to school are able to learn and what is your message to policy makers who can make a difference when it comes to food insecurity with food insecurity is we're talking about how we constantly can improve our government food insecurity uh shouldn't be even on the table uh in 2025 26 we have beyond we have so much food in this country and actually in the world it's all about how we distributed it right it's all about a value proposition who we value who we don't value and that's that's the sadness of this because we all you know whatever's happening throughout the world whether ukraine gaza or in africa and what do we end up doing rather than sending food we burning food because based on principles right so this is happening globally this is happening locally and it needs to stop you know we have enough food we know how to solve this and we just have to distribute so the value proposition of who are our neighbors who are less fortunate uh needs to be brought up we need to come up a system to fix it because we can fix it you know and it's not something we get caught up with everything that happens this can happen this can be fixed in every major american city what do you think is the biggest challenge to facing the issue of food insecurity as you know here we are in 2025 how is it the kids in this country and other countries are still going hungry well i mean it's rooted in laws that are very that have to sort of be unpacked right and in a time of crisis you actually respond quickly during um the pandemic uh to my great friend uh dear friend was the address you know we work a lot with world center kitchen and because they called me basically around march 15th and said hey do you think people need us in harlem i said do i think absolutely because they would take him up with his team within a week and we start to serve food for the next six months out of red rooster we became that place we started 100 people a day then 400 people a day then 800 people that 1500 people a day and we did it in new york jersey miami uh no one cared who's republican in democrat guess what it's a world center kitchen we have to solve it right when i work with a world center kitchen through let's say the fires in california right same thing we come up with a system and as chefs and as communities we we can't solve everything but we can solve food insecurity it's it's really about uh improving the system and changing the laws that really goes back to jim crow now uh do we have the capability to know how to do that of course we do do we want to do it no we don't we have it's not like we don't have the capacity to do it we are the richest company in the world we have technology we have the workforce to do it but we just haven't put focus on it let's talk about this beautiful space where we're sitting right now marcus dc how does this restaurant reflect your values and your extraordinary journey and your desire to educate people well for me the restaurant it has to be part of the neighborhood has to be in the neighborhood other neighborhood it has to be delicious it has to be filled with hospitality uh and feel when a guest walks in it needs to feel like yes i'm coming home or it was a stressful day but now i'm here and for me as a restaurateur and a chef it's really about starting those emotions and really building that journey with you let's have an hour and a half with you for me it's really about from the moment you really going on our website making that reservation just coming in how do we make you happy how do we make me make you feel at home regardless what your day was regardless what you're not celebrating or celebrating right because we don't know truly why you're with us but we know that we're going to take care of you so to me it's a truly it's a very multifaceted experience the dc being ethiopian i used to come here in the 90s in 2000 not for food because i was invited to ethiopian celebration so that idea that you can be an immigrant in ethiopia and own your own business like a man's morgan that was very much in the center of this right that wow these were these ethiopian entrepreneurs that did things that worked for themselves that was so inspiring to me but guess what dc is an extremely multicultural city because of the school system and because of universities but also because of embassies right so it wasn't just when i think the ethiopian community i meant truly the whole immigrant community that is here and a lot of them work in the hospitality community right the other layer was me coming here in the 2000s and you know cooking for the clintons cooking for the bushes cooking for the obamas but also for the institutions here the museums here right so it's multiple sort of back and forth but then also what does it mean to be an american what does it mean to be black american so telling that story in the restaurant was extremely meaningful to me to do it in the capital right uh so as you look through the restaurant you see the greater dc but almost an abstract form you see patterns of ethiopian african almost tribalism that are just colors but it means something the center stage is really the guest but we push that through the open big bar and the open kitchen so we can tell the story who works here who's serving you this is not just coming from an empty place when i was that line cook in france the kitchen was always behind a magical wall and we were these invisible people to share the journey between the invisible worker to the visible worker well that's both my grandmother's story and that's my journey right and then of course my swedish path comes into the designs whether it's the chairs that i've now designed right so it's an opportunity to tell marcus dc it's not a generic it's specific journey it has to land on delicious how do you hope people feel after they eat one of your meals here i don't know i know people feel great fantastic because uh yes our restaurant was very privileged and very excited about how busy we are in these very difficult times right i know a lot of restaurants not just in dc are working extremely hard and you know the restaurant community we always have to respond to what happens around us right when the unknown of cost of goods we have to deal with that when the labor market goes up and down we have to deal with that uh when our the farms and the restaurant are getting rated we have to deal with that not just as something that we see on social media but something that is actually it's real emotion we know people in our community in our industry and the cooks and the servers are not the ones that are creating issues they're hard-working people with extremely uh passionate extremely passionate about being americans and contributing the cooks the gardener the server the person who makes the bed at this hotel they're not the ones creating issues they're actually one of adding to them if your mom could see everything that you've accomplished marcus if she were here today what do you think she would say i use now she's not with us anymore but i brought my mom everywhere and uh i have so much to thank both my mother both my children mother my swedish mother i remember actually here in dc doing a dinner for um looking for laura bush which was the first lady and uh my mom uh i invited my mom and you know i said mom you're the first lady and my mom said she only had free food at this place and i put them in the back that's my mom in the back what an incredible memory yes that's my mom an opportunity to get good food what do you think your accomplishments mean to your family in sweden and your family in ethiopia well i look at my journey both with my direct family but also my extended family through the restaurant community and it's really important that um you know my kids see uh my wife and i loving this place loving this country and sharing through our work ethic but also the experience right so when zion and grace walks come to our restaurants they're part of that experience right zion wants to be a chef too and so does little grace as well but for the larger extent of the restaurant family is that you know being a chef that was of color that was very often an anonymous labor can and should be a visible later whether you have your catering company whether you're cooking on tick tock whether you're cooking a restaurant you know put your dream high because and aim it even higher because you can do it i'm an example of that what is next for you marcus well next is tonight's service and we're going to get better and i think that's really important that just like the american experience has always improved on even how to push and pull on that so is restaurant work like we it's daily we improve and we get feedback from our guests from our team we'll never give up on trying to to serve even more delicious meal so even better experience i will never not think about that that we can get better so you're at the top of your game but you are still pushing yourself to find ways to get even better of course i mean like that's that if what could be more experienced than trying to get better what could be more american than trying to get better right what i love about being in america it's also very competitive environment but and so that drives me i love that that's how we do get better right i love the fact that we have so many brilliant chefs in this city or in new work where i am we're not just only the major cities the only way for us to to to improve is by competition so i i admire that i love that about industry and i think that there's never been more exciting time to be an american chef because there's so many different ways to engage with the guests technology has now made it possible that food can be anywhere and everywhere and those are the things that wasn't possible when i started working so i have to evolve and if i don't think it's exciting if i'm not passionate about going to my restaurant i should stop marcus samuelson thank you so much for this conversation thank you so much wonderful to talk to you thank you it was great