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Selassie Atadika shares her story with the audience at Food On The Edge 2019 in Galway, Ireland.
When you think of Africa, thoughts of food poverty and hunger are usually not far away, Selassie Atadika, aims to change that by tapping into the continent’s rich and abundant food traditions, there are ways, ingredients and systems that can help feed the world.
After over a decade spent engaged in humanitarian work with the UN and years of self-teaching in the culinary arts, Selassie Atadika completed course work at the Culinary Institute of America. Atadika brought her innovative approach, ‘New African Cuisine’ home in 2014.
Her food enterprise Midunu, celebrates Africa’s cultural & culinary heritage. Its goal is to create experiences where culture, community and cuisine intersect. Midunu employs local, seasonal, and underutilized ingredients including traditional grains and proteins to deliver Africa’s bounty to the table.
Describing a depth of knowledge in the traditional African approach and applied them to her ‘New African Cuisine’. Assimilating modern needs and demands as well as climate change and major socio-economic influences she developed a vision for an African cuisine that utilizes and reinvests in African foodways and local supply chains.
African cuisine is one of the most pant forward systems in the world with nuts, fruits and berries present instead of meat-based proteins. Food waste is a necessary minimum, flavour beats fats, foraging is a natural resource and sustainable protein choices like goat and snails are an integral element.
