Cookbook Celebrates DA’s Many ‘Culinary Languages’
Cookbook Celebrates DA’s Many ‘Culinary Languages’
For Kwame Mensah-Boone ’26, one of the most beautiful aspects of the Durham Academy community is the diversity of backgrounds and experiences represented by its people. For many families, food is an important way of telling their story — an opportunity to invite others to understand and celebrate their unique culture. So Mensah-Boone set out to expand the family dinner table by crowdsourcing recipes to be shared with the entire school community.
- The cookbook features recipes representing five continents. Students, parents, caregivers, faculty and staff submitted recipes for the Durham Academy Community Cookbook during the 2024–2025 school year, including everything from traditional Southeastern U.S. dishes like Brunswick stew to Venezuelan pan de jamón.
- He hopes to publish another edition this year, so keep the recipes coming! Mensah-Boone first shared the cookbook with his classmates earlier this fall at the Upper School’s Taste of the World celebration, where DA families served small bites of dishes representing dozens of countries.
- It represents the rich variety of flavors and backgrounds within the DA community, one recipe at a time. “To me, this project is about more than just food. It’s about the stories behind it, the Sunday dinners, the family traditions, the late-night snacks that turned into memories,” Mensah-Boone said. “Every recipe shared here is a piece of someone’s story, a reminder that our differences don’t divide us; they flavor who we are.”