Female top chefs, female catering is a growing trend, 10 places to know - Lifestyle

There are many famous Chefs who have distinguished themselves in recent years in Italian catering: the best known are Antonia Klugmann, Cristina Bowerman, Nadia Santini, Annie Féolde and Viviana Varese.

Certainly not the only ones: the number of chefs has increased in the last 5 years and it is a trend that continues.

On the occasion of 8 March, International Women's Rights Day, TheFork investigates the role of Chefs.

How?

With a survey of its partner restaurants and with the testimony of Jessica Rosval, Chef of Canadian origins, winner of the Bellavista “Cook of the Year” Award from the Espresso Guides.

While on the one hand 72% of the Chefs interviewed have a very long loyalty relationship with the place where they work, often right from the opening, on the other hand 39% declare that they have encountered many obstacles due to their gender.

Furthermore, two out of three (60%) argue that being a man facilitates the career path in catering.

Although 60% of respondents stated that there is no Chef in the restaurant where they work, over half of the women interviewed (52%) are convinced that the number of Chefs has increased in the last 5 years.

Among those who said they have male Chefs in the kitchen, 68% affirm that this decision has nothing to do with the gender they belong to and the perspective is therefore that this situation can change more and more rapidly.

In the kitchen, solidarity is woman: the case of

Jessica Rosval, a young Canadian-born Chef who, after a five-year experience at Massimo Bottura's Osteria Francescana, in 2019 was chosen by Bottura himself and his wife Lara Gilmore to manage the kitchen of Casa Maria Luigia in Modena.

In 2021 the Espresso Guides chose her as

: "For me cooking is not a competition, it shouldn't be: I am obviously proud of my team, with whom I share this recognition but the thing more important for me is to have the opportunity through this award to be able to communicate to as many people as possible, ”he said.

In this case, the message that Rosval wants to spread is the one related to

, a Modenese association founded in 2020 by her best friend, Caroline Caporossi, which aims to provide migrant women with professional training that allows them to actively integrate into the fabric of Italian society.

"Our project is divided into two parts: the first is the culinary training, which we offer specifically to migrant women of our community to whom we teach the basic techniques of cooking and also the fundamentals of the world of work in Italy", continues the Chef underlining as the goal of the four-month course is to give these women not only the skills but also the confidence necessary to fit into any reality in the restaurant world, chosen on the basis of their skills, their inclinations and their practical commitments in family.

Jessica Rosval is a prime example of how the restaurant world is changing: “Once this industry, like everyone else, was dominated by men, now women are making their voices heard more and more.

Let's say enough to have to prove that we are up to it every time, we reiterate that we too have ideas, experiences, stories to tell ".

And she adds: “I have nothing to prove to men who think there is no room for women in the kitchen, I don't care about them.

I know that in this moment of my life I am where I need to be ”. 

Waiting for more and more young female talents to enter the restaurant world, here is a selection of restaurants on the female-led platform.

Marked with a star on the MICHELIN Guide, La Capanna di Eraclio offers a familiar and almost homely atmosphere, cloaked in nostalgia, in which to taste typical recipes made above all with local delicacies, those of the Po delta, carefully prepared by Chef Maria Grazia Soncini.

Cristina Bowerman and her Glass Hostaria are also marked with a star in the MICHELIN Guide: in the heart of Trastevere the cuisine here becomes an expression of the border, between tradition and innovation, between Italian recipes and fusion solutions, between reassuring elegance and experimental courage.

Special attention also for vegetarians.

Immersed in a relais and before that in a farm in the Cortona countryside, Il Falconiere, a MICHELIN Guide star, is a restaurant that envelops you with its relaxed atmosphere and its traditionally Tuscan cuisine, which Chef Silvia Regi Baracchi enhances through strictly local recipes and products.

The scenography, in La Perla del Mare, a Livorno restaurant recommended by the MICHELIN Guide, is already one of the main ingredients, overlooking the beach of San Vincenzo with, in the background , the islands of Capraia and Elba.

Deborah Corsi's cuisine, then, is a celebration of seafood recipes reinterpreted with a decidedly contemporary twist.

I Salotti in Chiusi is a restaurant with a suggestive setting, especially when in summer you can dine in the outdoor gazebos.

The cuisine of Katia Maccari, which received a MICHELIN Guide star, is creative and rooted in the products of the same farm.

There is also a historic cellar with over three thousand labels.

At the foot of the Euganean Hills stands La Posata Bianca, a restaurant with a fascinating and romantic setting.

The cuisine of Mariana Epure brings together experience and innovation, aiming at a cuisine of both sea and land that aims to enhance the flavors and above all the carefully selected raw materials.

Essential, elegant, modern but also deeply linked to family roots, the same as the "grandmother" who gives the place its name: in the Mamie restaurant, the Salento Chef Maria Rosaria Peluso develops a Mediterranean and innovative cuisine, with great attention to conviviality .

The Prosit restaurant boasts a more than secular tradition in the Turin area, which Chef Manuela Devietti Goggia has recently renewed with a formula that blends classic Piedmontese and Ligurian cuisine with gourmettine formula, small and delicious courses.

There is also a delightful tea room.

In the heart of the splendid Catania, U Fucularu is a proudly family-run trattoria, where Carmela Grasso offers its guests authentic Sicilian cuisine, with the freshest Mediterranean flavors, ready to celebrate the most typical ingredients of this land.

On the menu fresh pasta, meat and fish dishes, classics such as caponata or exotic proposals such as cous cous.