American Indian cuisine celebrated at museum's cafe

Nation's Restaurant News, Oct 4, 2004 by Paul King

WASHINGTON -- The National Museum of the American Indian opened here late last month to great fanfare, and the museum's restaurant, Mitsitam Native Foods Cafe, received almost as much attention as some of the exhibits.

Roland Banscher, concessions director for Smithsonian Business Ventures, said business during opening week "exceeded our expectations." The NMAI, located next to the Air and Space Museum on the National Mall, is part of the Smithsonian Institution and cost about $200 million to construct. Officials estimated that Mitsitam, whose menu was devised by New York-based Restaurant Associates, fed 3500 guests each day during its first week of operation.

"So far, about 50 percent of the museum's visitors are going to the restaurant," said Banscher, who placed the typical percentage of museum visitors to a museum restaurant at 20 percent. "Part of that has been due to interest in the restaurant, and part of it is because the museum is small and the restaurant is easy to find," he noted.

Mitsitam--which means" Let's eat" in the language of the Piscataway and Delaware tribes and is pronounced mit-seh-TOM--is located on the ground floor of the curvilinear, quarried limestone building that brings to mind cliff dwellings and other natural habitats

The menu is composed entirely of items developed with, and approved by, Native American tribes from five regions of the Western Hemisphere. Thus the 370seat care has been designed to be both a culinary treat and an educational experience for the nearly four million visitors the museum expects in its inaugural year.

"We had two charges in the development of Mitsitam," Banscher explained. "One was to make the restaurant an extension of the museum experience. [The other] was to demonstrate to visitors that Native American foods have in many respects become mainstream."

The servery of the 10,000-square-foot, cafeteria-style restaurant is designed to evoke a Native American marketplace, according to Duane Blue Spruce, facilities planning coordinator for NMAI. The servery has warm, light wood tones, while the dining area has a brighter interior with traditional patterns and wood furnishings. One wall of the dining area is glass and looks out onto a woodland scene, complete with a small waterfall and a babbling brook.

The five main stations in the servery represent each of the five major regions of Native Americans in this half of the globe. New York-based Restaurant Associates, which manages restaurants at several other Smithsonian museums, was brought in two years ago to help develop the menu for the restaurant.

"With complete menus for each of the regions, the cafe is more like five restaurants in one that help to tell the story of Native American cultures through the medium of food," said Larry Ponzi, general manager of Mitsitam for RA. Entree prices generally range from $7 to $9, with the highest-priced item being a five-region sampler platter for two, at $18.95. RA officials put Mitsitam's check average at $9.

Banscher said the sampler is among the top-selling items so far. The most popular, he added, is the Campfire Buffalo Burger, at $4.95.

The Northern Woodlands station, which covers much of the Northeastern United States, offers such items as pumpkin soup with puffed wild rice, quahog clam chowder, ash-roasted sweet corn on the cob and maple-roasted turkey with cranberry and crabapple relish.

Great Plains serves buffalo chili, ash-roasted chicken on fry bread and an Indian taco, which boasts buffalo chili, pickled chilies, pinto beans, lettuce, diced tomatoes and shredded cheese on fry bread.

Dishes found at the Northwest Coast station include cedar-plank fire-roasted juniper salmon, celery-root salad and honey-baked golden beets. The station has the added attraction of a fire pit, which can be fueled by either wood or natural gas so that customers can see fish and meat being roasted.

Meso America, which covers Central American tribes, offers such foods as beef machaca and chiles tacos, pinto bean and corn enchi ladas, and totopos with came, which is a choice of chicken, pork or beef served with cotija cheese and either salsa quemada, pico de gallo or salsa verde.

The South American station features chicken tamales in corn husks with peanuts and chilies, quinoa grain salad, papusa with chile slaw and tomato relish, and cream of peanut soup.

"We felt that the cafe's menu was a perfect way to show the diversity and influence of Native cultures," said Duane Blue Spruce. "It is a teaching tool which demonstrates to visitors that familiar foods actually have their origins in traditional Native meals."

Ponzi said the menu would change seasonally at the very least.

The RA chefs who spearheaded the menu development were Richard Hetzer and Lou Piuggi. Hetzer is the executive chef for Mitsitam, and Piuggi is director of culinary for RA's Special Events division.

To come up with the menu, after establishing the template for the five regions, the Smithsonian put together five focus groups. Each group contained 25 representatives from tribes within the region being discussed.