ATX A-List Female Chefs Join Forces for Parkside Chef's Table Event

Top row (l-r): Abby Love (L’Oven), Natalie Gazaui (Ramen Tatsu-ya), Kendall Antonelli (Antonelli’s Cheese
Middle row (l-r): Jennifer Nguyen (Parkside), Jules Stoddart (Parkside), Lindsay Flagg (South Congress Hotel)
Bottom row (l-r): Bonnie Wright (Olamaie), Jo Chan (Eberly), Sarah Heard (Foreign & Domestic)

Like many workplaces, professional kitchens are a notoriously difficult space for women to thrive in.

Despite major strides being made in the past few years by female chefs all across the country, the professional kitchen is still mostly a masculinized space. Women are still seen as being more at home in, well, the home than the fast-paced and often stressful environment of professional kitchens, and in the era of #MeToo, this gender gap feels more acute than ever before.

That’s why we’re so excited to see that on Sept. 25, Parkside is throwing a dinner to celebrate the role of women in professional kitchens, with six featured chefs and beverage experts, all of them heavy hitters of the Austin culinary scene, creating dishes inspired by strong women in their lives.

Parkside’s executive pastry chef Jules Stoddart is spearheading the Parkside Chef’s Table Austin Women in Culinary event, alongside executive chef Jennifer Nguyen. Joining them in the kitchen will be Eberly’s Jo Chan, Olamaie’s Bonnie Wright, Ramen Tatsu-ya’s Natalie Gazaui, L’Oven’s Abby Love, Foreign & Domestic’s Sarah Heard, and Lindsay Flagg from the South Congress Hotel kitchen. Kendall Antonelli from Antonelli’s Cheese will be on hand to supervise the cheese course. The beverages at this dinner will be female driven as well. Parkside’s beverage director Tara Davies and Tracy Rowlands of Midnight Cowboy are teaming up to prepare craft cocktails based on spirits from Still Austin Whiskey Co. Eberley’s sommelier Krista Church has selected wines showcasing female wine producers to pair with the five courses of dinner.

Aside from celebrating the hard working women of Austin’s restaurant industry, this event seeks to create space for more female chefs and beverage experts by raising funds for the local chapter of Les Dames d’Escoffier, a society of professional women involved in the food, wine, and hospitality industries that seeks to encourage female participation in these fields through mentorship and the funding of scholarships.

“I do not have enough words to express how excited I am to be spearheading this amazing dinner at Parkside with my peers,” Stoddart says. “I am thrilled to be able to continue the conversation and to be able to bring a community of stellar women together to create an evening of excellence unparalleled to anything else we have had here in Austin.”