Red Rooster’s chef Mr Marcus Samuelsson on the power of food and music in the community.

This month, chef and entrepreneur Mr Marcus Samuelsson is bringing his iconic Harlem restaurant Red Rooster to Shoreditch in east London. The doors to his new premises on Curtain Road open on 26 May. To accompany this, he is releasing a cookbook. As you would expect, it features the recipes that have won Red Rooster so many fans in Harlem and beyond (Sir Paul McCartney and Mr Barack Obama to name but two).

Mr Samuelsson cooks Southern American comfort food with a global sensibility. He was born in Ethiopia, brought up in Sweden, and honed his craft at fine-dining establishments such as Georges Blanc in France and Aquavit in Manhattan (where he gained the James Beard Best Chef award in 2003.) “We’re inspired by the American south, but my journey as an immigrant is told through some Ethiopian and Swedish touches,” says Mr Samuelsson. “It’s a brasserie experience that is loud, big and fun. It’s food that comes from the spirit of comfort, eating together and celebrating.”

His book is also a love letter to the community of Harlem, where he moved in 2005 before opening Red Rooster in 2010. “The love and thirst for great music [in Harlem] has not changed, so I love that,” he says. “And the fact that on Sunday, church and gospel is king – it’s beautiful. In Harlem, it’s about the people who built the community being able to afford to stay. We contribute to that, by providing jobs. And Red Rooster is the way it is because of all the incredible people I’ve met who said, ‘Hey, young buck – you don’t know what you’re doing,’ and they’ve enlightened me. My job is to connect the past with the present and the future with delicious food and interesting culture.”

Given that Red Rooster is a passion project intrinsically linked to Harlem, how will it translate across the pond to gentrified Shoreditch? Mr Samuelsson admits it is a different proposition, but he sees similarities between Harlem and Hackney. “I grew up in Sweden, so London was always my first big city, but most of the time I went to the west side. Then I discovered the east side and I thought, ‘Yes! This speaks more to who I am.’ I saw a real grit and pride for Hackney, which reminded me of Harlem. There are the Jewish bagel shops alongside the hipster shops. And the relationship to music and all that stuff. And I thought, ‘This is exactly what’s happening in Harlem right now. This is fascinating.’”

Mr Samuelsson has set up shop in London in much the same way he did in New York, by keeping things as local as possible. “The employees come from the community,” he says. “When we looked at art we only looked at art from artists who work or went to school in Shoreditch. We found cooks who are from somewhere in Hackney.” He did this by getting out and talking to people. “For me, London is similar to New York, but has its own sensibilities. What is London telling me? I’ve done many events in London and each one teaches me something, whether I talk to Mark Hix, or Jason Atherton, or Nuno Mendes.”

To further slot into his new surroundings, Mr Samuelsson is making tweaks to the menu. “We have dishes that we don’t have in Harlem, like herring, which I grew up with. That dish makes sense in Shoreditch, but not necessarily in Harlem. And we’re opening in spring, so peas and asparagus are all over the menu.”

Indeed, alongside the usual favourites of yardbird chicken and corn bread, you could argue that some of the dishes at Red Rooster Shoreditch seem a little more fine dining-y. But if there were any doubt, Mr Samuelsson’s intentions remain clear. “London doesn’t need another beautiful high-end restaurant,” he says. “You have enough. A delicious place where you can celebrate with your friends with food from the soul? Everybody needs that.”

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