How H3irloom Food Group Brings the Art of Hip Hop to Its ‘Story to Tell’ Dinner Series

Baltimore-based H3irloom Food Group has a hip-hop story to tell and is using its private dinner series to pay homage to the music genre they love the most.

Earlier this month, H3irloom Food Group hosted its second annual “A Story to Tell” private dinner series at East Baltimore’s The Sinclair, Okay Player reports. Named after the infamous track on The Notorious B.I.G.’s Life After Death album, the dinner series aims to tell the story of hip-hop through a six-course meal inspired by the musical art form.

“Lyricists are saying things that people have heard before, but they are presenting it in a flow, the cadence is a certain way,” executive chef David Thomas said.

“They make people stop and listen.”

Thomas, a former winner of Chopped, believes the private dinners possess the same elements found in hip-hop, a new way of looking at something old.

“With these dinners, it’s the same thing,” Thomas said. “We want to give you something that you may have heard of before, but you’ve never seen it presented this way. You’ve never seen it paired this way. You’ve never seen it in the atmosphere that we give you.”

The inaugural dinner paid homage to Wu-Tang Clan’s “C.R.E.A.M,” while this year’s event aimed to represent the growth of hip-hop.

“This one is about the game changers in Hip-Hop,” pastry chef Tonya Thomas said.

“That was the whole momentum of how we wanted this one to feel. To see how it evolved into this next generation of Hip-Hop and songs.”

The first dish, titled “Play Your Part,” included a frenched chicken leg with tempura fried lobster on a pimento cheese bed with pickled relish. It was named after André 3000’s opening lyrics on the UGK song “International Players Anthem (I Choose You).” DJ B-Eazy played the track and as the beat dropped to go into Pimp C’s legendary verse, hidden sparklers exploded, as a rush of servers brought out the first plate in Memphis hi-hats.

Other dishes included “Scrape The Plate,” named after Jay-Z’s lyric off his 2001 single “Girls, Girls, Girls.” The dish featured duck fat poached pacific amberjack fish and plantain gnocchi over an oxtail brudo stew. “Mount Up,” named after Warren G’s rallying call for his crew of “regulators,” featured a mixture of rabbit and chicken precisely formed into a french ballotine preparation, with a side of salt-cured and shaved pastrami over a bed of sweet purple cabbage.

“Food and hip-hop are two trains going down the same track,” Chef David thomas said.

“One has really been fueled by not just culture, but others who have embraced it.”

“Food, on the other hand, has been embraced by people for a long time, but there are a lot more people profiting from what African Americans have created than African Americans,” he continued. “We’re just trying to shorten that gap. These dinners are for letting people know we’re more than just carry-out. We have been elevating food from the very beginning, especially, on this continent.”