Melting pot
Houston’s culinary landscape embraces Nigerian cooking
We tuck into beef suya — grilled skewers of spicy seasoned meat wearing a dusty, aromatic coat of ground peanuts — set against a mound of fragrant jollof rice with tomatoes and onions and punched by the heat of cayenne pepper. This is the signature dish of a restaurant aptly named Sabo Suya Spot on Bissonnet near Beltway 8.
We are trying typical dishes of Nigeria. But what we’re really tasting is America. To be more specific, Houston.
Much has been written about Houston’s polyglot culinary culture, an identity stamped by the foods and flavors of many countries. “Melting pot” describes the easy intermingling of the city’s Indian, Southeast Asian, Chinese, Mediterranean and South American flavors, alongside Texas’ tapestry of Mexican, African-American, Cajun, Czech and German heritage.
Chef Edward Lee of Louisville, Ky., is a food explorer with much to say about how immigrant cultures are changing and redefining how America eats. He already knew as much about Houston; one chapter of his new book, “Buttermilk Graffiti: A Chef ’s Journey to Discover America’s New Melting Pot Culture,” finds him immersed in the city’s Nigerian community, eating goat pepper soup, balls of steamed fufu bread and
suya skewers of grilled beef, lamb and kidney.
What’s even more interesting to Lee is how the intersection of food cultures happens in smaller pockets across the country. His research had him observing Lebanese kibbeh in Clarksdale, Miss.; Peruvian food in Paterson, N.J.; Cambodian pork lab in Lowell, Mass.; aquavit in Seattle; and Uyghur noodle soup in Brighton Beach, N.Y.
His takeaway is that notions of “traditional” American food are going out the window as American towns and cities reshape their culinary landscapes to reflect contemporary culture. Houston is a prime example.
It’s where an estimated 150,000 Nigerian Americans have made their home, including Bedford Umez, president of the Nigerian Foundation, a nonprofit advocacy group representing Nigerians in Greater Houston.
“The industrial nature of Houston with economic opportunity, economic power, oil technology and the cost of living are all factors” contributing to the growing Nigerian community, said Umez, who teaches government at Lee College in Baytown. Nigerian immigrants have the highest levels of education in Houston and the nation, surpassing whites and Asians, according to census data bolstered by an analysis of 13 annual Houston-area surveys conducted by Rice University.
And wherever immigrant populations form, restaurants follow. The local Nigerian community has a handful of dependable spots serving authentic food of the homeland, Umez said, including Signature African Restaurant, Afrikiko, Finger Licking Restaurant, Suya Hut and Sabo Suya Spot. Most are in southwest Houston.
Umez is particularly fond of Suya Hut’s marinated meat skewers. “No place in Houston does it better than they do,” he said.
Silva Olu has been getting his suya from Sabo Suya Spot for at least seven years, he said. “If you want to get the real, authentic African suya, you come to him,” the Nigerian American said, standing next to owner Adamu Suleiman during a recent lunch hour. “He’s good at what he does.”
Good enough to impress Lee. Suleiman, who hails from the Kano state in North West Nigeria, opened Sabo Suya Spot in 2010, specializing in skewered meats, jollof rice, roasted spicy hen and ram (goat). He goes to great lengths to prepare his peanutty meat skewers. Suleiman cold-presses peanuts, extracting oil that is brushed on the meats. The peanut-cake byproduct is then fried, crushed and used to coat the meat, which also is flavored with a mix of spices.
“They say it reminds them of home,” Suleiman says of his suya. “This is the traditional way of doing it. It’s what I grew up with.”
Though Nigerians make up the majority of his customers, others have found their way to his suya, Suleiman said. He remembers a white customer who ordered the suya so spicy it burned his lips and tongue. “He went to the bathroom to wash his face and came back and started eating it again.”
Lee tried taking samples of those skewers from Sabo Suya Spot home with him to Louisville, only to have TSA confiscate them from his checked luggage. He wanted to share them with his wife and cooks at his Louisville restaurants, 610 Magnolia, MilkWood and Whiskey Dry.
Those suya, Lee said, are precisely the kind of dish that happens when a city’s communities “rub up against each other.” He speaks from personal experience as a Brooklyn, N.Y.-raised child of Korean parents who now cooks in the American South. His definition of what constitutes authentic cuisine and American food has changed.
“Anything that lands on these shores is American food,” said Lee, who won an Emmy Award for his appearances on the series “The Mind of a Chef.” “Even Korean food: Once Korean immigrants came here, their food changed. It evolved within the context of America. That’s what makes American food so fascinating. We take from the homeland, change it, improve it and make it something completely different and interesting.”