Around Our Table: The Culture, Cooking and Heritage Behind Chef Shannon Talbot-Bennett

For Chef Shannon Talbot-Bennett, food carries memories. Born and raised in South Africa, her cooking reflects the flavours, traditions and family experiences that have shaped her throughout her life.

That connection to heritage was clear in the dishes she created for the StrEAT Food Awards 2025, where Shannon was named StrEAT Food Chef of the Year and took second place in the Dish of the Year category.

Her dishes brought together different cultural influences, from the Caribbean flavours of her award-winning jerk chicken tacos to her contemporary take on South African bunny chow. Each one has a story behind it.

As colleagues come together through OCS’s Around Our Table campaign, led by CHROMA‘s Race, Ethnicity and Faith Network for World Food Day, Shannon shares some of the experiences and cultural influences that continue to find their way onto her plate.

Food Starts With Family

Shannon’s relationship with food began at home.

Growing up in South Africa, cooking was part of family life. Her father and brother helped shape her understanding of food and the importance of sharing it with others.

Traditional South African dishes and cooking methods were passed down through generations, becoming part of everyday family life. For Shannon, those recipes represent family, childhood and traditions that have remained a constant throughout her life.

Bobotie is one dish that holds a particularly special place in her family. The combination of seasoned minced meat and an egg-based topping bring together savoury and sweet flavours in a dish that can be enjoyed throughout the year. Served warm, it is comforting on a cold winter’s day. In summer, it can be served cold alongside a fresh salad.

Its versatility has made it a firm family favourite, but the memories attached to it give the dish its meaning.

Bunny chow brings back a different set of childhood memories.

As a child, Shannon remembers the excitement of eating a meal served inside half a loaf of bread rather than traditionally on a plate. There was something fun and different about it. The dish was traditionally served with a spicy pickled grated carrot garnish, and she remembers watching her mum or brother react to the heat of the carrot salad.

Those small moments of laughter around food have stayed with her.

The same connection can be seen in the way Shannon describes family gatherings. When her family comes together, a proper South African braai (BBQ) is part of the occasion. The preparation is part of the experience, with biltong, droëwors and traditional South African drinks enjoyed while everyone waits for the braai to be ready.

Her husband has taken that tradition a step further, making his own biltong after receiving a biltong-making box and gradually perfecting his technique.

Food has therefore remained part of family life in different forms, from recipes passed down through generations to traditions that continue to evolve.

A Taste Of South Africa

One of the clearest examples is Shannon’s Next Level Bunny Chow.

Bunny chow is a South African street food dish traditionally made by filling a hollowed-out loaf of bread with curry. For Shannon, it offers a direct connection to her South African roots.

Her version paired a rich lamb curry with freshly baked bread, bringing a contemporary approach to a dish with a strong cultural identity.

The dish also gave Shannon an opportunity to share something personal through food. Her South African heritage was the inspiration behind it, connecting the dish she presented to the experiences and culture that have influenced her as a chef.

That sense of identity is important to Shannon’s cooking. Traditional dishes can evolve, take new forms and incorporate different influences, while the cultural reference remains part of the story.

Bringing Cultures Together On The Plate

Shannon’s cooking also reflects the way food can travel across cultures.

Her StrEAT Food Awards winning dish, a Caribbean-inspired jerk chicken taco with pickled pineapple salsa, drew on the bold flavours and energy of Jamaican street food.

The dish was designed to be approachable and enjoyable, with the focus firmly on flavour.

Her cooking therefore draws from more than one cultural influence. South African heritage sits alongside Caribbean-inspired flavours, with each dish providing a different way to explore food, tradition and the experiences behind it.

Food With A Story To Tell

For Shannon, creativity comes from understanding what makes a dish meaningful and then finding a way to express that through cooking.

Her training as a pastry chef has given her a strong technical foundation, with precision and attention to detail informing the way she approaches savoury food too. Her experience has also given her the confidence to take familiar ideas and make them her own.

Some of those familiar ideas come from the food she grew up eating.

South African influence can be found throughout the way Shannon’s family cooks and eats, from sauces and side dishes to traditional meals, desserts and snacks. These flavours and techniques have naturally become part of everyday cooking.

More importantly, they represent a way of life built around sharing food, bringing people together and creating memories.

That balance of heritage, experience and creativity was evident at the StrEAT Food Awards. Her two dishes represented different cultural influences, yet both reflected the same thoughtful approach to flavour and presentation.

Her success also followed her being named OCS Chef of the Year in 2024, an experience that helped strengthen her confidence in her own ideas.

“Winning OCS Chef of the Year made me realise I could trust my instincts,” Shannon says. “It gave me the confidence to take on bigger challenges and believe that my ideas had real value.”

Around Our Table

Food has a way of bringing people together.

A dish can start a conversation about where we come from, the people who taught us to cook, the occasions we remember, or the traditions we continue to share.

For Shannon, that connection stretches from childhood memories around the family table to the food she creates professionally today.

Even when people move away from the place where their traditions began, the flavours, recipes and memories can remain. South African cooking has been part of Shannon’s life for as long as she can remember, and she continues to carry that heritage through the food she cooks, the meals she shares and the traditions she passes on to her own family.

That is the spirit behind Around Our Table.

As colleagues bring and share dishes during World Food Day, there is an opportunity to share more than food. Every dish can carry a story, whether it reflects a family tradition, a place, a culture, a personal memory or a new experience.

For Shannon, cooking provides a way to keep those connections alive while creating something new.

Around our tables, different experiences and cultures come together, one dish and one story at a time.