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Simran Sethi at her home kitchen in Winston-Salem, N.C. Photo: Stacey Van Berkel for The Wall Street Journal
Beth Kracklauer
Updated Nov. 25, 2015 2:32 p.m. ET

IS BIODIVERSITY THE KEY to a better cup of coffee? And how sexy can achieving food security really be? Simran Sethi’s answers are “yes” and “you’d be surprised.” In her book “Bread, Wine, Chocolate: The Slow Loss of Foods We Love,” published this month by HarperOne, the author looks at ways in which monoculture and an increasingly standardized global diet put food systems in peril and leave crops vulnerable to blight and climate change. And she does so winningly, by relishing her favorite things to eat and drink, visiting the places they’re produced, digging up their stories and teasing out nuances of flavor unique to individual varieties and landscapes. “Five years ago I quit my tenured position, sold my house, gave away my car and started on this journey,” she said. “I’ve been on six continents and haven’t lived anywhere longer than five months.” Between jaunts she’s returned to the house where she grew up, in Winston-Salem, N.C., and cooked alongside her mother, Hema Sethi. What happens there is as revelatory as anything she’s seen on the road; she is, after all, someone who believes the choices we make in our kitchens can ripple outward to promote a more diverse and delicious food supply. As she put it, unapologetically, “Eat more. Eat better chocolate. This is the path to saving the planet.”

My cooking mentors were: my grandmother and my mother. From a very early age I would travel to Chandigarh, in northern India, where my grandmother lived. And she would take me to the market with her. There was all the chaos, and the freshness of everything. Seasonality, eat local: These weren’t “things,” they were givens. There was no other way to do it. I felt very close to her, and I translated that into being close to my mother as she cooked.

The thing people notice first about this kitchen is: the mural. My mother commissioned a local artist to make it. It depicts an Indian market with chickens running around. What my mom took from my previous kitchen is the design element of the open cabinet. I’ve collected pottery over the years. My friend Sam Clarkson is a potter, and a lot of the stuff you see is his. We’re not tucking these things away, we’re showing them off. Pottery collection Photo: Stacey Van Berkel for The Wall Street Journal

The best feature of this kitchen is: the view. Cooking helps to anchor me in the moment, which is rare for me because I’ve always got so much going on in my head. And so the view from where I’m cooking has always been important. Here it’s a view of the woods. You’re always seeing the seasons change from the kitchen.

The kitchen tools I can’t live without are: My AeroPress coffee maker and my hand coffee grinder. They go in the carry-on luggage. I’m grinding coffee beans in my hotel room. It sets the tone for the whole day. Also my Henckels paring knife, nesting-doll measuring cups, ceramic colander and Cuisinart immersion blender. Each of these has been stashed in the luggage. They’re tokens that help me make any home mine. Mural on the kitchen wall Photo: Stacey Van Berkel for The Wall Street Journal

The cookbook I turn to again and again is: “An Invitation to Indian Cooking” by Madhur Jaffrey. When my mother married my father she didn’t know how to cook. He taught her. And when I decided it was my turn to start figuring this stuff out, she said, “This was my very first cookbook.” It’s a point of reference. But more than anything, what writing this new book has taught me is to use my palate and my own best judgments. indian spices Photo: Stacey Van Berkel for The Wall Street Journal

My pantry is always stocked with: chai spices. I’m obsessed with some from the state of Gujarat. They make their chai with black pepper. It’s not what we do in the north, but I’m loving it. There are coffee beans right now from Ethiopia and from Kenya, but those are always changing. Sugar’s always there. I’m still not a purist who drinks my coffee black, as I guess the super-experts would tell me to do. And the grains—I just made a teff pudding to eat for breakfast.

More In My Kitchen

In my refrigerator you’ll always find: seasonal greens and fruit. Right now we’ve got some collards—this is North Carolina! And sweet potatoes. Broccoli. I die for my mom’s sambarro. It’s just peppers, onions and tomatoes, cooked down. It’s this thing—I think every culture has one, whether it’s ketchup or salsa—that you put on everything. Eggs in the morning: sambarro on top. Potatoes and veggies for lunch: sambarro on top. Chicken at dinner: sambarro on top. Now we’re rationing it, because the summer peppers are gone. Maybe we used it a little too liberally.

The pan I reach for most is: a Bialetti pan I got from Martha Stewart’s show. I’ve been a guest a couple of times, and this time there was an audience giveaway. And I was like, I want that pan. It’s gorgeous, a huge, huge pan with a really heavy base. And my mother sent me the cast-iron skillet that we used when I was growing up, and now it’s here, a touchstone.

My favorite way to cook is: someone else cooking for me! But I can always pop open a tin of sardines and make some pasta and throw in some greens, and there’s dinner. That’s the kind of “chef” I am: what’s easy and clean. I don’t do complicated things for myself. I love them, and I love when other people do them for me. But what I’m interested in is getting the best possible ingredients I can and making the most delicious meal out of as few things as possible. I’m no ascetic, though. For a while I was a yoga teacher—eschewing all of these things. I stopped eating sugar. Then I realized these are some of the most wonderful things in life. Butter, sugar, salt, I love them. And I’m not afraid of them anymore. Simran Sethi and Hema Sethi, her mother Photo: Stacey Van Berkel for The Wall Street Journal

A wine I love is: Jolie-Laide Trousseau Gris. Ooh la la. This particular grape is only grown commercially on one 10-acre plot in California, and it’s in danger of disappearing. I went to this restaurant in Oakland, just for a snack. And I thought, Oh dear god, what is this? I’ve never had a wine like this before. What I’m trying to do with my food, Scott Schultz, the winemaker, is trying to do with his grapes: just reveal the flavor, let it be what it is. It’s beautiful, crisp, sweet, with a lot of minerality. Kind of dazzling. And I wasn’t a wine girl.

A food trend I am totally over is: toast. Is that still a thing? And anything turned into foam. No, I do not need a foam version of bacon. Give me the sizzle.

When I travel, I like to: collect spices. Tastes are my souvenirs. I also try to suss out street food. If I’m in a place I’m less familiar with, I’ll do a street food tour. I did one in Shanghai that was incredible. Or I’ll try to find a friend who will take me out. And I also like to go to a restaurant for at least one really nice meal—splash out for something that’s special and fancier. I try to have an open mind and an open palate, and stretch my sensory bank. What can I draw on and think about and start to love?

—Edited from an interview by Beth Kracklauer


Appeared in the November 28, 2015, print edition as 'Simran Sethi.'




