The Banana Leaf

Chef Brenda Zukel is the creative mind behind the Banana Leaf. She has been cooking for most of her life. Her earliest memories are standing in the kitchen watching her parents cook, learning the foods, culture, and traditions of the Hmong people. The family would sit and eat together creating a sense of unity, family, and identity. Her earliest memories fostered a passion for cooking and a desire for sharing that passion with others. 

The Hmong people being not well known creates a lack of options for experiencing Hmong culture and food. Culture, unity, family, and identity are important to Brenda and she wanted to craft an experience to share the soulful and connected nature of Hmong food to the world. 

This passion and desire to share she developed from these early experiences in her life is the main driving force for The Banana Leaf.