The Secret Ingredient: Sesame Oil

"Every time you eat something you learn something."

Hey, I made myself a new website! I wanted to bring it to your attention because it’s pretty cute, but it also has a big “Work With Me” button — because I would love to work with you! Whether you’re looking for a unique dessert to serve at your wedding (no cakes please) or want to throw a fun party around creative cooking, I’d love to help you channel your personality and tastes into something delicious. Get in touch!

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In office shows, there’s always that agent of chaos who you can’t keep your eyes off of because they’re constantly doing something that keeps the plot moving. That was Leanne at the ACLU, hanging over our cubicle wall and shrieking or laughing or challenging us to a competition. As I got to know her and she became more than a character to me, I saw how genuinely she’s motivated by care for her communities, whether that’s ACLU’s union, AAPI small businesses, NYC tenants, queer New Yorkers or just her wide circle of friends who are scattered across social impact organizations and the food industry.

Leanne is also an excellent cook and loves to organize creative potlucks like I do. She was behind the sexy foods party for which I made these NSFW mushroom bao (with mushrooms, rhubarb, and very wide holes) and a “five-ingredient party” in which we were challenged to make dishes tasty with limited ingredients. She’s started doing illustration and design work around food, like restaurants or Bon Appétit, and found satisfaction in bringing together her skills and passion this way. We talked about her deep love of sesame oil and how food is art, sort of.

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Sesame oil! It's so fatty and nutty but it's not nut. It’s sesame! It’s so savory in the best way. I really really love sesame oil.

The meal that I eat the most is thinly sliced brisket that I fry up fast and then dip in salt and sesame oil. You have this beautiful super savory depth of flavor that comes from just three ingredients. Everything I cook and everything that I've grown up with is made of very simple ingredients. My parents are really good cooks but very economical and honestly sometimes just lazy about it. They're like, I don't want to buy that many ingredients. So I grew up eating simple but really flavorful meals and so that's why sesame oil and salt appeals to me so much.

My grandma used to make this ketchup shrimp. It's just ketchup, shrimp and a ton of garlic on rice. This is one reason I had that five ingredient party — because there's so much you can do with so little. And it’s still so intense in flavor. Garlic is so powerful, ketchup is so powerful, shrimp is so powerful. You don't need a lot to make an extremely savory or flavorful meal. My dad would make me steak, with just calamansi — a lot of it — soy sauce and garlic. You put the steak in a bag to marinate for a day and it’s broken down because of the acidity. And then you cook that with onions and eat it with rice and it’s really emblematic of Filipino food, which is like super acidic, super savory, super punchy in flavor.

I also grew up eating a lot of Persian food because my mom's a jeweler and her business partner is a Persian man. But the way my parents ate it, they kind of Filipino’d it, if that makes sense. Like with sumac — when I watched my Persian uncle make [a dish], he’d put a little bit on. But we would drown it in sumac and then we’d squeeze lime and lemon and smash the burnt tomatoes in there too and really make it as acidic as possible.

Kate: So did you learn to cook from your family?

No. They really gatekept all of the recipes. They're not very good teachers, and they're not very patient people. And I think they also were like, I want you to come home to eat this food. And if you know how to make it yourself, you're not going to come home. So when I moved to New York, I was only making brussels sprouts in the oven and heating up sausages, that was the extent of my cooking ability. I've always loved food but I was nervous to start because it felt so daunting.

K: What made you start?

I needed to eat. I started following recipes more, like googling “red pasta” or whatever. And then over time it was about getting to eat out or eating my friends’ food. Every time you eat something you learn something. I’d be like, Oh wow, I really like a strong garlic taste or Oh, I really like when meat is cooked in a certain way, and then I could google it or ask how to make it that way. I’m now in this place where I can afford to eat out more but I’ve also learned how to cook to a point where I can make almost everything I want. That's so special. I love that cooking is so empowering in that way.

K: You seem to be surrounded by people who work in the food industry and you’ve given back so much to it through your design and illustration work. How did you find yourself there?

I just gravitate towards people who love it in the same way as me. I would say food takes up at least 80% of my thoughts, if I'm not feeling anxious that day. And I don't just like to eat it, I like to know about it. I like to know how to make it. What does this mean? What is this word and what is the history behind it? What is this ingredient, and who uses this ingredient? These conversations can sometimes be really nerdy and I love it. I think there are people who are down to have those conversations about like, different types of sesame oil, and there are other people who are like, It’s just sesame oil. So I gravitated towards people who want to have these silly conversations about things that I actually give a shit about.

It’s also a great joy of mine to cook for people working in the food industry. For all of the labor that they put into the food they make, they’re not paid fairly. And so it’s truly a labor of love. I have a lot of chef friends who are geniuses, they're so brilliant and they’re not getting compensated fairly for all the creative work, the physical labor and time that they put into the things they do. And so getting to give back in that way where I get to cook for my friends who work in food, that’s really special for me. And I’m also getting feedback on the food that I'm making!

In the design context, well, we don’t need to have a hierarchy but [Leanne constructs a hierarchy with her hands] if I made a list of things I love, it would be food — ceramics — napping — and then design. I spent a lot of time cultivating a skill and it's really fun to make someone's idea come to life. But I don't love it as much as I love food. I never want to work in food because I don't want to have my livelihood and my stress related to finances touch something that I love so so dearly and is so sacred to me.

K: Maybe this is a difficult question, but I’ve been thinking about whether cooking is art. I tend to think of art as work that’s extraneous to life. Cooking is necessary but it can also be a work of expression. What do you think?

I think it can be both. I’m thinking about ceramics. When I look at a plate, I'm like, This is art. But some people just see a plate. And I think people have a similar perception of food, where they might just see eggs, but I’m like, No this person cracked it a certain way. These eggs came from somewhere, they're gonna look a certain way, the color of the yolk is gonna be a certain way. There are so many factors that contribute to this egg that is on your plate right here right now in this moment. There are so many considerations and so many choices. And that for me is very reminiscent of art, where you have to make a lot of choices and that is what makes your piece right.

I love care in the choices, right? That’s what differentiates food to me. How much thought did you put into every decision that made the thing in your bowl right now? When I'm cooking for friends, it's like, What are the dietary restrictions? How many people am I cooking for, how many dishes do I want on the table so that it has range?

K: Do you find it harder to cook for just yourself?

No. I am the easiest person to cook for because I know exactly what I want. I just want sesame oil. No, just kidding. I’ll look at my fridge and make it work. I have frozen scallion pancakes all the time. Oh my God, I made something so freaking tasty. I was too lazy to make rice and I wanted something fast. First I fried all my thinly sliced beef brisket and put it to the side. And then in that beef oil I fried the scallion pancake. And I fried some greens because I need to be healthy. And then I put a ton of Kewpie mayo, the veggies and then the beef on there, I put sesame oil and salt on the beef and I closed the sandwich. It was so creamy, it was so savory, it was so crunchy. I was like, This is so fucking good. I love cooking for myself. As much as I love to cook for other people, I think the best part of being able to cook well is getting to feed yourself exactly what you want.

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