{"id":79708,"date":"2025-01-13T16:22:56","date_gmt":"2025-01-14T00:22:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/01\/13\/windy-citys-weed-chef\/"},"modified":"2025-01-15T19:45:30","modified_gmt":"2025-01-16T03:45:30","slug":"windy-citys-weed-chef","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/01\/13\/windy-citys-weed-chef\/","title":{"rendered":"Windy City\u2019s Weed Chef"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Born and raised in Chicago, acclaimed chef Manny Mendoza discovered his love for cooking as a young boy watching his mom prepare dinner for the family. Trailing her in the kitchen, Mendoza quickly learned that magic lived in the alchemy of ingredients transforming from one state into another. After years of helping his mother, he began working in kitchens as a high schooler to earn his culinary stripes.<\/p>\n

Mendoza soon learned that while he loved cooking, he had some big questions\u2014deeper than the kind one might expect from a 17-year-old. \u201cEven in high school, my curiosity about the grander system was sparked,\u201d he says. \u201cI wanted to know why certain neighborhoods had limited access to fresh and healthy food and others didn\u2019t. I grew up in the South Side, a neighborhood in Chicago that had limited access, and it made me question why the people where I\u2019m from are a lot different and seem to have more stressful lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since then, Mendoza\u2019s learned that a large part of the stress he picked up on as a teenager is linked to what people are putting in their bodies. \u201cIt stems from health disparities and preventable diseases that are more prevalent in communities that are Black or Hispanic,\u201d he says. \u201cI realized that a lot of that had to do with food; where our food was coming from and who had access to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Armed with his socio-political lens and culinary curiosity, Mendoza graduated high school and attended the Culinary Institute of America in New York City where his interests were further unlocked by the Big Apple. \u201cI got really exposed to the global culinary scene,\u201d he says, citing memories of evenings spent with classmates, trying every type of cuisine and style of service they could. \u201cI got to dive deep into what it means to have food, to grow food, to eat food; how to eat food with other people,\u201d he says enthusiastically. \u201cIt really opened my eyes to see there was something a lot bigger to the idea of food and where it comes from than what I was previously exposed to. I was thinking about the dynamics between how food is grown and the people who are growing it\u2014and then the people selling and eating it. I really wanted to understand that system.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In addition to wondering about the systems and mechanisms around food, Mendoza began questioning what he\u2019d been told about cannabis, both as a drug and as an ingredient. \u201cMy friends and I were a tight group of elite cooks, but we\u2019d have to smoke and practically hang off a cliff to not get caught,\u201d Mendoza recalls with a laugh. \u201cAnd then we\u2019d go back to class and run through everybody; be extremely efficient, be top of our classes\u2014we didn\u2019t just piss away our opportunity at the world\u2019s best culinary school.\u201d<\/p>\n

After long days at the head of their class, Mendoza and his friends began experimenting cooking with cannabis. He immediately realized there was a stark difference between the high-end dishes he was making in class, and what he\u2019d heard about cooking with cannabis. \u201cThe only thing we knew was brownies and peanut butter cups,\u201d he says. \u201cRight away I got bored by that. We were being exposed to the global restaurant scene\u2014Michelin restaurants, James Beard award-winning chefs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Armed with the realization that the chefs he looked up to would never simply bake a brownie, Mendoza began thinking about other ways culinary cannabis might fit into his overall ethos and understanding of food. \u201cIt piqued my intrigue about focusing on the experience,\u201d he says. \u201cI began to think about packaging the lifestyle [my chef friends and I] were living, going to wineries, going to farms, immersing ourselves in food and wine and the source, smoking when doing all of it. I felt like we had some inside knowledge that most people had no idea about.\u201d<\/p>\n

With his interest in learning and sharing about the origins of food and cannabis, the ever-curious Mendoza moved to California where he made cold-pressed juices for beverage startup Suja; attended a farm and agriculture school in San Diego; and worked in cannabis grows and dispensaries. \u201cI wanted to keep learning, I wanted to tap into the real source of where a lot of our food is coming from\u2014and where our cannabis was coming from, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

As he began learning more about both of these systems, Mendoza began hosting a series of pop-up dinners across California, laying the foundation for what would become Herbal Notes, the Chicago fine dining culinary cannabis experience he founded in 2016 that would launch him to national acclaim. There, Mendoza\u2019s longtime curiosity sets fire through educating his guests, immersing them in a culinary experience that explores three pillars: the \u201ccannatomy\u201d of cannabis; the medicinal and wellness benefits of cannabis; and social responsibility.<\/p>\n

This first of these pillars, cannatomy, is designed to identify all parts of the plant and destigmatize it. The second, Mendoza says, invites guests to look at all the plant\u2019s healthy aspects aside from just THC, such as the oils and the seeds, which civilizations have been using for thousands of years. And the third pillar is perhaps the most important to Mendoza. \u201cI\u2019ve lived through the War on Drugs. I\u2019ve been arrested, people around me have been arrested,\u201d he says. \u201cWhere I grew up, I saw how people were afflicted by the War on Drugs and put in the washing machine of trauma, cycling through generations. We must use this industry as a new tool, dig up all the trauma; dig it up, till the soil and grow new communities, futures and families.\u201d<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s just what he\u2019s working to do\u2014not only through Herbal Notes, but also by partnering with local communities to establish urban gardens and working with Chicago schools in his neighborhood to teach kids about the basics of food. \u201cCooking got me to cannabis, and now I\u2019m using cannabis to get to my even grander plans to educate and expose kids like me in the inner city to what food really is, where it comes from and how they can use it to their advantage in life,\u201d he says. \u201cTo teach inner city youth so they feel empowered to cook for themselves; to look at a potato and onion differently when that\u2019s all that\u2019s left, and it\u2019s after school and their parents are working.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to that larger ongoing mission, Mendoza recently launched Xocolat, a line of artisanal edibles available in Chicago. \u201cWe\u2019re sourcing direct trade cacao from M\u00e9xico and Central America,\u201d he says. \u201cThat\u2019s where I\u2019m from, too; my roots come from what cacao\u2019s roots are, and it\u2019s also where cannabis comes from. I want to tell the full story about chocolate and where it comes from.\u201d Mendoza and his team house-grind the cacao, which is made into chocolate, infused and fortified with mushrooms and other adaptogenic ingredients indigenous to Latin America.<\/p>\n

Xocolat feels like a full-circle moment for Mendoza, whose never-wavering curiosity and desire to both learn and teach have brought him to this moment. \u201cTo be here now and have the recognition I have for it is something I don\u2019t take for granted,\u201d he says. \u201cEverything I do is with the intention of helping people and teaching people. I want to keep pushing forward with intentionality because I am<\/em> those people.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Salvadoran-Style Pupusas<\/strong><\/p>\n

4 servings<\/em><\/p>\n

Target Dose:<\/strong> 5mg THC per salsa serving (using Infused Salsa Jitomate\u2014recipe in the book) or your preferred dose (using a commercially made tincture of your choice; go low and slow).<\/p>\n

Equipment<\/strong><\/p>\n