I’m a White Chef Cooking Indian Food: Here’s Why I Won’t Stop

I’ve been told I’m stealing. That my presence in Indian food is a problem. But I’m still here, because this cuisine saved me

It begs the question, Do we own a cuisine because we were born into it?

After sixteen years of studying the cuisines of the Indian subcontinent, through research, classes, travel, mentorships with Indian food historians, Hindi lessons, and relentless reading, I’ve come to understand one thing clearly: I will always be a guest in this cuisine. A grateful, passionate, and devoted guest, but a guest nonetheless.

Despite that devotion, I’ve been told, sometimes gently, and occasionally harshly, that I have no right to cook and share Indian food online. That as a white man, my presence in this space is inherently problematic. That by making Indian food professionally, I am taking opportunities away from Indian chefs who, the argument goes, have a more legitimate claim.

And I get it. I truly do.

Because when a cuisine is born from centuries of tradition, ritual, memory, and identity, especially in the aftermath of colonization, there is pain. Colonization didn’t just take land, it erased voices, warped narratives, and rebranded cultures through someone else’s lens. So when a white chef enters a space that holds those memories, it can feel, to some, like another form of taking.

That’s the paradox and the poetry of it. It’s passed down, handed over, whispered about, guarded, and then given freely. Every cuisine on this planet has evolved because people moved, shared, blended, and adapted. French cuisine wouldn’t be what it is without Arab influence. Southern American food is inseparable from the traditions of enslaved Africans. Chinese cuisine, in all its vast diversity, has shaped and been shaped by those who cooked it far from home. And yet, we don’t bat an eye when a Japanese chef masters French pastries or a Greek chef opens a sushi bar in New York.

So why is Indian food treated differently? Well, here’s where it gets complicated.

Indian food, like Chinese, Mexican, or Thai food, has too often been misunderstood and misrepresented in the West. Written off as “too spicy,” “too smelly,” or “too complicated.” These aren’t just culinary criticisms, they’re microaggressions wrapped in the language of taste. And for many first-generation immigrants, they carry the sting of alienation. That their food, their comfort, their memory, their love, was never good enough.

I want to challenge that. I want to build a bridge between people who have only ever known “curry” as a generic dish on a buffet and the truth, that Indian food is layered, regional, spiritual, scientific, and unapologetically diverse. A cuisine that changes every 30 kilometers and cannot be reduced to a single recipe or spice blend.

But here’s the paradox: in trying to uplift the cuisine, I also become a lightning rod for the very pain I’m trying to honor.

If we believe that a cuisine belongs exclusively to the people born into it, we imply that food is static. That it doesn’t travel, evolve, or welcome outsiders. That love, reverence, and years of immersive learning mean nothing unless stamped with the right passport or the right skin.

What happens to cross-cultural respect then? To the deep friendships I’ve built with Indian chefs, historians, and home cooks? To the joy I feel when someone tries my food and says it reminds them of home, not because I copied it, but because I listened, learned and treated it with reverence.

No matter how many Indian elders or chefs have embraced me, no matter how carefully I’ve honored the cultural and historical context of each dish, someone will still say I don’t belong. To them, I’m not a student. I’m a threat.

Part of it, I believe, is the trauma of colonization. The subcontinent has been exploited, extracted from, and misunderstood for centuries. And when a white person steps into that cultural space, it can feel, viscerally, like another form of taking. I don’t dismiss that feeling. I sit with it. I try to understand where it comes from. But I also know that the answer can’t be gatekeeping. Because if we start saying that only people born into a culture can cook its food, we miss the very point of food itself.

Food is the most democratic form of culture we have. It doesn’t require a degree or a bloodline, just care, curiosity, and respect. The moment we start placing borders around who can cook what, we risk severing the very connections that food is meant to build. Yes, it matters how you cook it. Yes, it matters whether you give credit, share the history, and name your sources. But intention matters too.

I will never be Indian. I will never carry the ancestral memory of Diwali meals or family recipes whispered between generations. But I can be someone who studies, listens, honors, and shares what I’ve learned with humility. I can say, “This comes from Gujarat,” or “This version of saag has deep Punjabi roots,” and mean it, not as a performance, but as reverence. I can name the farmers, the spice traders, the home cooks, and the scholars whose work makes my food possible.

And yes, there will always be those who look at me and say, “You don’t belong here.” But I’m not here to belong. I’m here to serve. To serve the food. To serve the story. And to make sure that anyone who has ever said “Indian food smells weird” or “I don’t like curry” gets a chance to experience the cuisine with fresh eyes and an open heart.

Because Indian food saved me. It gave me purpose. And I will spend the rest of my life returning that gift with as much integrity as I can.

Because while I may be misunderstood, I also carry a responsibility. As a white chef cooking a colonized cuisine, my job isn’t to center myself. It’s to advocate. To amplify. To open doors without walking through them alone.

The deeper I go into Indian cuisine, the more I realize I’m not chasing recipes, I’m chasing understanding. Every dish carries centuries of history, migration, caste dynamics, climate, ritual, and resistance. To cook it without context would feel like copying poetry phonetically, with no grasp of its meaning. But when you do understand it, when you trace the ingredients back to the soil and listen to the people who’ve cooked it for generations, it stops being just “food” and becomes something sacred. That sacredness rightfully evokes protectors. And I’ve come to see myself not as a possessor, but as a caretaker, an outsider honored to be let in.

Still, there are days it’s hard. It stings when I’m accused of diminishing the very cuisine I’ve built my life around with love and care. It’s a particular kind of ache when your reverence is mistaken for arrogance, when the years you’ve spent learning, giving back, and showing up are flattened into a single, dismissive label: “appropriator.” But I remind myself that those criticisms are often born from pain, generational pain of being erased, mocked, or told your culture is only valuable when someone else profits from it. And if I can hold space for that pain while staying grounded in my truth, then I can keep going.

Because my truth is this: I don’t cook Indian food because it’s “trendy” or “exotic.” I cook it because it changed my life. I cook it to honor the people who believed in me and became family. Because it gave me purpose in my grief, meaning in my career, and connection when I felt alone. I cook it to honor the teachers, the aunties, the farmers, the historians who shared their knowledge with me. I cook it to tell their stories, not as my own, but as the threads I’ve been trusted to carry. If that trust is ever broken, I want to be the first to own it. But if it’s intact, and I believe it is, I’ll keep cooking. Not to take, but to offer. Not to speak over, but to lift up. Always a student. Always with love.

Still, I press on, not because I seek approval, but because I love this food too much not to share it. I will never claim ownership. I will never stop learning. I will always name the regions, the people, and the history behind what I cook.

If food really is a universal language, then let’s make room for both native speakers and those who learned it later in life. Not to compete, but to collaborate. Not to take, but to taste and tell, with respect.

Because the truth is, no one owns a cuisine. But we do owe it something.

We owe it memory.

We owe it accuracy.

We owe it respect.

And above all, we owe it love.

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