Chef Selassie Atadika
Yale Residency
September 29 – October 05, 2024
In Collaboration with the Council on African Studies
Yale welcomed Chef Selassie Atadika, owner of Midunu in Accra, Ghana, as the inaugural fellow to kickstart the Yale Global Table Program — a partnership between the Yale MacMillan Center, the Yale Schwarzman Center, and Yale Hospitality that brings culinary thought-leaders from around the world to campus to illuminate the connections between sustainability, health, culture, and community.
Celebrating Africa's Cultural and Culinary Heritage
Atadika was drawn to the kitchen from an early age—often found grinding pepe close by her mother’s apron strings. Rooted in Ghanaian traditions and shaped by years of living and eating across the United States, Europe, and many corners of Africa, her culinary perspective has continued to evolve. Largely self-taught, she later completed coursework at the Culinary Institute of America. A founding member of Trio Toque, Dakar’s first nomadic restaurant, Atadika has brought her inventive vision back to Ghana through Midunu, a nomadic dining concept that showcases what she calls New African Cuisine.
Before beginning her journey as the founder of Midunu, Atadika served as a UNICEF emergency specialist for a decade. Recalling her humanitarian work, Atadika shared that she had the opportunity to travel to over 40 African countries — where she fell in love with dishes from each. Atadika enjoyed dishes like maboké in the Central African Republic, doro wat and injera in Ethiopia, and nyama choma in Kenya — to name a few. Atadika’s decade-long experience with UNICEF across over 40 African countries has provided her with a unique understanding of the links between food access, nutrition, and cultural preservation, which informs her efforts to incorporate African foodways into global sustainability solutions.
I think that each and every one of us has a role to play in our food systems. It’s important for us to understand our food systems… and turn them into something that is dynamic.
Shaping Global Sustainability Solutions
In analyzing food systems — complex networks that include all actors and activities involved in food production, processing, distribution, consumption, and disposal — Atadika considers four main aspects: cultural practices and traditions, geography, preservation, and sustainability. In explaining how each of the four aspects shape food systems, Atadika draws on her diverse experiences of studying African cuisine.
During her one-week residency at Yale, Atadika collaborated with students, faculty, and dining services to create immersive experiences that aim to reshape how the university approaches global food systems both academically and operationally.