Nadia Sammut comes from a dynasty of chefs. Her grandmother opened La Fenière, a restaurant in Provence, in 1975, and her mother later took it over, clinching a Michelin star in 1995. Now, Ms. Sammut herself is in charge — and she has turned La Fenière into the world’s first Michelin-star gluten-free restaurant.
The gluten-free, lactose-free menu is no fad. Ms. Sammut was born with celiac disease, caused by an immune system reaction to gluten, so she’s acutely aware of food’s impact on human health and on the planet’s. She has turned that awareness into a successful gastronomical proposition — specialties include a beetroot dish with rose water and geranium oil — but also an ethos which her academy Nourrir (Feeding) disseminates by educating schools, farmers, scientists and businesses.
Ms. Sammut, 43, recently spoke about food and the environment in a telephone interview from Lourmarin, France. The following conversation has been edited and condensed.
Are you aiming to change mentalities around food through your restaurant and academy?
Yes, absolutely. Eating three times a day is voting. We need to be conscious of the fact that our nutritional acts have consequences on the environment, the climate, and the health of our planet. The choice and sourcing of ingredients is a major act of environmental decision-making.
What are you doing about it yourself, concretely?
My belief is that we need to revitalize our farmland and soil and to come back to a regenerative kind of food. I’m working with farmers on growing regenerative plants, meaning plants that will release nitrogen in the soil, that don’t require a lot of water in case of drought and that are nutritional.
One plant that’s at the core of my research is the chickpea. We’re familiar with it in hummus and in couscous dishes, but not as a main-course component. We tend to think of plants as a side, an accompaniment on our plate. But chickpeas bring protein, and we need protein. So instead of eating beef at every meal, we can bring in pulses [dry, edible seeds] such as chickpeas.
How exactly are we destroying the planet through our food habits?
Overconsumption of meat, for one thing. Meat itself is not harmful; the way livestock is raised, is. Beef and lamb production are responsible for vast quantities of methane released into the atmosphere — a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming.
Then there’s fishing. Whole varieties of fish are currently disappearing: They’re being eaten up by invasive species of sea life such as the blue crab, which originated in the Atlantic but is now proliferating in the Mediterranean, having been brought over in ship ballast water.
I have introduced blue crab in my cuisine and am setting up a special unit to develop it as a food ingredient. We need to understand what’s happening in the food chain to be able to take action.
The final element is water, a major element that’s not spoken about enough. In our vegetable gardens, we work with farmers on limiting the use of water.
Can you explain what’s environmentally wrong with a supermarket meal — say, microwavable lasagna?
If you check the ingredients, the pasta is made with processed wheat, and the tomatoes have most likely been transformed — grown out of season in greenhouses, or [genetically modified]. As for the sauce, it will have gluten but also additives and preservatives. So by eating that single serving of lasagna, you’re having a significant impact on the climate.
How?
Because you’re participating in a high-intensity, low-quality form of agriculture: a production model in which food is transformed with chemicals, with products that are harmful to human health, inside factories and industrial plants.
How is the food that you serve in your restaurant different?
No preservatives, no chemicals. The cuisine is gluten-free. I also don’t cook meat here. It’s important to show that plant-based recipes can be very meaningful culinary experiences.
I slow cook with a solar-powered oven, which runs only on solar energy — no electricity at all. The oven can heat up to high temperatures, but very slowly. Yesterday we made a sweet potato confit that slow cooked for about an hour and a half in the garden. It was a delicious chewy confit.
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