When I was three or four years old, my sisters—who are 12 or 13 years older than me—babysat me while they worked at a Chinese restaurant on the South Side of Chicago. I actually learned to count in the back of that restaurant, putting almond cookies into little bags. Every time I got the count right, they’d give me a piece of sesame candy as a reward.

My older sister Cathy also took me to the Taste of Chicago when we were growing up. She was a broke college student back then, so the first stop was always the Hare Krishna tent because they offered food by free will donation. That’s where I was first exposed to vegan food, and it was beautiful. Because she was on a tight budget, she wouldn’t let us spend our food tickets on something basic like pizza. She’d say, “You can get that any day. There’s turtle and beer soup over there—let’s try that instead.”

My mother was born in Germany, and my father grew up speaking Polish, so I had strong German and Polish influences from an early age. We lived in a primarily Mexican and African American neighborhood, which added more cultural layers to my perspective and palate.

I worked for the Chicago Park District and absorbed cultural influences from every neighborhood.  Each has a distinct ethnic makeup—some were near Chinatown, others in predominantly Polish, German, or Russian communities. 

Then I studied cultural anthropology in college, which deepened my appreciation of global cultures. Later, in the Army, I attended Russian language school and deployed to Afghanistan, where I served as a military liaison to foreign civilian governments. My world view expanded as I explored all these different cultural traditions firsthand.