I do my best. I’ ve read that Questlove has been pulled over at least 20 times for Driving While Black— including the night before he won a Grammy. He got a car and driver because so many cabs were turning him down. Once, he had to fit his six-foot-four-inch frame into a pedicab to get from a Roots rehearsal to The Tonight Show because no cab would take him.
I ask if he sees himself as an instrument of change.“ Dude,” he answers,“ I don’ t even believe I have impact in my own field.” At the same time, he’ s actively working for greater equality in food access. He recounts having learned, years ago, from Magic Johnson that when Johnson opened a TGI Fridays in Harlem, it was the only place that you could get a fresh salad within a fifteen-block radius. To that end, he joined the advisory board of the Edible Schoolyard NYC, whose goal is food education in inner-city schools. Kate Brashares, executive director of Edible Schoolyard, tells me,“ He’ s the real deal. He really understands the importance of getting healthy, delicious food to everyone.” She adds,“ He’ s opened doors to us we never could have opened without him.” Some of that may be the color of his skin. Some is Questlove’ s talent for collecting ideas and people to the mutual benefit of both. He tells me he loves that Daniel
Fuel, shares billing with Hugh Acheson’ s lamb with fava beans and Tom Colicchio’ s smoked monkfish. On a cocktail table near a bar serving cognac and gin concoctions by Nitecap’ s Natasha David, guests write anti-hunger slogans on paper plates( food is fuel for my family; food is fuel for my mind) and photograph them. Minton’ s Joseph“ JJ” Johnson— whose upgrading of the junk-food classic Frito pie is a masterwork of rice and cassava chips, peanut sauce, braised goat, and edamame beans in a bespoke Mylar bag— is here for his culinary cachet and his food-justice work. JJ is an adviser to the Food Bank for New York City. Once a week, the Minton’ s staff feeds the 89 tenants of a nonprofit that houses the homeless in the building above the Harlem restaurant.
And yet: The night isn’ t heavy with the cause. Champagne and Rémy Martin flow. Guests gather around the chefs and cluck and ooh.“ You, the chef, are really the star of this show,” Johnson tells me in a kind of daze.“ It’ s this no-judge zone, too, where everyone really cares about food in a cool way. Plus, Tom Colicchio helped me plate.”
As we stand by the open kitchen, surveying the chefs and guests— an astoundingly beautiful crowd, in every hue, of
MOVEABLE FEAST Questlove uses a dedicated Instagram account to post shots of dishes that inspire him.
CENTER LEFT: AMY LOMBARD. CENTER RIGHT: @ WILLAJEANNEWORLEANS / © INSTAGRAM. ALL OTHERS: @ QUESTLOVESFOOD / © INSTAGRAM.
Patterson and Roy Choi opened LocoL in the middle of Watts. It’ s a direction he can see himself taking, though he can’ t say how yet. He can say, with characteristic humility, that he’ s starting small.“ I’ m going to do the documentary about black chefs and hopefully expose some people and start some scholarship programs to culinary schools.” His approach is shaped by a lesson he learned from President Obama:“ You’ ve got to believe in small. No pebble splash starts with the outer ripple.” When he teaches classes about Prince at NYU— he’ s also a professor— he likes to limit the number of students to nineteen so that he can connect with each.“ I mean, right now,” he says,“ before I go in the grave, I feel like if I can really affect the course of 20 people’ s lives... maybe 50, then I’ ve succeeded.”
Questlove’ s food salons play a growing role in his activism. He’ s planning one in Washington, D. C., in honor of Earth Day, which will be, rather pointedly, at the home of George Washington University’ s president, across the street from the White House. The one I most recently attend here in New York has a social-justice theme. The Food Policy Action Education Fund’ s anti-hunger campaign, Food Is every age, all talking about food— Questlove tells me his new obsession is Impossible burgers, which are faithful simulacra of meat made from plants. I tell him I haven’ t tasted them yet, and he shakes his head and grips my arm.“ Dude, you’ re going to freak out. You will not be able to tell the difference between it and a burger!” He tells me about“ the blood element”— which makes the wheat protein, coconut oil – and – soy based burger juicy, like... meat. He’ s investigated the soy content.“ It’ s low,” he tells me.“ Because I worry about soy.” Questlove tells me that Impossible meat is going to be a big deal.“ It literally addresses all the problems we have.” The environmental cost of animal farming, endemic health problems, hunger.
He has to move on, give bear hugs, taste Aquavit’ s Emma Bengtsson’ s banana split, talk to CNN’ s political gadfly W. Kamau Bell. About... comedy? Politics? Food justice? The banana split? Or maybe more about the future— a subject Questlove manages to keep lightly on his mind.
“ I fear for the Impossible guys the way I fear for the makers of the electric car from the gas companies,” he tells me as he breaks away.“ That’ s how on the cusp they are.” □
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