Indigenous Food Lab ushers in a new era of Native visibility at Minnesota State Fair

The most local food at this year's State Fair can be found near the back of the International Bazaar of the Great Minnesota Get-Together.

The Indigenous Food Lab at the Taste of the Midtown Global Market booth has a debut menu that earned a coveted spot on the official new fair foods list. A mixture of nixtamal and locally harvested wild rice is topped with a tart wild berry wóžapi sauce and offered with either bison meatballs or sweet potato dumplings (and an optional crunch from a spiced cricket-and-seed topping).

It has many of the hallmarks of a popular fair food — local flavor, curiosity, naturally gluten- and dairy-free, and it can be made vegan. But how a Native American dish got to the State Fair is a journey that starts with one of the most recognizable chefs to come out of our region.

In 2019, Sean Sherman took the stage in Dan Patch Park on what was billed as "The Sioux Chef Presents the Indigenous Food Lab." Into the microphone, he welcomed the crowd to the fair's first Indigenous Peoples Day.

"I don't think it was official," Sherman recalled. Just before kicking it off, his co-host and Minnesota's lieutenant governor gave him the go-ahead. "Peggy Flanagan said, 'Yeah, let's just call it that.' So, we did." Although the fair was canceled the next year due to COVID, when they returned in 2021, it was officially official: Indigenous Peoples Day was part of the Minnesota State Fair's programming.

"I had tried for years to have any presence at the fair," said Sherman. "I would go to the fair to document anything that has anything to do with Natives." He found very little on the fairgrounds that spoke to him about the modern Native American experience. "I found some dreamcatchers being sold at a stand and turned them over. They were made in China," he said.

According to research from the fair, the Indigenous Food Lab isn't the first Native American food vendor. Notably, there was Heidi Grika, of Birchberry Native Arts and Food, whose long-running stand sold hominy, white flint corn, maple syrup and wild rice. There are stands like Native Roots Trading Post in the West End Market, Native Spirit in the International Bazaar and Nazka's Handmade in the Merchandise Mart. But never has a Native food that's made to order — and served by Indigenous makers — ascended to this level.

This is part of what Sherman and his continually evolving nonprofit do: educate and create opportunities for Native people and deliciously fresh ways of examining what it means to serve local cuisine.

Sherman started his career as a chef, working in other people's kitchens and making other people's food. While he was holding onto his roots and ancestral knowledge from growing up with his grandparents on South Dakota's Pine Ridge Reservation, it wasn't central to his work life.

At age 29, he was a burned-out cook in need of respite when he traveled to Mexico and spent time with the Huichol people. The sabbatical proved to be a revelatory one that changed Sherman's career path. He founded the Sioux Chef in 2014, a catering company with an educational arm, and the businesses steadily gained ground. The Tatanka Truck soon followed, serving pre-colonial cuisine. There was no dairy, no flour — a significant statement considering the city of Minneapolis owes much of its wealth to flour mills. Those mills harnessed the power of what became known as St. Anthony Falls, and the falls would play a significant role in Sherman's story, too.

His company and Sioux Chef star power grew beyond Minnesota as the conversation on pre-colonial cuisine grew louder. In 2018, "The Sioux Chef's Indigenous Kitchen" cookbook, co-authored with recipe developer and Star Tribune recipe columnist Beth Dooley, earned Sherman his first James Beard Award.

The growth led to an opportunity with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board to revitalize a restaurant space right in front of those falls on the Mississippi River. In 2021, Owamni opened to immediate acclaim, named for the place known as Owamni Yomni, a sacred space with swirling waters. It was Star Tribune's restaurant of the year and earned the James Beard Award in 2023 for Best New Restaurant, a national honor. Sherman was recognized as one of Time magazine's people of the year and received the Julia Child Award for both the restaurant and his work with the nonprofit that operates it.

North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems (NATIFS) was founded in 2017 and is dedicated to addressing the economic and health crises affecting Native communities by re-establishing Native foodways. Its website states: "We imagine a new North American food system that generates wealth and improves health in Native communities through food-related enterprises."

The roots of his movement that started in Minnesota have since become part of a national movement, poised to go global. The accolades seem to energize the chef-activist to create opportunities for the Native community, but there's also a hunger for this knowledge and way of eating. With the rise of gluten and dairy sensitivities, this cuisine serves that community.

In 2023, NATIFS opened the Indigenous Food Lab inside Midtown Global Market in Minneapolis, with shelves lined with products and ingredients that are Native made and harvested. There's space for a commercial kitchen, classrooms and the opportunity to sell ready-made foods at an attainable price point. And because of the Indigenous Food Lab, fairgoers get to taste the food, too.

"I had tried for years to have any presence at the fair," said Sherman. "I documented everything I could find that might be Native food and there, and there wasn't much. I mean, OOf-da [Tacos] has fry bread tacos, but that's not Native."

Making it onto the fair's vendor list takes some jockeying. For the fair's organizers to consider a new vendor, it needs to not only expands food offerings at the already-packed fairgrounds but also align with less-sexy considerations like portions, profitability and marketing.

"Our goal is to offer new foods that showcase flavors, ingredients and presentations that resonate with a Minnesota population eager to explore unique and creative culinary creations," said Lara Hughes, the fair's marketing and communications manager. "On top of that, fair fans have come to expect an official new foods list that features a good number of flavorful, innovative, exceptional items that you might be more likely to experience at a linen-tablecloth restaurant than in a paper boat. The two offerings by Indigenous Food Lab perfectly align with these goals."

The inclusion also presents an exciting opportunity for the Indigenous Food Lab to build or fortify food supply chains with Native growers and makers. "We tried to make sure we used all products that could be sourced from Native businesses," said Sherman. That meant finding someone who could supply the 8,000 to 12,000 pounds of bison for their stint at the fair Aug. 28 through Labor Day.

"The exposure really helps us raise this awareness," said Sherman. "We're able to be in spaces typically Native people haven't had the opportunity to be in. We want to normalize Indigenous food and food producers — locally, globally and nationally and creating pathways."

Although the food is only available during the second half of the fair, in a stand that's labeled for "international food and products," it's still major progress — and a part of Sherman's and NATIFS' big picture.

On Aug. 25, the fifth Indigenous Peoples Day at the fair, Sherman once again took the stage alongside Flanagan and others to celebrate the culture and people who came here first, and to revel in the singular Minnesota-ness of the State Fair. This year's theme was Indigenous food sovereignty and land management, which highlighted Indigenous food, history, culture and arts. Fairgoers could sample Minnesota wild rice, heirloom corn tortillas and fresh herbal teas, and learn from knowledge keepers, chefs and entertainers who discussed and celebrated Indigenous culture, especially its foodways.

"We saw an opportunity long ago that this can be bigger than just a restaurant," Sherman said.