Photography by Bo Carlock / Spacecrafting
Mateo Mackbee
Mateo Mackbee never planned to be a James Beard Award–nominated chef, but that’s where he has ended up. And it’s clear that this is where he was meant to be.
It goes back generations, actually. His grandfather, based in New Orleans, was a chef on a cargo ship. “I grew up in a food-centered family,” he says. “I cannot remember a time when there was not a pot on the stove.” In kindergarten, he’d ask the lunch ladies for to-go rolls, which he snacked on while watching PBS’s Yan Can Cook. “I have a very vivid memory of watching this man make these chickens dance and cutting scallions and making roses out of carrots … I kind of feel like … food was just following along behind me.”
But Mackbee says it wasn’t until the economic crash of 2008, when he lost his job and home, that he actually turned to cooking as a vocation. He’s been cooking ever since. After logging hours in Twin Cities kitchens — and miles in food trucks — Mackbee says it was a chance encounter in a bar with a pastor from rural Minnesota that made him think Central Minnesota might be the place to stake a claim.
By May of 2020, he and his now-fiancé, Erin Lucas — who just earned a “22 Best Bakeries” nod from The New York Times for her Flour & Flower Bakery — had opened Krewe, a New Orleans–inspired restaurant in St. Joseph, Minnesota, that includes a farm and programs to help kids learn to cook and eat their own food. His grandfather’s century-old red beans, jambalaya and gumbo are on the menu. The rest of the Cajun-Creole dishes are a combination of church-lady cookbook inspiration, his education and his preternatural ability to marry New Orleans soul and Central Minnesota palates.
His faith in the welcoming cuisine paid off, both in turning tables and garnering nods from some of the culinary world’s best and brightest.
“I’m happy to be that little light somewhere to give someone some hope. Maybe they are missing home and want to do what they love. Take that leap of faith and come and do that.”
