Events
SUMMER 2025
-
Pierre was invited to be a judge for a cross-cultural cooking contest at the Chinatown Community Development Center, a nonprofit that provides affordable housing to over 5,000 residents of San Francisco. Among other judges were the San Francisco Chronicle's food editor and the president of San Francisco Airport.
ONGOING
-
One of the program areas of Gastrodiplomacy for the People is Food Education and Storytelling, which we implement through visits to various educational environments across the country. In these photos, you see Pierre with the students at Longfellow Middle School in Berkeley, California. After teaching them about African ingredients and the history of food passageways between Africa and America, Pierre taught the kids how to make sushi using the ancient African grain fonio.
SUMMER 2025
-
This summer, Pierre participated in an artist residency project at the esteemed Eames Institute's ranch in Petaluma. Rooted in his ongoing research around gastrodiplomacy and food justice, he sought to work with local materials and traditions while weaving in elements from his West African heritage. At the ranch, Pierre planted indigenous amaranth, an ancient grain cultivated both in West Africa and by the Meleya and Amayelle tribes of the Coast Miwok people. This symbolic act laid the foundation for a culinary offering he will return to cook at the fall harvest: Efo Riro, a rich Nigerian dish made with amaranth leaves.
"This residency was a natural continuation of my broader mission: to use food and craft as tools for cultural connection and environmental stewardship. Supported in part by my recent USJLP (U.S.-Japan Foundation) Gastrodiplomacy grant, this period allowed me to explore not just edible traditions, but also the material expressions, mud, clay, fiber, that hold memory and meaning. In blending local and ancestral practices, I hope this work contributes to a vision of sustainability rooted in both place and heritage.”
— Pierre Thiam
SPRING 2026
-
Gastrodiplomacy for the People will be launching its first ongoing community activation through a stall at Oakland's historic Grand Lake Farmers Market.
FALL 2026
-
We are partnering with NYU Africa House in New York to design a one-of-a-kind culinary experience that brings research and storytelling into each course of the meal.
SPRING 2026
-
We hosted a special dinner for invited guests from the Bay Area to celebrate Pierre’s residency at the Eames Ranch.