Regulars at MAZU have grown accustomed to Van Ward’s warm greeting, often before they’ve fully crossed the restaurant’s threshold.

Speaking with the News this week, Ward said she’s built relationships while working behind the bar kitchen at MAZU: She knows who comes in on Thursdays and remembers what people order, which specials they liked. After nearly two years behind the counter, she figures she knows “75% of the people at least” who walk through the door.

“You get so much of that at MAZU,” Ward said. “You get to really be there and talk to every person that comes in. We can share stories.”

Those customers won’t see Ward working regular shifts at MAZU anymore. But they’re likely to keep encountering her presence there as she continues to offer weekend specials and events via Taproot, the vegan private dining business she operates with her wife, Bee Ward.

Ward described Taproot as a vegan “mobile kitchen” with no storefront, traveling into clients’ homes, to special events and back into MAZU, where much of Ward’s cooking life took shape.

“Taproot and MAZU are collaborating a lot together now,” she said.

Squash and fried squash blossoms filled with tofu ricotta from a recent seven-course “local and foraged” dinner prepared and served by Taproot at MAZU. (Submitted photo)

Within the last month since launching Taproot, Ward has developed themed dinners and custom menus, cooked for families and taken on events where vegan diners want the assurance that every course fits their needs. In mid-July, Taproot made a public appearance at the Vegan Market event hosted at the YS Brewery Barrel Room, and reported that she sold out of a number of items within an hour of the event’s opening.

With all that in mind, Ward said she’s still working out how to concisely describe the wide range of work she hopes Taproot will encompass.

“I’ve noticed, out of all the things I’m doing, what feels good to me and what feels good to other people,” she said. “People want intimate, connecting activities to do. People want to gather in groups; it’s a very natural thing for people to do.”

Ward has had a lot of time to observe how folks converge around food and drink, having spent most of her working life in restaurants, bars, catering and wedding venues. Her first job, at age 15, was doling out soft-serve and milkshakes at Kelley’s Cafe in Jamestown, where she went to high school. She went on to work in Dayton’s Hope Hotel, where she said tending bar became her craft.

“I was heavily, heavily involved in bartending,” she said, but added that her focus started to shift once she stopped drinking.

“Sobriety comes to a certain point when you’re getting older where you’re like, ‘I actually just have to remove myself from the environment,’” she said. “There’s a behavior that comes with all of it that’s really hard to displace.”

MAZU, however, offered another route into the culinary industry: Ward, who became vegan seven years ago after she met her wife, found herself with a burgeoning desire to work in a vegan restaurant. She said she was drawn to MAZU’s menu, which, rather than only foregrounding veganism, tends to emphasize the food traditions and cultures represented in its dishes as a matter of course.

“Veganism, to me, is harm reduction — and that’s not to diss on anybody else’s life choices or food choices, but that’s it across the board for me personally,” she said. “It’s not just about animals. There is a lot that goes into play — the earth, the people who have to work in it. There’s a lot.”

When Ward joined the staff, MAZU’s Angie Hsu called her the restaurant’s “mixologist,” and Ward took off applying her bartending instincts to alcohol-free drinks: fresh raspberry puree and white pepper with rosewater; “cortisol cocktails” of coconut water, aloe vera, pineapple and lime juice, spirulina and Tajin; her beloved wellness shots of fresh juice, ginger, turmeric and cayenne. From there, she said, Hsu encouraged her to begin creating food specials and special events, and each one opened another possibility.

Chef Van Ward at work plating. (Submitted photo)

“I used to craft really cool drinks,” Ward said. “I still do, but now, I manipulate that into food, too.”

Ward said Hsu continued to support her as Taproot began taking shape — even though an independent vegan chef could reasonably be viewed as a future competitor. On the contrary, the two businesses have blossomed into regular collaborators, and Ward said she’s felt embraced by both MAZU and the wider community.

“I should almost be her competition, but Angie has really just backed me,” Ward said. “Feeling so loved and passionate about something, and being in such an inviting environment that is also about sustainability and community and love and connection, it just made me feel my true connection to it.”

Ward and her wife Bee, who is from Vandalia, spent several years moving around. They camped in Colorado in a converted SUV, participated in the farm-stay program World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms and lived in Asheville, North Carolina. When they wanted to come back to Ohio, it was important to the couple that they find a place where they felt like they belonged.

“There’s something about the comfort of home, even if we never have really felt like that — Ohio is not always kind to the kind of people we are,” Ward said. “But we both had always dreamed of living in Yellow Springs. This was a safety space for both of us. And so we were like, ‘If we’re gonna live in Ohio, we’re living in Yellow Springs.’ So it really is a gift; I used to go camping with my dad here, and that’s my connection to nature, which is huge, because it connects me to my veganism, which connects me to my food.”

And her food, she said, leans into a kind of playful reinvention; she noted an upcoming MAZU special which she said will feature a vegan “Cuban” sandwich with mojo mushrooms, pressed and marinated tofu, seeded mustard and citrusy pickles. Ward added that she has a particular affection for sandwiches, which are often a limited vista for vegan eaters.

“Sandwiches are so much easier to get when you’re not vegan,” she said with a laugh. “I was grumpy every time I went somewhere and they wrapped hummus in a tortilla and said, ‘Here’s your sandwich.’ I’m like, ‘I would love more than this.’”

Thus, Ward has been creating sandwiches aimed at delighting the taste buds — and, sometimes, the eyes: MAZU regulars may recall her Pride-weekend “Pretty Patty” special, which featured a patty fashioned from soy curls, walnuts, mushrooms and onions with hibiscus ketchup, turmeric mustard and beet “mayo,” all on a bright-blue spirulina bun.

And, of course, she’s ventured well outside of sandwiches; a recent “local and foraged” dinner event at MAZU featured, among other dishes, fried squash blossoms filled with tofu ricotta, tofu “salmon” with greens, dandelion-root and chicory ice cream, fermented cashew cheese and pickled berries. Ward said she asked diners to attend in “garden party” attire.

“I love a dress code — people want an excuse to dress up,” she said.

Taproot’s work is shared between the Wards; Van credits Bee with teaching her to cook vegan food, and said her wife prefers to stay mostly out of view handling the alchemical precision inherent to baked goods.

“She does it all with me — she’s the baker,” Ward said. “Desserts are not for me; they’re too meticulous, they’re too calculated. For me, I like a little bit of this, a little bit of that, just kind of throwing it in there until it feels right — you cannot do that with baking.”

Ward said she doesn’t expect everyone who eats her food to be vegan, or to become vegan; her aim is to make plant-based food generous and interesting enough to invite people in. 

“The world is built on food — community is built on food,” she said. “I think it’s a really intimate thing. Everything, every holiday, is surrounded by a meal.”

“Taproot” then, as a business name, gives a concrete image  to what the couple have been aiming toward: A taproot is the central root that grows downward from a germinating seed, anchoring the plant as smaller roots extend outward. To Ward, it suggests food at its source, but also strength and origin.

“It’s the core root. It goes the deepest. It’s strong. It’s powerful,” she said. “It’s where the life began of that vegetable — its taproot.”

After years of moving, Ward said she’s found a place where she wants to remain, and good, meaningful work that lets her put down her own roots without standing still. Taproot can travel to a dining room or event space, then return to MAZU, where Ward’s own growth was nourished rather than contained, and where the relationships she’s formed have helped that growth come into view.

“Living in Yellow Springs has really just changed a lot,” Ward said. “I walk out and people know who I am and they tell me I’m doing something that’s real. I’ve had imposter syndrome to the max, and now I’ve started feeling like it’s true — I am really doing this.”

Taproot will provide specials at MAZU July 23–26 and July 30–Aug. 2; will make an appearance at YS Food Truck Rally at Antioch College Mondays, July 27 and Aug. 3; and at the YS Barrel Room Thursday, Sept. 10. Outside the village, find Taproot at Cincinnati Vegan Fest on Sunday, Aug. 16, and Dayton Vegan Fest on Sunday, Sept. 20.

For more information about Taproot, email vanward.taproot@gmail.com search “Taproot. Rad Food, Deep Roots” on Facebook or follow @taproot_radeats on Instagram.