HONOURING FAMILY HERITAGE

The Wolfman’s new cookbook pays homage to love of Indigenous cuisine inspired by his mother

At first, almost five decades ago, cooking for David Wolfman was a way to have quality time with his mother and learn the stories of her life and people. When he was a hungry nine-year-old growing up in Toronto, Wolfman was enticed into the kitchen by the smell of baking bread. He wound up helping his mother prepare meals. Then, Dolores Wolfman would tell her son about her own childhood on the Xaxli’p First Nation in British Columbia.

Dolores had left her reserve in the 1950s. She met Rubin Wolfman, a railway worker, and they settled in Toronto. Years later, their son recalls, when Dolores made salmon for dinner, she would be sad and homesick. “I’m just so accustomed ... Back home, I would just go and get it. We had abundances of this,” she would say.

A few years later, by the time David Wolfman had entered cooking school, he was struck by the deep comforts of a home-cooked dinner. “Even more than loving food, I noticed — I have two sisters, and my mom and dad — as soon as food went on the table, they went quiet, and they were at peace. There was sort of a moment of sharing ... It’s almost like our stomachs and hearts were talking at the same time.”

Now 56, Wolfman has been renowned for more than half his life for what he calls Indigenous fusion cuisine. He combined the chef’s skills and knowledge he learned at George Brown College with the inspiration of his mother’s heritage and other Indigenous traditions, first as a caterer, then as a culinary arts professor at his alma mater, and then as a TV chef who hosted his show Cooking with the Wolfman on APTN for nearly two decades.

This fall, Wolfman is launching his first cookbook, Cooking with the Wolfman: Indigenous Fusion, co-written with his wife, Marlene, who is Métis. This month, his book tour will take him beyond Toronto to Ottawa, Edmonton and Victoria.

The highly personal book teems with recipes that range from basic to more elaborate, with an emphasis on game-meat dishes such as slow-cooked ginger caribou shanks and rosemary tatanka (buffalo) with sardine tapenade.

The book is also clearly the work of a culinary professional — its directions are extremely thorough; its introductory chapters cover basic kitchen techniques and tips, and scattered throughout are primers on cooking methods and more. Thanks to Wolfman’s years of research, the book casts a wide net, referring to the foods and cooking of Indigenous people across North America.

“Each (First) Nation has its own food source, different climates, different soils, different preservation,” Wolfman says. He points to fishing weirs in Ontario, sun-dried meats in the Prairies and the fermented foods of the Inuit as varied examples of Indigenous food practices.

With his own cooking, Wolfman intends to honour Indigenous foods rather than replicate them. “We couldn’t do it exactly,” he says. “The animals have changed with farm-raising and wild animals are limited. What I’ve done is I’ve modernized some of the techniques. The main ingredients are Indigenous, but Mediterranean or Middle Eastern herbs, herbs from around the world, are very versatile and might amalgamate.”

Dolores Wolfman didn’t live to see her son’s cookbook, which includes a photo of her. “She passed away eight years now,” Wolfman says. “She’s still here in my heart, and she’s all over my book.”