Episode #58: Jeremy Chan

Jeremy Chan is the chef of the London restaurant Ikoyi, a two Michelin star restaurant built around spice. Jeremy just came out with a book from Phaidon, called Ikoyi: A Journey Through Bold Heat, which describes at length his Chinese-Canadian background, his youth in Hong Kong and England, studying language at Princeton, working in finance, shifting his focus to cooking and how he jumped from kitchen to kitchen asking loads of questions and absorbing as much as he can.

We discuss how Ikoyi, the restaurant he created with his childhood friend Iré Hassan-Odukale, is often misunderstood. While there are elements of Sub-Saharan Africa on his menu, he clarifies that the Ikoyi is not a Nigerian restaurant and was never supposed to be one, even though the media has built a narrative that it is one. He describes, while he is inspired by these flavors, namely the bold spices used there, and his partner is from Nigeria and the restaurant’s name comes from a neighborhood in Lagos, he’s never felt that culture was his story to tell. Rather, he uses spices – not just West African, but global spices – without their cultural context. He simply focuses on the flavors and how he personally relates to them and finds ways to express them. Even as everyone has continually tried to pigeonhole Ikoyi, he remains defiant. He’s just cooking to the best of his ability in the way he thinks is best. Whether you agree with his approach or not, you have to respect how he is able to trust his own instincts and block out all the noise.

See a full transcript at www.newworlder.com.