Weekends with Yankee

NARRATOR: This week on Weekends With Yankee, senior food editor Amy Traverso explores Rockland, Maine, with chef Jordan Benissan of Mé Lon Togo.

Jordan shares his journey from Togo, West Africa, to coastal Maine.

They source chicken from a gourmet butcher shop, then cook up his mother's memorable peanut chicken stew and celebrate at a party filled with music.

TRAVERSO: This is already a favorite family recipe.

(laughing): I know that's, they're all going to love it.

- Oh, wow.

That's it.

TRAVERSO: Mm.

NARRATOR: Moving south to Massachusetts, adventurer Richard Wiese meets up with former NASA astronaut Cady Coleman and her husband, well-known local glass artist Josh Simpson.

We also get an insider's tour of a 50-year retrospective of Josh's work.

- That little planet that we live on is only as big as a little marble, if you get the right distance and the right perspective from it.

NARRATOR: Continuing on to New Milford, Connecticut, we join husband-and-wife team Stacy Kunstel and Michael Partenio of Dunes and Duchess.

We get an up close look at their unique designs and signature pieces.

- If you have one of our candelabras on a table, nobody's going to walk in that room and, and not say something about it.

NARRATOR: So, come along with us for a once-in-a-lifetime journey through New England as you've never experienced it before, a true insider's guide from the editors of Yankee magazine.

Join explorer and adventurer Richard Wiese and Yankee's senior food editor, Amy Traverso, for behind-the-scenes access to the unique attractions that define this region.

It's the ultimate travel guide from the people who know it best.

Weekends With Yankee.

- Major funding provided by... ♪ ♪ - In Maine, spring isn't just a gift.

It's an achievement.

This is Maine.

Forged by nature.

- New Smyrna Beach, Florida.

Relax already.

- Kloter Farms-- from outdoor structures to solid hardwood furniture for over 45 years.

- On an American Cruise Lines journey, you can explore historic New England.

- Country Carpenters.

Handcrafted barns and homes for over 50 years.

♪ ♪ TRAVERSO: I'm here in beautiful Rockport, Maine, and I'm going to be meeting someone I've been wanting to meet for a while.

It's chef Jordan Benissan.

Now, Jordan is from Togo in West Africa, and he's a professional musician, he's a percussionist.

But living here, teaching percussion at Colby College, he started to miss the flavors of home, and he began cooking food from home, and people loved it.

And now he has a restaurant called Mé Lon Togo.

It means "I love Togo."

So, I'm so excited to taste his food, hear his music, and just talk about his really interesting life.

Hi, Chef Jordan.

- Yes, Amy.

TRAVERSO: Hi, it's so nice to meet you.

- Nice to meet you.

TRAVERSO: I'm so-- I've been hearing about your food, and I'm so interested in hearing about your work, because you're both a musician and a chef.

- Yes.

So, when I realized that I really miss home cooking... TRAVERSO: Uh-huh.

- You know, food my mom prepared.

TRAVERSO: Right.

- I thought it would be a good idea just, you know, to go back and start making stuff my mom used to make for us.

TRAVERSO: Uh-huh.

- So I start inviting my colleagues and students to my house for dinner parties.

Everybody start asking me, "When are you going to open a restaurant?"

(Traverso laughing) Because we'd... Nobody's making food like that around here.

TRAVERSO: Right.

- (chuckles) TRAVERSO: So what do you like about living here?

- I think, first, the natural beauty of Maine.

TRAVERSO: Mm-hmm.

- It reminds me of home.

TRAVERSO: Ah.

- And, also, you know, I like to take drive, checking out different antique stores.

TRAVERSO: You live in an antique house, you said, yeah.

- Yeah, yeah.

TRAVERSO: Well, do we have all the ingredients you need for cooking?

- We're going to go to my favorite butcher shop to get some chicken.

TRAVERSO: All right, let's go get some chicken.

(laughs) - That's it.

(laughs) ♪ ♪ Hey, Sarah.

- Hi, guys.

TRAVERSO: Hi, Sarah.

Nice to meet you.

- Welcome.

- Thank you.

TRAVERSO: So I understand we're getting some chicken and... - And some beef, yeah.

- Sounds good.

TRAVERSO: So tell me a little bit about this place.

How long have you had this beautiful market?

- We've been in business about ten years now, and we started as a very small whole-animal butcher shop.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- But our mission is to promote sustainable agriculture in Maine.

TRAVERSO: Right.

- And that's why we have the meat case.

TRAVERSO: So, yeah, tell me, where are you sourcing all this really beautiful meat from?

- All the meats in this case are from small family farms.

TRAVERSO: Uh-huh.

- Sides of beef, whole pigs.

TRAVERSO: Wow.

- Whole lambs.

And our butchers take care of the rest.

Here you go.

TRAVERSO: Look at that.

- This is going to be fabulous.

- Oh, yes, I'll say.

TRAVERSO: Thank you so much, Sarah.

- Thank you.

TRAVERSO: Congratulations.

This is really a magical place.

- Very welcome.

TRAVERSO: Okay, take care.

- Happy cooking.

TRAVERSO: Thank you.

- Thank you, Sarah.

TRAVERSO: Oh, this is so lovely.

- Yes.

TRAVERSO: I can... First of all, I'm seeing a lot of evidence of your love of antiques in this room.

- I'll say.

TRAVERSO: It feels like home.

- It is-- the restaurant was born out of the dinner party.

My guests, when they come, I want them to feel at home.

TRAVERSO: That's so great.

There's so much beautiful art on the wall-- I'm noticing that mask right there.

- Yes.

It is used during a religious ceremony.

TRAVERSO: Oh, wow, all right, well, how about we go in the kitchen and start cooking?

- Excellent.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

So we're making a chicken with peanut sauce, right?

- Yeah, West African chicken and peanut sauce.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- So, if you want, you can start breaking the garlic apart.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- And I will cut the onion and start chopping it.

TRAVERSO: Tell me about the food of Togo.

Like, are there really distinct regional differences as you move around the country?

- Yes.

People in the South, you know... TRAVERSO: Uh-huh.

- ...they, they cook differently.

Having contact with all the outside world, also... TRAVERSO: Mm-hmm.

- ...since they are on the coast, because it's... TRAVERSO: Oh, right, yes, yes.

- Yeah, yeah.

TRAVERSO: That's a good amount of ginger in there.

You don't peel it, which saves a lot of time.

- And, also, there are some good nutrient in the skin, also.

TRAVERSO: Mm-hmm, right.

I'm going to start not peeling my ginger.

- That's it.

TRAVERSO: Especially in a stew, where the textures... - Yeah.

TRAVERSO: ...has time to soften, right?

- Yeah.

TRAVERSO: All right, I'm almost done here.

I don't know how finely you need it, if it doesn't... - Oh, that's good.

TRAVERSO: That's good?

- Yeah.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

All right.

- Now we're going to add the anise seeds.

TRAVERSO: Mm-hmm, just whole, you don't need to crush them?

- Yeah.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- So, that's one tablespoon.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

Kind of a generous, heaping tablespoon.

- Yeah.

Salt.

TRAVERSO: Uh-huh.

- And now we're going to add the chicken to it.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

TRAVERSO: So these are bone-in chicken thighs.

- Bone-in chicken thighs.

TRAVERSO: Okay, yeah.

With the skin on them.

- That's it.

TRAVERSO: That-- a lot of flavor, okay.

- Yes.

TRAVERSO: Ooh.

- And now we're going to go to the stove.

TRAVERSO: It already smells incredible.

- That's it.

(chuckles) TRAVERSO: So what's next?

- I'm gonna let it go for, like, 15 minutes.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- Then I will come back and stir it again.

TRAVERSO: Right.

- Make sure that, you know, the, the salt is getting evenly spread, yeah.

TRAVERSO: And about how long will we be cooking the chicken in this way?

- 30 to 40 minutes, yeah.

TRAVERSO: Okay, okay.

So now do we chop the tomatoes?

- Yes.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

And is it just one tomato?

- Yes-- you'll leave the skin on, yeah.

TRAVERSO: Oh, good.

- Yeah.

TRAVERSO: So much easier, I like this... (both laughing) I like this approach.

- Yes.

TRAVERSO: Now, tell me about any memories you have of this dish.

- Growing up, peanut was one of my, uh, you know, favorite snack.

TRAVERSO: Are the peanuts in Togo, in West Africa, very different from the ones we have here?

- When it comes to, to the roasting time... TRAVERSO: Uh-huh.

- So it is done in a clay pot with sand.

TRAVERSO: And then it's set over heat?

- Yeah, over fire.

TRAVERSO: Wow.

- When the sand gets hot... TRAVERSO: Right.

- ...then that's when you put the peanut in.

TRAVERSO: Oh, my gosh.

- Then you keep, you know, stirring it with the sand.

TRAVERSO: Ah.

So is that, like, the best roasted peanut you'll ever have?

- It is, it is, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

TRAVERSO: It sounds incredible.

All right, so the tomatoes are ready and the tomato paste, but this needs to cook a little bit longer?

- Yeah, let's reduce the heat.

TRAVERSO: Okay, well, it already smells incredible in here.

I can only imagine, when everything's together, how good it's going to smell.

- That's it.

(both chuckle) ♪ ♪ TRAVERSO: Okay, so it's ready.

This is, by the way, the most beautiful Dutch oven I've ever seen.

- Yeah.

TRAVERSO: So how did you finish it off, now?

Let's take a look there.

- So... TRAVERSO: Whoo!

- After the chicken was done cooking... TRAVERSO: Was cooking with the ginger and the garlic... - With the ginger and everything, yeah.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- I remove the chicken, set it aside... TRAVERSO: Okay.

- ...and put the chicken broth and the spices... TRAVERSO: Okay.

- ...in the pot.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

So the cayenne pepper... - Fresh tomatoes.

TRAVERSO: Right.

- And, uh, tomato paste, yes.

TRAVERSO: Tomato paste, okay.

- Then I add the peanut... TRAVERSO: Peanut butter?

- Yes.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- And about two cups of water.

Then brought it to boil.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- Then I add the chicken as, uh, the last step.

TRAVERSO: Okay.

- And let it simmer just for a few minutes.

TRAVERSO: Okay, so now, flavors have had a lot of time to combine.

- Yes.

TRAVERSO: I'm so excited to taste.

(chuckles): It's an easy job today.

- Outstanding.

TRAVERSO: Mm, wow.

Mm.

(gasps) That is so good.

It's, like, so savory.

It's one of the most savory things I've ever eaten.

(gasps): And the nuttiness of the peanuts, and then the acidity of the tomatoes, it's just perfect.

This is already a favorite family recipe.

(laughs) I know that's, they're all going to love it.

- Oh, wow.

TRAVERSO: Mm.

- That's it.

TRAVERSO: Thank you so much for bringing this cooking to Maine and for sharing your talents in the kitchen, and also your musical talents.

This is really a wonderful day.

- That's it.

TRAVERSO: Yeah, thank you so much.

- Thank you, Amy.

(mandolin playing) (people talking in background) (guitar joins in) ♪ Sunshine can't bother me ♪ ♪ Not rolling home ♪ ♪ Not rolling stone ♪ ♪ Can sing outside ♪ (song ends) - Whoo!

(guests applauding) NARRATOR: We're in Shelburne Falls, where Richard is meeting up with Cady Coleman, a former NASA astronaut who spent 159 days in space aboard the International Space Station.

WIESE: So, when you meet people, and they say, "Oh, so what do you do?

", what do you say?

- Well, you know, the fact that when people meet me and they say, "Oh," you know, "you're an astronaut?

", you know, "A real one?

", I'm, like, "Yep, a real one."

WIESE: You grew up in an exploration family.

- I did-- my dad, uh, was a deep sea diver.

Ended up being the head of, uh, salvage and diving for the Navy.

And, you know, through his career, part of the SEALAB program, where, when men first lived under the sea.

In my upbringing, I think it was sort of normal to think that living someplace kind of dangerous that other people would think was pretty weird, um, was normal.

WIESE: Everybody who's orbited the Earth has talked about the profound experience about it.

- Just seeing it for the very first time, you know, looking out the window, and, and you know you're going to see this.

I mean, people have told you, you've seen pictures, you know what it actually is supposed to look like.

And yet, when you see it with your own eyes, you look out the window, and, and seeing that curve of the Earth, it's so clear that you are in a spaceship.

Everybody you know, every human except the couple of you in a spaceship that is alive is down there on Earth.

And I'm very proud of this very international program that we do this with.

You know, more than 16 countries now, and have partners, that we are all very different, and, yet, at the people level of living and working in space together, we, we do that really, really well.

And I think it helps shine the light, you know, for down on the Earth, where people can get hung up in sort of the rules and the treaties and all those kinds of things.

But I think that the International Space Station really provides a beacon of what we can do as people.

WIESE: The first I had heard of you... - Mm-hmm.

(flute playing) WIESE: ...was, you played the flute in space.

Not just playing the flute, but you played with one of the greatest people of that instrument, Ian Anderson.

- Getting to go to space, I think all of us really are wishing to, to share that with other people, and one of the ways you can do that is by bringing something from somebody else's world, or your shared world, you know, up to space.

So, as a flute player, I did bring my own flute up to space.

I also brought, um, an Irish flute that was more than 100 years old, and a tin whistle for a, a band of great renown, the Chieftains, and then I also, uh, brought a flute for Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull, because I really loved that he brought the flute to rock music.

(playing "Bourée in E minor" by J.S.

Bach) (piece ends) WIESE: That is so wonderful.

Jethro Tull's words to you; you playing as an astronaut.

- I loved doing this.

It brings me right back to space.

And it was on the 50th anniversary of human space flight that we did this together.

WIESE: You're in Houston.

You're training in the Soviet Union, Japan.

How do you meet the guy from Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts?

- Josh and I actually met just after I, uh, defended my dissertation, and I called, literally, a wrong phone number.

And he was so funny that I called him back.

And we have been together ever since.

WIESE: The world you're coming out of, engineering and chemistry, seems much different than his art of glassblowing.

- He's just really a unique person that is, you know, funny and passionate about what he does.

And, you know, there is a lot of chemistry in, involved in glassblowing, there's a lot of physics.

I mean, it's actually tremendously complicated, but especially, my very favorite are the glass planets that he is known for, and had been making for a dozen years.

I mean, I knew about them when I was in grad school here, because I went to grad school in the same area.

But, and one of my things I wanted to do when I defended my dissertation, was to go to, like, the gallery and go and pick out my planet.

You know, I'm the kind of person that wants to have something on my desk that just reminds me, "Okay, "I know you're getting bogged down in this, "but here's the goal.

And you're just going to take this one step at a time."

And so I think that we're of the same heart, I would say.

NARRATOR: Richard had the opportunity to meet Cady's husband, Josh Simpson, who draws his inspiration from space.

- You ask how one becomes a glassblower.

In my case, it was completely by accident.

I was a student at Hamilton College, and they had a deal where you could leave for the month of January to get out of town and do almost anything you wanted to do, provided it had some academically redeeming value.

And I convinced the dean that year that I'd like to learn how to blow glass.

And I left to go to Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont.

When I arrived, they had taken down their glass furnace.

And so I arrived, and there was nothing there.

I realized there were bricks there, and after a few days, I just thought, "I'm just going to build a glass furnace."

Even though I didn't know how to do that.

So that's exactly what I did.

I built a glass furnace with another student and started to make glass.

And the funny thing is that I was terrible.

I was terrible at it, but I thought I was doing great.

And, and I just... At the end of a month, I, I thought, "I haven't done this enough.

I have to continue doing it."

And I called Hamilton College, and, with one required course left to graduate, I dropped out of college.

I proceeded to teach myself how to blow glass.

And when I first moved here, one of the teachers in town asked me if I would be willing to demonstrate glassmaking to all the eighth-graders in the county.

These folks were not that interested in me making wine goblets.

They couldn't care less.

But then one night, I thought about the iconic photo that Bill Anders took of our Earth as Apollo 8 rounded the moon.

It was such an amazing photograph, and I thought, that little planet that we live on is only as big as a little marble if you get the right distance and the right perspective from it.

And so, the next day, for those kids, I began to make marbles that were meant to be planets.

I'm also a big science fiction fan, so we talked about what life would be like on this little planet that I was making for them.

Did it have oceans, or was it a gaseous planet?

Or was it rocky?

It's ironic that I met my wife.

I had been making planets for years when we first met.

She told me that she wanted to become an astronaut.

I think both of us are really interested in exploration.

When I make a planet, I'm interested in how the viewer, you, are going to explore this little planet.

And I always put something in that I don't expect you to find right away.

And you might never find it.

It makes it worth doing what I do, the fact that people are engaged with my work, like the work that I do, and the fact that they can be fascinated by it and inspired by it.

NARRATOR: Josh's work was honored with a 50-year retrospective exhibit at the D'Amour fine arts museum in Springfield.

Curator Maggie North offered an insider's view.

- The Springfield Museums are over 100 years old.

We have been the hub of Springfield's cultural and artistic life for many, many years.

In 2021, when Josh Simpson came to us at the museums and said, "We'd like to find a way to celebrate five decades in glass," we figured, "It's a natural fit.

"We'd love to help you do that here at the Springfield Museums."

The response to the work has a lot to do with the ability to immerse yourself within it, to recognize this incredible medium of glass turned into something magical, something that reflects the natural world and outer space.

But we also have a lot of folks come through the exhibition who are already Josh Simpson fans.

They've collected his work over the years.

They know of it because perhaps they've been to see his studio in Shelburne Falls.

And for them, this is like a coming home.

A way to see even more Josh Simpson work, and to understand the entire scope of his long and very impressive career.

NARRATOR: Moving south to the picturesque town of New Milford, Connecticut, we meet up with the husband-and-wife team behind Dunes and Duchess.

Stacy Kunstel, a former journalist, and Michael Partenio, a longtime lifestyle photographer, are now makers of hand-tuned, hand-finished pieces, ranging from lighting accents to tables.

The couple gives us an up-close look at their unique design aesthetic and a tour of their showroom and signature pieces.

- We are a custom furniture company based here in New Milford, Connecticut.

- Started in lighting, and now our biggest product line is dining tables.

- Yeah, we started off as candlestick makers, though.

- Yeah.

- There were a lot of jokes about that.

It's a kind of a funny thing in the 21st century to be a candlestick maker, but that's what gave us our start.

And then designers came to us and they said, "Well, if you can do that, well, why couldn't you make it into a sconce?"

Or, "Why couldn't you do a table base or some table legs for us?"

- And we never said no.

We always thought, "All right, well, let's try it."

And... - We were terrified to say no.

It was a new company.

- Yeah, yeah.

I've, I've been in photography and production pretty much my whole life.

- I'm trained as a journalist.

I did architecture school for a few years, but went right out of college and started working for magazines, first as a writer, then as a stylist.

And then Michael and I met doing photo shoots for magazines like Traditional Home, Country Home, Country Living, all over New England.

Really, all over the country.

- Yeah.

- Which exposed us to some of the most creative, beautiful homes.

Those homes absolutely provided a lot of the inspiration for what we do now.

I think we knew at that time that we wanted to make some sort of, of... Some sort of company.

- Yeah, mm-hmm.

- I wouldn't have called it a furniture company-- if you had asked me if I was going to be a table maker, I would've been, like, "That's crazy, we're not... How would we do that?"

But you presented me with this candelabra, which came from an inspiration... - Yeah.

- ...we had seen on a photo shoot... - Mm-hmm.

- ...in Florida.

And, like any girl, I was, like, "Well, it's not jewelry, this is weird."

But, you know, because we had worked with designers and architects for so long, we knew people, and they saw it, and they were, like, "Oh, that's really cool."

You know, "Do you think you could make me one?"

- Yeah, so after three, about three years, we took everything in-house.

We leased a little space, we put a finishing room in.

And then we subsequently moved into larger and larger and larger spaces.

So we do almost everything completely in-house now.

All of our hardwood is, uh, out of Pennsylvania.

Uh, we work with a lot of Amish sawmills down there, and Mennonite sawmills.

They're great business partners.

They're extremely reliable and honest, and, um, they really supported us through the last few years, um, because every, a lot of sawmills closed, materials got very difficult to get, and, um, you know, a lot of other companies that had materials were really just selling it to the highest bidder.

And though prices did go up quite a bit, uh, they really supported us.

And we were lucky to have these partners.

- Well, I think what we do is very traditional, but you look at it, and it doesn't read as traditional.

Strip the paint away, and it's turned wood, which is a New England tradition.

But when we saw it, we wanted to infuse it with color, we wanted to infuse it with personality, and we wanted people to be able to make it their own.

So, we take some of this beautiful wood and we slap lacquer on it.

We definitely fulfill that kind of preppy New England look, because it's colorful.

You know, think Ralph Lauren.

- If you go into a lighting showroom, you have, basically have four choices.

You know, you know, oiled bronze, black, brass, nickel-- that's pretty much it.

You know, color in lighting really is not available.

- I just don't know of any other companies that say, you know, "You can have a sconce on the wall, and you can make it whatever color you want to."

It's not going to be metal.

It's not going to be cold.

It's not going to be, you know, the look that has endured for so long.

- Yeah, well, and it's lighting that people will always talk about, too.

No, no one will walk into your... If you have one of our candelabras on a table, nobody's going to walk in that room and, and not say something about it.

NARRATOR: For exclusive videos, recipes, travel ideas, tips from the editors and access to the Weekends with Yankee digital magazine, go to weekendswithyankee.com and follow us on social media @yankeemagazine.

Yankee magazine, the inspiration for the television series, provides recipes, feature articles and the best of New England from the people who know it best.

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Call 1-800-221-8154.

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Closed caption funding provided by... ♪ ♪ (seagulls squawking, waves crashing) Major funding provided by... ♪ ♪ - In Maine, spring isn't just a gift.

It's an achievement.

This is Maine.

Forged by nature.

- New Smyrna Beach, Florida.

Relax already.

- Kloter Farms-- from outdoor structures to solid hardwood furniture for over 45 years.

- On an American Cruise Lines journey, you can explore historic New England.

- Country Carpenters.

Handcrafted barns and homes for over 50 years.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪