The Sioux Chef: Restoring Indigenous Food Ways with Sean Sherman

About this episode

Chef Sean Sherman discusses the restoration of indigenous food knowledge and its cultural significance.

What would American food look like if the story had not been interrupted? That's the question at the center of this conversation with Chef Sean Sherman — an Ogala Lakota chef who grew up on Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota and has spent his career restoring the indigenous food knowledge that colonization, displacement, and forced assimilation nearly erased. Sean is the founder of the Indigenous Food Lab and the award-winning restaurant Owamni in Minneapolis. His latest book, Turtle Island, maps the full tapestry of indigenous food across North America — erasing colonial borders to reveal the regional diversity, plant knowledge, and food sovereignty that existed long before European settlement. In this conversation, we talk about what was lost when indigenous food systems were dismantled — not centuries ago, but within just a few generations. We talk about the government commodity food programs that replaced traditional diets on reservations, the 90% unemployment rates Sean grew up around, and the moment in Mexico when he realized he knew hundreds of European recipes but nothing about Lakota food. And we talk about what becomes possible when that knowledge is restored — for…

People in this episode

Host: Dana DiPrima

Guest: Sean Sherman

Topics covered

• Indigenous food systems
• Culinary history
• Cultural restoration
• Food sovereignty
• Health and nutrition
• Colonization impact

Keywords

• indigenous food
• Sean Sherman
• food sovereignty
• cultural restoration
• Owamni
• Turtle Island
• Lakota food
• Pine Ridge Reservation
• colonization

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Indigenous Food Lab, Owamni

Books & works: Turtle Island

Places: Pine Ridge Reservation, South Dakota, Minneapolis, Mexico

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