A Tahini Entrepreneur Stirs Her Way Through The Pandemic

Like many food purveyors, Amy Zitelman experienced a turbulent 2020. Her company, Soom Foods, a maker of premium tahini, relied on restaurants for about two-thirds its business.

And with pandemic shutdown orders creating havoc for chefs, she expected Soom might suffer, too. “COVID devastated the restaurant industry,” Zitelman says.

Instead, Soom, which was co-founded by Zitelman in 2013, saw its revenues grow 30 percent last year compared with 2019 (she does not disclose dollar figures).

While restaurant orders were unpredictable, online orders made up the shortfall. Consumers can order directly from the company and its products are found on Amazon

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and other retailers’ sites.

Zitelman, who was among FORBES 30 Under 30 in food and beverage in 2018, spotted the interest in tahini developing last spring.

As consumers began cooking and baking more at home, they began searching for instructions on how to use it, and sources where to find it.

In 2019, Zitelman tracked about 6,000 searches per month via Google. In 2020, there were 20,000 searches for tahini in April and May, and interest has remained high, she says.

That’s good news for Zitelman’s recently published cookbook, The Tahini Table: Go Beyond Hummus With 100 Recipes For Every Meal, which went on sale in late 2020.

Many people know tahini primarily as an ingredient in Middle Eastern food. But as I discovered in 2018, tahini has increasingly been moving into more mainstream cooking, both in sweet and savory dishes.

While it can be used as a peanut butter substitute, Zitelman says it has a few unique properties. “The most important component of tahini is that it’s fat. That’s what allows it to be so transformative in a recipe,” she told me for the CulinaryWoman Newsletter.

Often, when consumers buy a new jar of tahini, they notice that it has separated into a thick paste at the bottom, with a layer oil on top.

That’s perfectly okay, she says. Zitelman’s trick with a new jar is to open it, remove the safety seal, close it, and give the jar a good shake. “The fresher it is, the easier it is for the oil to blend back in,” she says.

Once it becomes re-emulsified, take a knife or a fork and give the jar a good stir.

Cooks need to keep in mind there will be a discrepancy between the weight of the paste and the oil at the top, so thorough blending is important. And because Zoom products do not have preservatives, it’s good to use them up once they’re opened.

“Tahini does have a life of its own,” she says. “Three-quarters of a jar might be different for me than for someone who lets it sit longer.”

The pandemic did not have much impact on the shipments of ingredients that Soom receives from overseas.

But, it interrupted the in-person tour she had hoped to do for the book, with events planned at some of Soom’s restaurant partners. Instead, like many authors, she did virtual events, which she says “have really been a blessing for me.”

Zitelman says she couldn’t predict the number of people who might have turned out for a traditional event. Sometimes, she has spent an hour in grocery store and only talked to five or 10 people.

“Now, I’m able to stand in my kitchen, and share with 10 or 40 or 200 people. It’s amazing,” she says.

She hopes the book will broaden consumers’ perception of tahini, and by extension, result in more Soom customers.

“It’s North African. It’s Asian. It can be substituted for familiar American ingredients,” she says. “It isn’t confined to one time of day. It can be savory, or sweet.”