Henna Sharee (@hennashareee on TikTok) is known for her immersive food videos, branching across countless cuisines. In her series Meals Around the World, she shares recipes from all corners of the world, including Bangladesh, South Korea, and Barbados.
When she’s not testing out different cuisines, Henna is posting recipes from her own Latinx heritage, like sofrito and Dominican oxtail stew, or she’s sharing her weekly meal preps.
As someone with a natural curiosity when it comes to food, Henna is constantly experimenting with new recipes and putting a twist on some classics. She’s also constantly trying and reviewing new foods, like Insomnia and Crumbl Cookies.
In her latest series, Platano 101, Henna is sharing all the different ways you can prepare plantains, from Nigerian to Colombian to Salvadoran recipes.
We had the opportunity to speak to Henna to learn more about her unique journey in the food world.
Spoon University: How long have you been doing TikTok and what inspired you to start?
Henna Sharee: I started TikTok back in 2020, but I lived in a whole different niche. I started content creation back in 2016, after I graduated, and I was heavy into beauty and makeup.
When I went back to doing social media and TikTok was blooming from COVID and all that, I started doing makeup again. And then I realized it’s just a lot of work to put this makeup on and then take it off and all this stuff.
And so I kind of transitioned into a whole different niche, which was making content that was very Latin, like about music and culture. And then I kind of wanted to diversify my content again. I had this huge Latin audience, and I was thinking about what kind of content may resonate with them. And I realized it was food, because we love to eat.
Then I started making like Latin recipes that my mom taught me and things like that, and it started doing really well. And then I was like, well, I eat so many different kinds of food, so I should post that too.
SU: How do you decide what recipes to post and where do you draw inspiration for the recipes that you post?
HS: Honestly, I get my inspiration from two different things. One is TikTok comments. I literally just make what people suggest in the comments, and if there are things that I have not heard of before, I just go look them up and figure out what they are. I’ll usually pull from maybe like 10 different recipes and kind of see what the commonalities are, and then based on what flavors I like, I just tailor the recipe to my cooking style and what’s realistic for me to recreate at home.
The second source of inspiration is series ideas. I have a few different ongoing series, like meals I can make in under 30 minutes, my plantain series, which is doing really well, where I tell people all the different ways you can use plantains for various dishes, and my “Meals Around the World” series. Those act as a framework. For example, if I know I want to do a plantain recipe this week, I already know where I’m going with it since I’ve already plotted that series.
Of course, seasonal stuff inspires my content too — like it’s fall, so pumpkin desserts, apple pies, all the seasonal things help guide my content.
SU: You try a lot of different dishes from various cuisines and cultures in your “Meals Around the World” series. What’s your favorite cuisine that you’ve experimented with?
HS: Trinidadian cuisine, for sure. I made this street food dish called doubles, which is vegan. It’s one of those things I still think about — like, “Man, that was really good.” And then another one that sticks with me is pho. I made it so perfectly, like textbook perfect. I had Vietnamese followers telling me how spot-on it was, and that felt great. Those two dishes — Trinidadian doubles and pho — are the ones I think about all the time.
SU: Tell me a little about your cultural background and how that contributes to the type of recipes and content you post.
HS: I’m Nicaraguan, Dominican, and Lebanese, so I definitely specialize in Latin cuisine — specifically Central American and Caribbean cuisine. I share a lot of Puerto Rican and Dominican recipes, and I’ve posted a few Nicaraguan ones as well. I find myself bridging a gap for a lot of Latin Americans who were born in the U.S. but didn’t grow up learning to make these dishes. They might say, “My mom used to make this, but I don’t know how,” so I help bring that connection back for them.
SU: What’s your favorite recipe that you’ve shared across all your series?
HS: That’s a hard one because I share so many, but the one I’ve probably made the most is my pollo de solo, a sweet chicken stew. It’s one of my favorite childhood meals, and I love updating it each time I make it. It’s always well-received when I post it, and I’ve made it about three times now, tweaking it along the way.
SU: You post a lot about weekly meal prepping. How did you get into that?
HS: I started when I got a 9-to-5 office job as a social media manager. Managing a full-time content schedule and a full-time job, plus trying to stay fit, leaves no time to cook three meals a day, and since my boyfriend also works full-time and we live together, it just made sense to meal prep. What I love is that I get to experiment with new flavors every week, so I never get tired of eating the same thing for days. I rarely repeat meals.
Follow along Henna’s journey on TikTok and Instagram.