Julia O'Malley, food journalist, and Aaron Leggett, senior curator at the Anchorage Museum, will have a freewheeling on-stage conversation -- including taking audience questions -- about the culinary history and food culture of Anchorage.

Copies of Julia’s book about Alaska foodways, “The Whale and The Cupcake: Stories of Subsistence, Longing, and Community in Alaska” will be available for purchase and signing at the conclusion of the event.

Julia O’Malley, a third-generation Alaskan, is a journalist, teacher, editor and cook who lives in Anchorage. Her work in newsrooms, classrooms and kitchens explores Alaska’s cultures, politics, climate and food. She is presently part-time curator at Anchorage Museum, writing about and researching Alaskans’ relationship to salmon at a time of historic, climate-related volatility. She also teaches culinary arts and journalism at University of Alaska Anchorage. Her book about Alaska’s foodways, “The Whale and The Cupcake: Stories of Subsistence, Longing, and Community in Alaska,” created in collaboration with the Anchorage Museum and published by University of Washington Press, came out in December 2019. Julia received a James Beard Award in 2024 for a story about the cultural and economic implications of the climate-related crash of snow crab on Saint Paul Island. She also received a James Beard Award in 2018 for a story about a young whale hunter, Chris Apassingok, who was cyber-bullied by environmentalists after he took a whale in the village of Gambell. Julia has worked as an editor at Alaska Public Media and the Anchorage Daily News. She’s written for the New York Times, Washington Post, High Country News, The Nation, The Guardian, National Geographic News and Eater, among other publications.

Aaron Leggett was born in Anchorage and is Dena’ina Athabascan. He currently serves as the President/Chief of the Native Village of Eklutna. Aaron is Senior Curator of Alaska History and Culture at the Anchorage Museum and serves as an advisor to the Smithsonian’s Arctic Studies Center. He is a member of Alaska State Museum Collections Committee and the Alaska Native Heritage Centers Program and Policy Committee and serves on the board of directors for the Cook Inlet Historical Society. In 2014, Aaron was recognized by Cook Inlet Region, Inc. (CIRI) as its Shareholder of the Year, by the Alaska Federation of Natives as Cultural Bearer of Year, and by the Governor of Alaska for distinguished service to the humanities. Building on knowledge obtained from his Dena’ina grandmother and after earning a degree in anthropology from the University of Alaska Anchorage, Aaron set out to change the historical narrative. He has played a vital role in indigenous curation and tribal governance in Alaska and has authored numerous scholarly articles and co-authored publications about the Dena’ina language and people.

Cook Inlet Historical Society Presents- Anchorage: What the City Eats