Justin Sutherland is a Twin Cities-based chef that has had multiple restaurant successes along the way. Sutherland’s Handsome Hog is a contemporary take on Southern-inspired cooking, and he’s now out with his first cookbook.
Sutherland hit the news in a different way over the summer after he was involved in a terrible boating accident where he fell out of a boat on the St. Croix River and was hit by the motor’s prop.
He’s recovered and thanks to support from the Twin Cities community, other chefs including some of the biggest names in the TV, celebrity chef world, Sutherland is easing his way back into his work.
He took some time to talk to WCCO Radio’s Drivetime with DeRusha on Jason’s weekly “DeRusha Eats” segment.
See all of our "DeRusha Eats" segments here.
Jason DeRusha: The book is called “Northern Soul”. It launches today (Tuesday), and so people can find it everywhere. What was it like for you to open up a part of your own soul as you shared a lot of the cooking and recipes that have been formative for you?
Justin Sutherland: Yeah. You know, it was quite the process. I've been working on it for almost two years now, and you think you have all these recipes and stuff stashed away. That's kind of the easy part, but really formulating a structured book and like you said, putting your own stories on paper and then seeing it come alive was quite the process.
DeRusha: Justin, we'll talk more about your cookbook, but I do want to get into the unfortunate reason that you ended up in the public's attention this summer. July 3rd you were boating with friends on the St. Croix River when you ended up in the water and then the boat propeller ended up hitting you. Can you take me back to July 3rd and tell me what you remember about that day?
Sutherland: It was a beautiful day, we were out on the St. Croix with some friends, like we do every July 3rd. It was actually kind of the end of the day, heading back towards the dock to drop some people off and weren't going fast, but you know, a little gust of wind came and blew my hat off and just made a natural reaching reaction. Wasn't going before it, necessarily, and hit a little wake and was off balance on my right foot and went under.
DeRusha: Do you remember getting hit by the boat?
Sutherland: I remember when I was swimming back up, I could see the shadow of the boat had kind of floated above me and it was within inches. I saw that propeller going and then, you know, the lights went out briefly. I came back when I broke the surface again.
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DeRusha: Did you feel, I guess this feels like a weird question, but did you feel pain? I mean, you can tell us what you later discovered, but you were nearly killed?
Sutherland: Yes, it was horrible. But no, surprisingly enough. The pain after was horrible, but during the accident, I didn't feel any of the pain from it remotely. It's pretty incredible what your mind in me will do in those moments of trauma where they just shut stuff off, but they don't want you to remember.
DeRusha: Why don't you describe what your injuries were? Just how bad was this?
Sutherland: It was pretty bad. I mean, half my face was hanging off. Laceration all the way from the top of my head, through my eye, through my nose, complete skull fracture on the right side, compound fracture in my right shoulder and the propeller sliced through my left forearm. About five metal plates in my face right now. And metal plates in my arm. It was pretty serious, very much near death. People generally don't walk away from run-ins like that.
DeRusha: I know one of your eyes was severely damaged. Your left eye?
Sutherland: Correct. I first saw the pictures and really realized how severe it was. I mean, that blade sliced all the way through my eyelid and just stopped. I mean, less than millimeters away from ripping the eye out. Still got about, got 80% of vision back in there right now. And they think as the swelling continues to go down, it'll continue to come back. Definitely could have lost it.
DeRusha: This was 4th of July weekend. I know a lot of people out on the Saint Croix River, have maybe had a drink or two or ten. Were you impaired while you were boating?
Sutherland: No, actually not at all. And I mean, obviously they did the blood alcohol test after when I was unconscious. But no, I was not. I’d had a beer during the day, but I'm generally we've had the boat clubs together for seven years and whoever’s captain for the day takes that responsibility on, which was me this year.
DeRusha: When you're a public figure, I suppose you get two sides to that in a moment like this. The support was incredible and of course the criticism as well, because you got a lot of attention for the fact that there was a GoFundMe set up. I think people were astonished that you didn't have insurance?
Sutherland: Yeah, absolutely. And I think, twofold there. I remember when I found out the GoFund had been set up, this was probably after my fifth day in the hospital, and I still, at this point, didn't really realize how severe it was. So I remember being pretty angry. I didn't really want that. But then when you realize you're pushing $400,000 in medical bills that stuff's necessary.
As far as insurance, I had Minnesota Care, and at that time when we signed up, I'm making $16 an hour still. And $300, $400 a month and I just was never needing it to go to the doctor and ended up letting it lapse. Then got to a point where I really felt self-insured. I think you don't really plan for these catastrophic moments, but if I had to go have a $10,000 surgery or I had to go to the doctor for something, I felt I was in a place I could pay that out of pocket.
DeRusha: The catastrophic moment, a stupid question I guess, but you look at that differently now?
Sutherland: Oh, absolutely. I mean, I look at everything differently. How in control or in a direction you think your life can be going at any moment, and it can stop on a dime.
DeRusha: Has it changed who you are as a person?
Sutherland: I don't know if who I am as a person overall, but I mean, it inherently changes all kinds of things. When you have 16 days laying in a hospital bed with nothing to do, you think and reflect on all aspects of life. I think you get changed and I think your gratitude comes out. Realizing how both you love to death, just very grateful to be here and very grateful for the people and the support.
DeRusha: How do you not, right? What do I want to do go going forward when you feel like you get to continue having a crack at life?
Sutherland: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think all of those things that you just named, you'll go through your head and you reflect upon and consider. So yeah, not everybody gets a second crack at it. You want to make sure you’re doing it all the way.
DeRusha: The book is called “Northern Soul”, your journey to being a chef and a TV celebrity chef is fascinating and inspiring. You certainly didn't think you were going to be a TV, celebrity chef when you were a kid growing up here, but to have a book of recipes that are meaningful to you that come from your family and come from your heart, what does it mean to see that in people's hands now?
Sutherland: It's been a wild, wild ride and no, nothing that I ever planned on, or set out for. So, you know, very blessed to be here and be doing what I'm doing. I just think it's really important to share that story and share that food in those recipes that have been important to me throughout my life’s journey. So, it’s pretty cool to see it out in people's hands.
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DeRusha: Favorite recipes that you have in this book?
Sutherland: One of the recipes that just kind of tells the story of the book, what's super simple, is the collard greens recipe. For me, it's just that story of soul food and that simple food that came over from slaves that became Southern food. But now just really tells the story of it. Other than that, the gumbo in there is phenomenal. There's a lobster etouffee that we love.
DeRusha: Justin, you went to Apple Valley High School, right?
Sutherland: I did.
DeRusha: And you were a speech and debate nerd as a kid?
Sutherland: I did, all the way. Theater, speech and debate, that's what I was in. And yeah, 2003 went to nationals and it was something I kind of just fell into and ended up loving.
DeRusha: I mean, if you think about it oratory and cooking, it's just different ways of telling a story.
Sutherland: Absolutely. I mean food, music, and yeah, speaking like that, it's all just delivering that story. And I think, there are benefits from having skills in both camps.
DeRusha: When you're putting together a cookbook, “Northern Soul”, Southern-inspired home cooking from a Northern kitchen, I read the book, it's a great read because you share personal stories about yourself, about your family, about your restaurants. How much are you thinking, are regular people going to be able to make some of this stuff?
Sutherland: For me, that was thought number one. Especially as a first book and someone who collects and reads a lot of cookbooks. Even for me, sometimes you get these cookbooks and bring them home and you're like, ‘I can't make any of this’. This was very much geared towards a home cook, with just getting a taste of Southern cooking. Very technique driven, on a basic level, and just making it very approachable.
DeRusha: How are the restaurants doing? How are things going in St. Paul at Handsome Hog?
Sutherland: The restaurants are doing well. I mean Handsome Hog, luckily enough, has continued to do well. But we still, you know, the restaurants in St. Paul in general, are not back to where they are even close to where they were. So we still need some help. It’s hard to find staff, or you need more customers, or both. People think it's back to normal because when people go out, restaurants look full. And those are those certain one to two hour time blocks of the day, or certain, days of the week. They're coming back, but I think there's still a perfect storm with a lot of bad stuff up there for the restaurant world.
DeRusha: What's next for you? You're out doing interviews, promoting the book. Are you here in the Twin Cities or are you out of town right now?
Sutherland: No, I'm here, back at home. I'm just easing slowly back, trying to get back out there to work. Season two of my show Taste the Culture will be out here next week or so. So we finished, luckily, right before the accident.
DeRusha: Tell people about taste of the culture.
Sutherland: It’s a show that I get to be executive producer on that's on the Turner Network, Delta Airlines and HBO Max. It's a show where I get to travel around and kind of take the spotlight off of me and help tell some other unknown stories around the country. Focusing on the immigrant population, BIPOC, women-owned businesses, and everything in different aspects of the food space.
Sutherland's book "Northern Soul", is available now.
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