Sameh wadi biography

The story of how Palestinian-American chef and restaurateur Sameh Wadi ended up in Minneapolis is standard fare in the chronicles of American immigration — a cousin went first, and so his family followed.

Sameh wadi biography

Wadi, 31, was born in Kuwait to Palestinian refugees, and after living briefly in Jordan and then Canada, he arrived in the Twin Cities at the age of 13 and hasn’t left. He often ponders the question: “Couldn’t my cousin have picked somewhere warmer?”

That same cousin and Wadi’s late father, Ali Wadi, opened Holy Land, a grocery store, bakery, and restaurant that is now a well-loved Minneapolis institution, and Wadi followed in their footsteps when he opened his Mediterranean restaurant (heavy on the North African and Levantine influences), Saffron, at age 23.

“With Saffron, I put all my eggs in one pita pocket,” says Wadi. “I opened a fine-dining Middle Eastern restaurant in a failing economy in Minnesota, and that might sound