You might not think to associate hip hop with the art of cuisine, but according to Suffolk rapper Scott “Booda” French, “food and rap is a pairing as logical as bacon and eggs”.
This Sunday, Scott and his friend Sam “Fatty” Hemingway, launch their limited edition collectible book ‘the Big Rap Cookbook’, giving hip hop fans the chance to cook up the dishes that have inspired and satisfied some of their musical idols.
Featuring original recipes and food-themed interviews, the 200-plus page book features recipes such as Dirty Dike’s Pescatarian Porkless Curry, Jam Baxter’s Som Tam and Masta Ace’s Vegan Slaw.
The book taps into a trend for rap stars to embrace the culinary world - Coolio and Snoop Dogg have both released their own cookbooks, and Jay-Z, Kanye West and Diddy have opened their own restaurants.
“From speaking to the artists we’ve interviewed while creating this project, we’ve noticed there’s definitely a tendency for creative people to enjoy cooking,” says Sam. “It’s often been the case that some artists had a bad diet when they were growing up and they’ve chosen to make that change in their lifestyle as they’ve got older - Marco Polo said ‘I’m not trying to be an old, fat rap guy’”.
Now both aged 32, Samuel and Scott have been friends since they both attended Debenham high school, when they spent their evenings playing basketball, listening to Gang Starr records and hauling their turntables to various house parties near where they grew up in the Debenham countryside.
These days, Scott, who now lives in Ipswich, says he “bounces from bill-paying office job to bill-paying office job”, and currently works in recruitment.
Samuel has recently moved back to Suffolk after working as an English teacher in Italy and Poland for the last eight years.
The idea for the book came from the pair’s obsessions with food references in rap lyrics.
“While Biggie was filling his belly with ‘a T-bone steak, cheese eggs and Welch’s grape’, Snoop got ‘funky on the mic like an old batch of collard greens,’” said Scott.
The project discovered it’s roots when Sam used Twitter to troll and coax recipes or restaurant recommendations from Hip Hop legends. They then started to post their favourite food lyrics (or “food bars”) on Instagram, to see if anyone else shared their appreciation of Ghostface’s ‘eight ravioli bags’ or Roots Manuva being ‘content with this cheese on toast’.
“The response was incredible,” says Sam, having amassed more than 15,000 Instagram followers since inception.
“It’s taken a lot of time and effort to get it to this stage, but we’re proud that our passion project is something we can share with so many people.”
Other hip hop stars who have contributed to the book include Kurupt FM’s Seapa & Danny Rankin, Masta Ace, Marco Polo, The Purist, High Focus Records artists Dirty Dike, Coops, Jam Baxter & Dabbla, J-Zone, John Robinson, Scienze, Grim Sickers, Sumgii, El Gant (Jamo Gang), Juga-Naut, The Doppelgangaz, Monster Florence, Sonnyjim, The Last Skeptik and Melanin 9.
The Big Rap Cookbook will be priced at £13 and available to purchase from www.bigrapcookbook.com
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