Eco-Gastronomy: Transforming Food in the Bronx Ft. Henry Obispo

Author: Phil & Eric
Published: Sun 18 May 2025
Episode Link: https://rss.com/podcasts/potluckfoodtalks/2032532

🎙️ EP134 – 🌱 Henry Obispo is growing a new Bronx. Also known as The Sustainable Papi, this eco-gastronomer is reimagining food systems—one rooftop farm, hot sauce, and mushroom taco at a time. From food apartheid to Afrofuturism, Henry joins Eric in the South Bronx to talk urban agriculture, ancestral eating, and why plants carry the memory of people.

🎧 Topics Covered in This Episode:

🏙️ From Rooftop to Reborn Farms – How a 250 sq ft plot sparked a borough-wide food movement.

🍲 Food Apartheid vs. Food Deserts – Why one term tells the real story.

🛸 Afrofuturism in the Garden – Dreaming up new systems through imagination.

🔥 Bronx Hot Sauce – The spicy success of local peppers and community growers.

🍽️ Culinary Diplomacy – What Henri learned as the U.S. food ambassador to Fiji.

🌾 Plants Tell Stories – How food, medicine, and migration shaped the diaspora.

🌮 Mushroom Tacos > Everything – Why Mexicocina makes the best tacos in NYC (yes, really).

🌍 A Tale of Two Bronxes – Gentrification, luxury towers, and community resistance.

📚 Botanical Storytelling – Three years of curating 200+ plants at the NY Botanical Garden.

🌿 Future of Herbs – Researching what grows next—and who should benefit.

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