The Provocateurs:

Stuart Crainer:

Hello and welcome to the Provocateurs podcast. I’m Stuart Crainer, co-founder of Thinkers50. In Provocateurs, we explore the experiences, insights and perspectives of inspiring leaders. Our aim is to provoke you to think and act differently through conversations with some fantastic people. Provocateurs is a collaboration between Thinkers50 and Deloitte. So, my co-host is Steve Goldbach. Steve leads Deloitte’s sustainability practice in the US and is also the author, along with Geoff Tuff, of two best-selling books, Detonate which came out in 2018 and Provoke which inspired this podcast series. A new book from Steve and Geoff entitled Hone is published in September 2025. Steve, great to see you and can you please tell us more about today’s guest.

Steve Goldbach:

Great to see you, Stuart. I am excited to be here as always and I’m particularly excited for our guest today, Selassie Atadika. And I met Selassie at the Time 100 Climate Awards where Selassie was an honoree, one of Time’s Climate honorees that evening alongside amazing people like Mia Mottley and Michael Bloomberg and, frankly, she stole the show as far as I’m concerned. I was completely bowled over by her story, her achievements and the broad scope of everything she does, she’s got a diversity of activities that is super cool. She’s an award-winning chef, she’s a chocolatier and I will attest to the fact that I’m not a chocolate fan and they disappeared from our kitchen very, very quickly including from me. She is a thought leader in redefining food systems through the lens of sustainability, biodiversity and cultural heritage.

She’s the founder of Midunu, a nomadic dining concept, and Midunu Chocolates and has become a global advocate for sustainable agriculture and ethical trade and she uses her platform to highlight the untapped potential of African foodways. Through her efforts, Selassie not only educates but inspires audiences to act whether by supporting local food systems or advocating for sustainability in agriculture or rethinking roles in the global food landscape. Selassie, welcome.

Selassie Atadika:

Thank you!

Steve Goldbach:

I would love, maybe just for a fun place to start, do you want to share the fun little story of how we came to meet at the Time dinner?

Selassie Atadika:

Well, I went to the Time dinner and my brother was my plus one and, at the end of the night, we were just going through who were the people that we met that are really interesting people that we need to follow up with. And he was like, “You need to talk to Steve,” and I’m like, “I don’t have Steve on my list. Did I meet Steve?” And he was like, “No, you didn’t,” I’m like, “Well, how is Steve’s name on this list?” He was like, “I met him in the bathroom during the intermission.”

Steve Goldbach:

Indeed, your brother was next to me in the bathroom. And normally, there’s a rule, you don’t talk to the person next to you in the bathroom but somehow we got to chatting and your brother was just such a wonderful and engaging person and shared that, it was right after your award, so he shared that he was with you. And we talked about our mutual love of food and the fact that, 100 years ago, my wife and I had had a brief investment into an East Village restaurant and we just started connecting over food. And as you mentioned, food is such a cultural influence that it brought a couple of guys together to talk about their love of food and– 

Selassie Atadika:

Yeah. At the end, it was the restaurant, it was sustainability and it was writing. So, it was, yeah, a lot of dots that connected.

Leading Through Deliciousness

Steve Goldbach:

Indeed, indeed. Well, given all of what you do, how do you describe yourself? How do you describe what you do?

Selassie Atadika:

I know. People are always like, “What’s your title?” I’m like, “From which perspective?” I think, for myself, I like to say that I’m just a food advocate. I lead through deliciousness, that’s what I do. I think when I talk about sustainable food systems, the only way we’re going to win is through deliciousness because, once something tastes great, everybody’s on board.

Stuart Crainer:

I like that, leading through deliciousness. The world’s going to sign up for that, surely. And can you explain a little bit more about Midunu and nomadic dining, the origins of it and what nomadic dining means?

Selassie Atadika:

Yeah. So, I started the company Midunu in 2014. I moved back to Ghana after over a decade working with the United Nations and doing humanitarian work and I really had had all these amazing experiences around the continent that I felt I needed to share with others through a plate. Sadly, when a lot of people in the continent have a chance to travel, they’re going to Europe or to America, but that’s what we’re doing and we don’t really know what our neighboring countries are doing. And so, I wanted to give people a chance to experience this but to also see the economies that we could actually create and problems we could solve by really getting to understand and fall back in love with our food.

And so, I started this dining concept in Accra and the idea was sharing what I had tasted, seen with people here in Ghana and using what I call my philosophy new African cuisine and what that means to me is where we have culture, community and cuisine intersecting with environment, sustainability and economy. So, when we eat what grows here, we are respecting the environment. When we eat what grows here, we are putting money back into the local economy. When we eat what grows here, we’re respecting, most likely, our culture and there are stories that come from that and, for me, the community that grows but also the community that’s consuming can interact. And so, that’s what I was doing. I think a lot of people may have misinterpreted it as nouvelle cuisine or the pretty cute plates of food but for me it’s really about intentional plates, intentionally redesigning a food system that respects what is in front of us.

And for me, when I came back, I’d been traveling around, I think I hit over 44 African countries at that time and I was showcasing this food on a plate and I wanted to share this nomadic lifestyle that I’d had. And so, the dining experiences started off by moving from location to location within Accra, we now have a fixed home but I am also sharing this internationally. So, doing dining experiences around the world, sharing the lessons that I’ve learned from the African kitchen from plant forward to communal dining and shared plates.

An Innovative Business Model 

Steve Goldbach:

So, my understanding is that it’s, and correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s not only, certainly from the point of view of a North American and a European, an innovative cuisine but certainly local cuisine but it’s an innovative business model. You’re not there day in, day out, you have to reserve a spot or it opens periodically. How does the business model of Midunu work?

Selassie Atadika:

So, there’s two main components of it, the first is dining experiences, those are both … Actually, I would say there’s three components. There’s the dining experiences which is what people can experience in Accra but also internationally, there’s the chocolates that people can experience and that right now is in the US and in Ghana and the third piece is our hidden piece which is our research and documentation of what’s in our food system. So, what I realized is I really wanted to bring in local ingredients, particularly underutilized ones, and I saw that I didn’t have that information. Everything was handed down mother to child and that connection was getting weaker and weaker and so I needed to just go and meet auntie so-and-so in the village or down the street and start asking her questions.

A lot of those queries have led me down paths that have taught me so much that I want to share and it didn’t make sense to keep that as a traditional restaurant model and I knew that doing a 9:00 to 5:00 seven days a week was not going to allow me to do the research that was required to contribute to this conversation. So, the dining experiences is a way for us to showcase our philosophy on a plate, the institute is where we document the information and we’re sharing that, the chocolates is also another way of sharing that which is a bit more flexible and fits into what I call … You take something people know, which is chocolate, and then you take what they don’t know which is some of the spices and the conversations around the ingredients in the continent and it creates a space for a conversation and it’s much more accessible.

We actually started exporting in 2020 during COVID when people couldn’t come to us for dinners but we could share and give people a chance to travel around the continent through a box of chocolate. And that was also, for me, a way of having a conversation around how do we fix systemic injustice within the cocoa industry, how do we look at doing things differently. So, yeah, it’s not a usual business model but, for me, it gives me the space to do the research while sharing the flavors with people for them to understand the conversation.

Stuart Crainer:

In some ways, Selassie, it strikes me that the issues you’ve raised in Africa actually apply in Europe and America as well, we’ve become distant from the traditional crops that grow here. I’m in England and I expect to get my kiwi fruit from the supermarket – which have never grown here – and a host of things that don’t grow here and the stuff that does grow here aren’t fashionable anymore.

Selassie Atadika:

Literally, I was in the UK a couple of weeks ago and I remember, before getting on the plane, I had my last mango. I was like, “I’m going to go and experience what’s there,” and I was really enjoying the berries and I ate a lot of blackberries. And so, for me, I try to be intentional about where I am and what that speaks to. I would say that my experience in Ghana has been interesting because I was born here, I grew up here for the first six years or five years of my life, moved to the US and, when I came back in 2014 full time, I realized that a lot of the food that I grew up eating, I didn’t see. Growing up in the US, it was funny because, in elementary school, none of the kids really knew what to do with myself and my siblings, they were like, “They’re from Africa,” so they’re thinking what questions to ask.

So, it was like did you have a pet lion, did you live in a hut, all these questions would come at us and the only one I really entertained was what did you eat. And I remember having a list of all these beautiful ingredients, particularly if I’m thinking about yam, cassava, plantain, all these dishes and, when I came back, all I saw was rice. There was another dish that my mom used to make that I wanted to recreate, it uses blood from a goat and so I was thinking, there’s hayas, there’s budang, there’s all these blood sausages that are around the world, I wonder how I could play with this dish into a sausage. I couldn’t find anyone to teach it to me and I was shocked but I also realized that so much in our food system in Ghana had changed and that needed to … Well, I was just scared that a lot of the things that I ate growing up would no longer exist.

And the interesting thing is I’ve had this conversation with people around the world and we’re all suffering from the same thing. There are people who have had dishes from their grandmother, great-grandmother, aunties or wherever that they’re not sure or they see it also on the decline. So, that’s the one thing that brings us all together.

Steve Goldbach:

And one of the things that I can imagine that you think about doing is thinking about bringing foods with great heritages into the eating styles of today, food also progresses and is a showcase of our time. So, how do you think about having … In your cooking and your approach to food systems, how do you think about having both a leg in the past and also a leg in the future knowing that we’ve learned a lot about presentation and health? How do you just balance that aspect in your food leadership?

Selassie Atadika:

I’m smiling because there’s literally a principle in Ghana, we have these symbols, they’re called Adinkra symbols and there’s one specific one, it’s called Sankofa. And if you see it, it’s an image of a bird or it looks like a chicken and it’s facing forward and it has its neck turned back and in the mouth is a golden egg, it’s just an egg and basically it means go back and get it. So, the idea is that there are lessons in the past, there are things from our past that we need to understand and respect but they need to move forward. It’s not about this super romantic idea of nothing changes, everything is dynamic, culture is dynamic so, in fact, I think what we have to do is evolve with what we have or it’s lost.

So, I’ll take some of the ingredients I see in Ghana. So, there’s one of my favorite spices called prekese, it’s a pod from a tree and it’s currently at risk of being endangered due to deforestation. They don’t like to be planted in monocrop style, they need to be amongst other trees. So, I love the spice and I’m trying to use it as much as possible because, if we don’t, it’s going to be gone. So, when I went to the market, I would ask women … When I first came back because I hadn’t seen it before growing up in the US, I said, “What is it used for?” and they said, “Oh, it’s used for palm nut soup.” So, I’m thinking to myself, if we don’t use it for something else, that’s it, that’s all the life that this one spice has. So, I put it in chocolate, I put it in desserts, I use it as a dry rub on different types of dishes that I’m roasting or grilling and, therefore, this spice now has new legs that, hopefully, people can grab onto and be excited about.

The first time most people have ever tasted prekese that are American, I think … I have it in my chocolate, I think a lot of the people who’ve had prekese in my chocolates, it’s the first time they’ve ever had it. And it’s interesting because someone like Steve, like yourself would be like, “Ooh, what is this thing? It’s interesting.” It’s caramel, buttery notes and you’re going to be interested by it. Somebody else is going to be like, “Ooh, it’s on the arc of taste list so I’m excited about it.” Somebody else in Ghana will be like, “It reminds me of this soup my grandmother made.” So, all of us are going to be excited about it for different reasons and you might be a foodie that’s never had this and like, “Wow, it’s something I’ve never tasted in my entire life, I’m finally getting a chance to have it.”

So, there is a dynamism that needs to happen within there and I think, at the end of the day, if we want all of these things to survive, we need to make sure that whatever comes from our past has aspiration attached to it. So, if you’re in the village and someone is telling you to eat the same thing, by me zhuzhing it up and turning it into something, it becomes exciting. Perfect example, when I moved back to Ghana, fonio was not readily available here. Fonio is an ancient grain from West Africa, it’s climate smart, really wonderful. If you read about it, it’s like the quinoa of Africa. So, it’s this grain that does really wonderful things but, in Ghana, it was considered poor people’s food. And even in the regions where it grows, it was really only consumed when millet was not available so it was a lean season thing you ate because you had to and so a lot of people don’t want to touch it.

And interestingly enough, fonio is now super cool in the West and now Ghanaians are like, “Oh, wait, it’s from here. Oh, let me try it.” Ghanaians, we’re late adopters. So, whatever it takes to get us to the party, someone else has thought it’s cool, it’s aspirational now, now people want to eat it. And so, that’s given it a new life and it’s interesting to see the conversation had to go out and then come back in but, at the end, it was aspiration.

Food As a Tool for Transformation 

Stuart Crainer:

One of the things you’ve said, Selassie, is that food is more than a meal but also a tool for transformation and I think we’re getting a sense of that from what you’re saying. But can you explain a bit more why food is more than a meal and the transforming elements of it?

Selassie Atadika:

Yeah, absolutely. Food touches on almost every single aspect of our lives. When I even think about it from a point of view of policy, most ministries and sectors are touched by it and, unfortunately, some people see it as survival and other people see it as just a pure luxury. But if we break it down, most people, hopefully, are eating two times a day, there are those of us who are eating maybe lots of snacks in between but, if we’re saying that we are eating two to three times a day, that’s a lot of money that’s in the system globally. So, what we eat, by choosing to eat something that is … We’re stimulating an economy because we’re paying for that ingredient, you’re making choices about land use, you’re making choices about who’s growing, who’s eating, who cannot eat, school feeding programs determine what we’re growing. I am trying to think, health outcomes are also linked to that. We’ve got culture that’s coming through, we’ve got labor in terms of the type of food you eat and how you eat.

So, all of these things are interlinked. When I think about my experience in Ghana, some of the food systems choices, for example, rice was special occasion, the labor attached to growing rice changes and so, traditionally, you didn’t eat it all the time because it was expensive and it was difficult to grow. Fishing, there’s no fishing on Tuesdays in Ghana because we leave the ocean a day to rest. These rules were there for a reason and so it’s not that you don’t eat, it’s that you are respectful of how you eat it. When I think about even the way that nomadic communities are eating meat, meat for them is their wealth so you want to keep as many cows as you can. You’re not slaughtering a cow every afternoon and, when you do, you’re eating every single aspect of it because you know what it took to raise that cattle.

And so, these are some of the things that I think, when I think about how do we make change, I think sometimes food systems change is complicated because a lot of people need to come to the table but, at the same time, it’s also as simple as us making the right decision. So, I always say what are you voting with your fork? What have we voted with our fork in the way we’ve decided to eat? You have made a decision about what you value and that value is what the ecosystem is also pushing back on. When I think about some of the Scandinavian countries, when I see some of their policies, it’s, well, this is going to have a negative health outcome so we’re going to have an extra tax on that so that it covers the health sector. So, what are we going to do? Are we going to allow the market to … How do we influence the market as well in terms of how we see things?

If you can pay for it … If you look at Ghana, a lot of the negative health outcomes are foods that are for poor people or people that are under a certain budget because they don’t have the money to make better choices. So, you are laboring your economy by not making some of those decisions and supporting to make sure that water is cheaper than soft drinks or whatever it is that policy needs to look like, how do we think about designing the food system that we want.

Steve Goldbach:

System design is a very challenging thing because you’ve got all these different actors in a system that have individual motivations for what drives them. Where have you seen food system design done well and what’s the story that you see behind that and what other things would you like to see implemented in food systems around the world?

Selassie Atadika:

I think the Nordic countries seem to have done a really good job thinking it through in terms of their taxation, in terms of the policies and also putting investments in where they belong to allow certain things to happen. I would say one of the areas that we really need to think about, and I’m not saying that just because I’m an African, but when you look at the population in the next 50 years, the continent that we really need to think about is the African continent but, at the same time, we’re the dumping ground. We’re literally the dumping ground for everything nobody wants and no one can sell anymore. So, if you think about some of the soft drinks that people are not drinking anymore in the US and in Europe, they’re cheaper here than water sometimes. When you’re thinking about even poultry… So, the story around poultry in Ghana is that local chicken is twice as expensive as imported chicken. Now, the imported chicken comes to Ghana cheaply for many different reasons, subsidies, farm subsidies in certain countries, other countries, maybe the chicken has been in the freezer for too long and it’s considered not safe for local consumption so they sell it off to the continent. But when the chicken lands here, it’s half the price of local chicken and so what’s going to happen is most Ghanaians are going to want to buy the cheapest one so they can feed their families and the local poultry farmer is now going to be out of business which means he’s going to be unemployed, which means, which means, which means…

So, the question is I don’t even know who’s actually making that decision about our food system but we need to make that decision actively. So, that’s just, for me, one example, there are other examples of other things being dumped in our markets but, if we’re not careful about how we support and ensure that we’re making the best decisions for particularly a very young population in the continent, we’re asking for problems in the future.

Steve Goldbach:

And that’s certainly one of the complexities of system design is all the unintended consequences. Stuart, you look like you were going to ask a question, I just wanted to jump in with that thought.

Stuart Crainer:

Yeah. But I think it’s, from what you say, Selassie, it’s about intentionality at all stages from the plate to the planet and, actually, the system and the system.

Selassie Atadika:

It’s one system. It’s actually one system, right?

Stuart Crainer:

Yeah. And the food system is underappreciated as a system. Because it’s on your plate in front of you, you tend to forget about the political and the other forces that work in it. So, in many ways, it’s thinking of it as a system is the starting point as well as the end point.

Selassie Atadika:

Absolutely. I’ve been doing something like research around rice and seeing and hearing about IMF policies in the early ’80s and how that’s completely changed the diet in Ghana. So, these are things that … Unfortunately, because food ends up being this monolith in a way but, at the same time, it’s each policy has, I guess, what is it, the butterfly effect, it’s happening and so subsidies on rice in America in the ’70s had a massive impact on rice consumption in West Africa in the ’80s.

Stuart Crainer:

That’s interesting. You are Yale’s inaugural Global Table Fellow, which I need to ask you about. What a wonderful title. I would love … We all aspire to be a Table Fellow. And you’ve lectured at Yale and another really exciting recognition of your work. So, tell us more about that and your experience at Yale.

Selassie Atadika:

Yeah. So, that was last year and I had done two events with Yale earlier where I went in to speak to them. Yale has had a long history of championing plant-based, plant-forward eating and they’ve worked to make sure that their campus has … I think it was around 80% plant-forward dining. And so, their interest in me was around the work that I’m doing in plant-forward cooking and eating based on lessons I’d learned from the African continent and this was the third one, invitation from them. And as the fellow, the idea was how do we bring together programming beyond the dining hospitality space. So, my first invitations were from Yale Hospitality and the second or this third invitation included the Schwarzman Center as well as the McMillan Center. So, these were three different parts of the university, academic, social and the dining services coming together, I ended up teaching a class on environmental studies and, interestingly enough, that week it was on cash crops and so I was like, “You want to talk about cocoa? Here we go.”

So, it was really wonderful to have a chance to talk to students in the classroom as well as get into the dining services and help students come up with a grain bowl using fonio and them learning how easy it is to really just come up with something delicious using different ingredients. It was wonderful also being able to take over one of their dining facilities. So, I created a menu that was African and was plant-forward, it was based in the rooted section of the dining hall and it ran for about three months.

And one of the small just moments that I saw was students who were just like, “I feel seen. I feel seen on the menu, I feel seen having my dishes and food that I call home here.” It was also nice to see students who’d never tried it before but were from other parts of the world who felt the connection to it because some of the flavors felt like home. When we were doing the grain bowls, there was a student telling me about how his grandmother had made a dish and there were flavors in that dish that was letting him think about his grandmother.

Steve Goldbach:

So, Selassie, you’re a Yale Table Fellow, you’re a Time honoree, you’re an accomplished chef, what’s next in your world? What are the things that you’re working on today that our audience should know?

Selassie Atadika:

Well, I’m writing a book and it’s really about the lessons that I’ve learned from the African kitchen and how they are a large foundation of what I believe the world’s answers … Let me rephrase that. I’m working on a book and it’s based on lessons that I’ve learned from the African kitchen and I believe that these lessons will teach us a lot and are the answers that the world is looking for to solve some of our food system change issues.

Steve Goldbach:

And that’s in progress right now. I know from prior conversations, I think you’re working on that.

Selassie Atadika:

Yes, it’s in progress. It’s definitely in progress and back to writing so, yeah.

Steve Goldbach:

Excellent.

Selassie Atadika:

The other things that I’m looking forward to working on is actually just policy work and engaging more on that. I think, for me, I am ready to go much farther beyond my table in terms of creating impact in terms of organizations that are looking for fresh perspectives or people who actually have been working in the field and understand what some of the real bottlenecks are and the challenges that exist to creating change. So, policy work, advisory work, writing.

Stuart Crainer:

The amazing thing about kitchens is that they touch on so many different issues, innovation, leadership, logistics, creativity, sustainability, customer care, they’re all there. One of the things I liked, I read one of your blogs when you talked about kitchen leadership and you said leadership looks like a chef reimagining a source because the market didn’t have onions that day, a chocolatier tweaking a formula to work with a new harvest batch, a server reading the needs of a room better than any script. It isn’t leadership by hierarchy, it’s leadership by resilience, by creativity, by care and it’s women holding the fire steady. And it is really fantastic, really nicely written as well but the leadership lessons from the kitchen are incredible and that is at the heart of your work in many ways.

Selassie Atadika:

Definitely. And it’s interesting because, in Ghana, people don’t know what to do with me. They’re like, “She’s a cook, she’s a cateress, we don’t really know,” but food is at the heart of everything I would … Without food, the world does not go around and understanding it, managing it, controlling it is the beginning of everything. If I’m not wrong, I think it was in the, I think, ancient Greek culture, it was the chef, the priest and the doctor were the same person. Because of food safety, you had to bless the animal, you weren’t sure if you slaughtered it …

Sorry, it was a butcher, a priest and a chef were the same person because you actually had that much control and knowledge of what’s happening in the system. So, I always say we can make what nurtures us or, unfortunately, if it’s done wrong, it could actually have a huge negative effect on people. I always tell my team, the women that work for me, you could either kill somebody or you can nurture them. So, we have all of that in our hands to move forward with.

Steve Goldbach:

And just to the “you could kill someone or nurture someone”, it’s a great way to make sure people are purposeful and thoughtful and intentional in how they think about food. Maybe just a question to end on, Selassie, is where we started. So, you were one of seven global honorees at the Time 2025 Earth Awards and we said some of your fellow Earth Award winners. What does an honor like that mean to you and how are you thinking beyond the writing of your book, of using the platform you now have to create a better planet for the future?

Selassie Atadika:

Yeah. It feels heavy sometimes but it also feels where I want it to be and where I’m supposed to be. So, for me, I will answer it in a slightly long-winded way. My dad was a bit nervous so, being immigrants to the US, being the oldest child, I actually went to school to be pre-med and, when I decided that I wasn’t going to do that and was going to major in environmental studies and geography, my dad was quite concerned. And then when I decided that I wanted to become a chef and go to culinary school, he was like, “Two Ivy League degrees, I can’t believe this.” But for me, I’ve always felt that it was important to have somebody who understands the importance of food and the world economy and the environment and all of these things. And so, I’m grateful that my work is being seen, I’m grateful that people understand the importance of what food has to offer to the conversations around sustainability.

In terms of what this means to me in the next phase, for me, it’s going to be moving far beyond my table in Ghana, it’s now about creating the impact that the continent needs in order to be seen as a player in sustainability and in terms of food system change. It’s being able to impact policy work both by African nations but also by partners who are putting money into the continent or investing in the continent. And it’s being able to actively create opportunities for smallholder farmers in Africa to be able to have living salaries, living wages, things that are supporting of them. And for me, that’s really what this is about, it’s really about having their voices, their work seen and their work valued. And hopefully, I think and I believe that, hearing and seeing all of this, it’s win-win. So, if we’re actually sharing some of the knowledge that’s coming from the continent and how we have had this resilience for so long, it’s going to impact positively on the food system and in what and how others outside of the continent are eating.

Stuart Crainer:

We’re going to have to wait a little while for the book, Selassie, by the sound of it. How do we find out more about your work now? 

Selassie Atadika:

Well, yeah, you can reach me on my website, it’s selassieatadika.com, and I’m also on LinkedIn, Selassie Atadika, and I’m sometimes on Instagram but mostly the best way is my website.

Stuart Crainer:

Brilliant. A great conversation, Selassie. Leading through deliciousness, you can’t get much more persuasive than that, I think. And helping us link the plate, the planet, really important issues. And I think the issues for Africa you’ve highlighted, the issues from Africa as Steve’s highlighted, the systems thinking affects everybody in the world and it’s just changing the way people think about food is a tremendous challenge but fantastically important. So, thank you very much for joining us today. Thank you, Steve, and thank you everyone for watching, we look forward to seeing you again soon.

Steve Goldbach:

Thank you so much, Selassie.