Meet Chef Walks First: Trotter Project Official Chef Partner

Meet Chef Jessica Walks First! Chef Walks First is an official chef partner of The Trotter Project and owner of Ketapanen Kitchen.

Meet Chef Jessica Walks First, owner of Ketapanen Kitchen and chef partner to The Trotter Project! Chef Walks First does everything with love, which is the meaning of "ketapanen" in her native Menominee language. Chef speaks with us about the natural integration of her background in her cooking as well as her education series, informing students of any and all ages about the influence of Native cultures in food and beyond. Learn more about Chef Walks First’s story below.

Watch Chef Walks First’s story here.

Chef, it’s so great to chat with you! Let's kick things off and dive into the past. Can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you fell in love with the culinary arts?  

That's a very long story. I'll try to give you the condensed version.

I've been cooking since I was five. I think food and cooking is a love language in my family.  It's always been something that's been part of who I am, part of who my family is, part of my role in the community. It was just always there. I honestly didn't think about it as a career ‘til about maybe 10, 11 years ago, and it was not by choice.

Someone pulled my strings and pushed me in that direction. And then I realized that I actually could do this for a living because I've been doing it my whole life.  And it grew from there. When you're doing something that you love and that means something to you, like cooking, you don't see it as work.

It's not hard to do it every day. It's not hard to be passionate about something that means something to you. My family, we're a family that was breaking generational curses and healing generationally. It's especially in our community, the Native community, cooking and food are something that brings us all together.

And I think that's why I'm so heartbroken by it, because I know it's what heals us. 

You are part of the Menominee tribe of Wisconsin—talk to us more about how your background, your heritage, your culture have really influenced this journey and especially the food you love to cook.  

For me, there's no separation between me and my culture. It's not part of who I am. It is who I am. My whole life has been influenced by our customs, our traditions, our stories, our foods. It's always been, and it's not something that just one day I decided I like this.

That's always existed within me. I never considered doing Indigenous foods. It wasn't something I set out to do, that was a path that kind of unfurled in front of me. I can't explain how it happened. It just did. Every sign was there, I guess I could say. 

In Chicago, this area, these are my ancestral homelands, not just the Menominee people, but many other tribes. And, there's zero representation when it comes to Indigenous foods.

And I think that just fueled the passion, making sure that the representation was there because representation is important. I grew up in a world that had nothing of me and my surroundings. There was nothing of myself in the world around me, not in school, not anywhere, unless I was with my community or I was at home on a reservation.

So trying to make sure that the next generations don't experience that, so my son can look around him and find his culture everywhere. That's another reason I think that drives me to do the work that I do when it comes to Indigenous foods.  

That's so powerful, thank you for doing that. Tell us about what are some of those dishes that we can find? What are some of your favorites that you like to make so that we can all say this is something amazing and new that we should be eating too?  

I get asked this question a million times and my answer always changes depending on what mood I'm in or what season it is!

One of the favorite things we have on our menu is bison meat. We do buffalo brisket, pulled bison, we do bison tamales, all that meat. I'm very fond of it just because of its health properties and because it's a great alternative and a healthier alternative to beef.

But that figures prominently on our menu and a lot of our dishes. And then again, wild rice. That is a staple of the Menominee people. It's actually what our name means. It's “people of the wild rice.” So a lot of dishes on my menu have wild rice in them, are centered around wild rice. We have wild rice crepes. We have a woodland wild rice with mushrooms, a traditional wild rice dish with berries and maple. Those are the ones I like to cook, but there are things I like to cook that are not Indigenous foods, like pasta and making a mousse dessert. I love playing with flavors, I have other favorites, but again, that changes seasonally. 

Was there that kind of “aha” moment that made you want to start Ketapanen Kitchen? And what has it been like to be a business owner for the last decade?

I think there were a couple aha moments. Several years ago, I had flown down to Florida and I stopped to visit one of my instructors, Chef John Abels, and we started talking.

I think he believed in me more than I believed in myself, to be honest. And he was the aha moment. He was the one that said, you need to do this. “You're going to be wildly successful if you do this.” I didn't believe in that part of myself.

And so that was the first aha moment. And then, the other aha moment was when my son was little. We were in the kitchen and I had just made spaghetti. And he said, “Mom, I could taste the love in this. You know what, Mommy, you have a ketapanen kitchen.” 

It just made sense. We're not fluid language speakers, but the word “ketapanen” is regularly used in our home. It's how we tell each other we love each other. It made total sense at that moment.

What has that journey been like for you the last 10 years? 

I'm catering and education focused. I don't even know how to describe the journey.

It started out as  a whim, then it grew into an idea, and then I was very unsure of myself. I think I lacked confidence in my abilities and my skills. I worked primarily for one organization and just did catering for their events and then for the Trickster Cultural Center in Schaumburg. And then their former executive director, Joe Podlasek, just pushed me one day.

He said you gotta go out on your own, you gotta do this.  And I hemmed and hawed and still didn't feel confident in myself.  But he forced me to do a dinner, and I do say forced because I didn't want to do it. I was scared, scared to fail—and it was successful and our business just took off from there.

It has probably quadrupled in the last four years. It has grown by leaps and bounds. And what I learned is, just doing Indigenous foods and catering wasn't enough, it had to have the education component because, if you look at just in the state of Illinois, if you look at what children are taught about Indigenous history, there's so much missing. There are so many mistruths.  

There are a lot of discrepancies and food is definitely not part of it. So how are we to understand what Indigenous cuisine is? If no one has ever taught us, how do we know that 50 percent of the foods that we eat every day are Indigenous?

So I realized that in order to make sure that my concept was successful, I had to provide background, I had to provide education, and people requested it of me. 

The first time I was asked to speak, once I got up there, it just started flowing, and when you have a passion for a subject, it's really easy to talk about it. And it became easier and then it became more in depth. Then I started working with other organizations, like with the Field Museum, to create education pieces.

There's a lot of work to be done, not just in the culinary industry, but when it comes to food education. And I think that's shaped what my model is. 

For right now, we are a two person show, me and my sous chef, Georgiana Peacore. We do it all. And we work very hard  and it's a lot, but it's heart driven. So I don't mind the long days and the weeks without sleep because it happens. As long as I'm able to share my culture through food.

So are you going into classrooms usually for the education piece? 

I do. I go into classrooms anywhere from kindergarteners to college students.

I work with most of the major universities in the area. I work with a lot of the grammar schools. I go everywhere. Libraries, art institutions, you name it. Wherever. I go into a lot of offices, believe it or not. There are a lot of companies that have called for cultural education.

That is really cool. So let's talk a little bit about that work that you do with The Trotter Project. Can you remember when you first started working with us and what it was like to become a chef partner with us?

Derrek Miller saw a news segment that I was in with John Abels. I know that they had a working relationship prior. He reached out to John, who reached out to me, and we ended up doing an event at the Museum of Science and Industry, a lunch and learn event.

That was the first time I worked with The Trotter Project and I loved it. It's a bunch of kids and they're eager to learn and eager to try. And then, the more we began to talk, the more the work that The Trotter Project aligned with what I believe in, sharing food education, sharing healthy food, making sure that the kids’ needs are met in those areas.

It synced with my heart. And of course, Paula Houde is utterly amazing. It was like a beautiful package sitting in front of me. And I was like, I'm all in.

And we love working with you! I love seeing every time you're in the classroom with the kids and they're learning even just the basics. What we also love is that you have been able to connect with scholars of ours, like Josue Cervantes, ‘23. Talk to us about that special relationship you have with him.

Incredible young man, just so amazing. I met him at the New York Produce Show. The work he's doing is very similar to myself. And honestly, I've adopted him. He's like another child to me.

His mom has adopted me. I've gone into their home and his mom has taught me how to make traditional tamales their way. He's come into my home and we've cooked and he's taught me things. We really bonded because that love of ancestral foods is there. And he's an amazing young man and honestly, he's going to blow up one day and he's going to be uber famous.

I'll be happy to know that I was a little piece of that journey for him because he is so talented and bright. 

Absolutely. Is there anything you'd want to see from the organization going forward? 

I have an abundance of ideas, always. Paula and I have worked together with some programs, going into schools and having these shorter culinary programs, I would love to see that happen more.

Even a summer camp, I know it's been done in the past. And I would love to see that expanded and adding maybe short field trips from Chicago to a couple Native farms in the area. It would be amazing to bring kids from the city to these farms to let them see that and see how these foods are grown and harvested and treated.

There have been plenty of things that have crossed my mind, but those stand out. Obviously, just to keep doing the work we're doing and making sure we're reaching as many kids as possible. That's the most important thing I want to see happen. 

Anything that you'd like to share, say, for future scholars of The Trotter Project or anyone else who's looking to get into the culinary arts? Do you have a few pieces of advice for them?  

My best advice is to have a thick skin. Walk in like you own the place, even if you're scared out of your mind. You have to have grit and passion to survive in this industry. You really do. And if you don't, it shows and you'll never survive. Unfortunately, that's the reality of it. But, passion is the most important thing because if you aren't loving what you're doing, it's going to be work to you and you're going to give up.  

So I always say if your heart is there and you're truly passionate about it, hold tight to that passion and that's what's going to pull you forward.

A big thank you to Chef Walks First for all she does to support The Trotter Project and spread Indigeneous education! To learn more about our scholarships and other programming, be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date and check out our donation page here.