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so for the past few days I've been going
around and asking people a seemingly
silly question and before we start I
just like to ask you guys to ask that to
yourselves what is food now most people
have asked have given me similar answers
food is just something on a plate that
we eat every day and technically
speaking sure that answer works but the
one problem I have with that is well
food is a thing that's been John mankind
together for millions of years it's it's
been the subject of everything from
trade to health to books so it's food
really just something on a plate hi my
name is Arjun Rea and I'm a chef I love
to cook and today I want to talk to you
guys about my journey trying to find the
answer to that question growing up in
the United States
I've always been exposed to a very wide
variety of cultures and cuisines we have
restaurants from around the globe right
at our fingertips and being an
adventurous person I love to take
advantage of that however I never really
thought where did this food come from
where did the idea of any of this really
come from the stories behind them the
first time I can really remember
thinking about my food was I remember
one time my parents are hosting a
Christmas party and I saw my mom burning
what looked like sugar on cups of milk
so I asked her what is she making and
she told me it was something called a
creme brulee so I went upstairs I hit up
Google and they told me that it
apparently translates to something
called burnt cream and so I was in shock
why would someone be burning perfectly
good cream and then giving it to
somebody so the next morning I went down
to confront my mom when suddenly on the
counter I saw a creme brulee that was
uneaten so being an adventurous one I
took a spoon plunged it in an
apprehensive we took a bite
instead of tasting like ashes and smoke
like I expected it to it was lovely
it was creamy smooth and melted right in
my mouth and it was just ingenious to
put sugar on top of cream and I was
shocked who thought of this who burned
sugar on cream and then turns into a
dish
it seemed amazing to me so over the next
few months I went on a deep exploration
of French cuisine studying everything
from the fruit of the Middle Ages to the
contemporary uses of truffles it amazed
me there were so many things that were
just the result of trial and error
experimentation finally after a few
months I garnered up the courage to
create my own dish a creme brulee so I
stepped up to the stove did what I saw
on the recipe and although it wasn't
great I was proud of myself because I
finally understood this dish the story
behind it the reasons for its existence
and I found this to be the case with a
lot of other dishes and this is what
sparked my passion for cooking so over
the next two years I really don't even -
cooking creating all the classical
French dishes and I took that time to
really refined my skills
finally when I was about nine I decided
to audition for the show chopped junior'
which is this so basically what it is
it's a cooking competition and you have
to create an appetizer entree and
dessert and you have 30 minutes allotted
for each round so the first few steps of
the audition process were pretty easy it
was just summing some pictures of my
food and doing a few brief interviews
then the producers sent me an assignment
which was to create a one-minute video
about why is my food unique why isn't me
on a plate and this was the one part
that I struggled with I really stumbled
on this question because why is this me
on a plate
I mean there's probably millions of
people out there who can cook French
food there was nothing special I had no
connection to the dish so I decided to
take some time off and really spend a
few spend a bit of time to just
brainstorm how to put myself on the
plate so I do think what how can i
connect myself to the stove how how can
put myself on there and the most obvious
thing to me was my Indian heritage every
day growing up my mom would do our best
to serve me
traditional Indian dishes so I grew up
on that and but I didn't want to just
cook Indian food either I wanted it to
be me otherwise would just be the same
thing just cooking the same thing over
and over so then I got this crazy idea
what if I combine two cultures so I made
this dish called shrimp and risotto and
so what it was it was risotto which is
classic Italian and then you have shrimp
but made with some Indian flair you have
some spices in there and to my surprise
it turned out great because it was
something that I had never tried before
I never heard of it but it was fusion it
worked just too right so after doing
this over and over - a few classical
dishes I I decided that that was my
style and so I really for the show and I
did that I submitted fusion and that was
me on a plate and it had to do a few
more various tasks and eventually I made
it onto the show and so the actual
experience was amazing they took me out
to New York for a few days and I went to
the studio and I was surrounded by
children just like many kids who found
their passion and cooking and had
managed to put themselves onto a plate
so the first round so I ended up getting
chopped in the first round but he was
still an amazing experience I learned so
much from those around me and so after
that so what I had to do was I had to
come up with a new idea you know I've
done chopped what else can I do how else
can I continue to get my food out there
so I decided my next task was gonna be
to write a cookbook and so my cookbook I
decided to start cooking all the fusion
dishes I could all the dishes that were
me yeah so so if I sat down I wrote the
recipes I spoke with people and finally
I made my cookbook so basically what my
cookbook was what it was just it was so
I had to have a theme so I decided my
theme be history because I love history
so what I did was I took all of my
recipes that I Dre
down all the interviews that had done
with people and I spent hours and hours
sitting at a table researching each dish
and what I eventually came across was
that every ingredient every single
flavor had a history that went back at
least a few hundred years or so you know
the sugar in our chocolate the syrupy
poor on our pancakes
everything has such a story in history
so I had found for every recipe I wrote
down a paragraph or so and so that was
my cookbook and I to this day I still
keep cooking and I love to research
every dish but the main thing I learned
from cooking isn't just how to cook a
dish the main thing I learned from
cooking is that everything has a story
behind it that food isn't just something
on a plate to go back to my original
question food is something it's an
expression
it's what somebody it's how somebody
decided to put themselves onto a plate
it's the result of experimentation and
failure and so the one lesson I learned
from cooking that can be applied to
everything is that put yourself to the
fullest like when you do something like
make sure you're expressing yourself the
best you can and that you don't let
anything block you thank you
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