Program rooted in Gwich’in chef’s cuisine earns awards

Growing up in the North, Steph Baryluk remembers her family members had different jobs when it came to harvesting and processing food.

From dicing caribou meat and making dry fish to baking, she said she learned from a young age about not wasting food and only taking what you need.

“Those were all lessons I didn’t appreciate at the time. It was just a part of our life, it was a part of what we did,” she said.

Baryluk, who is Teel’it Gwich’in from Teetł’it zheh or Fort McPherson, said that background helped her when she went to culinary school in Vancouver.

Now a Red Seal certified chef, she lives in Tsawwassen, BC, and is the recipe creator and cultural educator behind Rooted, a dining program at Simon Fraser University that focuses on Indigenous food.

“I’ve been working in the culinary industry for a long time and … there’s never really a place to showcase our food,” Baryluk said. “Now, within the Vancouver area, there’s so many chefs out there doing this work and it’s awesome to see that there’s options for people who want to go out and eat, who want to experience Indigenous cuisine.”

A flavourful education

The program’s menu features the likes of three sisters soup (corn, climbing beans and squash), bison bourguignon, birch syrup raison almond squares, venison sausage penne, bannock donut holes, elk pot pie, and braised rabbit with fresh sage.

Each meal comes with a QR code where people can learn more about the ingredients and Indigenous culture.

“As an Indigenous chef and an Indigenous woman I feel like our food, our stories should be showcased,” Baryluk said.

“Our people need to be proud of who we are. Our people need to be able to see what we’re capable of.”

Rooted was recently recognized by the National Association of College and University Sciences with a gold award for social justice, diversity, equity and inclusion, alongside the grand prize in the sustainability category.

Baryluk said the program has been making positive change, connecting people from different cultures through food.

“One of the highlights for me is having the Indigenous students coming up and just full of so much emotion that their food is being served,” she said.

“I think it’s important to spread the message that if anyone else wants to get into culinary or showcase who they are, they should do it. You’ve got to bet on yourself sometimes, put in the work and then things will start to come together for you.”

The origin of Rooted

Simon Fraser University’s Dan Traviss and Fiona Cameron said Rooted began when the school applied for BC government funding to develop an Indigenous food program.

“It was a cuisine that was really being missed,” Traviss said, noting the university relies on contractors to run its food operations.

“We wanted it to kind-of be done right.”

Through campus partners, he said they connected with Baryluk and “the rest is history.”

Cameron said Rooted, which launched in March 2023, has had a positive impact on Indigenous students and has also promoted cross-cultural connections.

Traviss said the recent awards won by the program are “a great accomplishment.”

“There isn’t a lot of people doing something exactly like this,” he said, “so I think it creates more awareness, more exposure to the program, for Chef Stephanie, just Indigenous cuisine in general.”