Inside Indigenous chef Vernon DeFoe's revamped Gatherings Cafe
MINNEAPOLIS — You've likely heard about the renowned Indigenous restaurant in downtown Minneapolis.
As we've reported, Sean Sherman's restaurant won a prestigious James Beard Award. Owamni is sit-down dining, but the Indigenous food scene is growing at all price points. WCCO went inside a newly renovated Native cafe.
Vernon DeFoe knows his way around a kitchen. Food has always been a special part of his story.
"I am Anishinaabe from Red Cliff, Wisconsin, so right up by the Apostle Islands," DeFoe said. "I always grew up eating fish and venison. A lot of berries, my great-grandma would go pick berries in the backyard."
Now he's the one handling fruit. It's happening inside the Gatherings Cafe inside the Minneapolis American Indian Center on Franklin Avenue. It's a newly renovated, affordable, Indigenous breakfast and lunch café. DeFoe said the most gratifying part has been "just having people come and try stuff that they haven't had before and then just seeing their reaction afterwards."
DeFoe used to work with Sean Sherman, who started the nationally acclaimed Owamni in downtown Minneapolis. He took his experience inside the community center to bring more people from the broader community inside, to shop, admire art and indulge.
Gatherings has been a staple along Franklin Avenue since 2016. A new, bigger kitchen and dining space will let them reach more people. While they do have a full menu, they don't have many of the foods that colonizers brought over from Europe.
"No beef, chicken, pork," DeFoe said. "Those were mostly all brought over by the Spanish."
It's part of a larger movement.
"I do think that there is a lot of growth happening in Minneapolis and in Minnesota and I am hoping that that will also spread throughout the U.S.," Giiwedin, one of the diners who was visiting from Leech Lake Reservation, said.
It's certainly spreading through the state, from a farm in Hugo to Midtown Global Market and beyond via the Indigenous Food Network.
DeFoe said this is healthy food from the land — corn, beans and squash. They are all from here, South America to Canada. His hope is that more people will "come and have a meeting here, have some coffee, have some breakfast, lunch, whatever."
A place to learn and a place to gather.
Gatherings Cafe is on East Franklin Avenue. It's open Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.