Year of the Tiger roars in with culinary fireworks

Chef Jerome Grant wants people to know that Lunar New Year is about “more than red envelopes,” he told Maiysha Kai of theGrio in a recent interview. Grant, the inaugural chef of Sweet Home

Café at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, is of Black and Asian descent.

“I wasn’t a kid that was born in America, but my life has been based in America,” Grant told theGrio. “I grew up with a Filipino mother. I had her traditions, and my biological father, my stepfather, I have their traditions. So our American table was different—it was different from yours—but who’s to say it wasn’t American?”

With that, let’s take a tasting tour of how onsite chefs across the country celebrate the Year of the Tiger with culinary fireworks from Texas A&M University, Phillips Exeter Academy and UMass. Get ready for spring rolls, dumplings, unique sweets, cool treats and even some dancing.