On Being Female…In the Kitchen

The first time a male friend told me to “go back to the kitchen,” I didn’t understand what he meant. As a nine-year-old, my view of gender was still pure; still equal. He had meant the comment as an insult, yet I took it as a compliment; I loved to cook! So of course, I wanted to go back to the kitchen. Unfortunately, snide remarks and jokes of that nature only continued as my male middle-school peers became more confident, though I was certainly not the only target. Gender biases are not new, but when I look back at that moment now, it frightens me to think about how ingrained these biases become in our culture from such a young age. The boys I went to school with had already internalized stereotypes about women being domestic and being in the kitchen, and felt comfortable enough to take part in making fun. They were eight or nine.

         The funny thing about being told to go back to the kitchen is how backwards it is when you compare it with how women in the culinary world are actually treated. Women are not urged to work in the kitchen, not celebrated or lifted up; not at all. Female chefs and restaurant workers are actually often ostracized, looked down on by their male colleagues and taken less seriously, a truth that reveals an entirely different kind of gendered stigma that women have had to fight to overcome. For some reason, men, historically, just don’t think women can cook high-end meals as well as men. And for a woman to prove that she can, she first has to be taken seriously by the males in charge. While the industry has come a long way in accepting women into fine dining and even awarding them with accolades and Michelin stars, the history of women in the kitchen has been complex and taxing. And while the push to the top to be fully accepted and acknowledged is still an upward climb, it has produced some badass chefs and incredible restaurants along the way.

According to the Culinary Institute of America archives, from the moment fine dining hit the scene in the 19th century, women were kept on the outside. Similar to just about any other industry of the time, women were not seen as beings who were capable of hard or serious work; deemed inferior to men, by men. While society had no problem letting women cook at home for families, when it came to breaking into the restaurant world, they were told there was no place for them. The industry was a boy’s club, and allowing female chefs inside, no matter their talent, was relatively unheard of. However, cooking schools were more accessible to interested women, acting as a place where aspiring chefs could hone their craft and excel. Several even took on the venture of writing cookbooks after cooking school, like Fannie Merritt Farmer in 1896, who served as the principal of the Boston Cooking School. Still, cookbooks and cooking school didn’t seem to be enough to allow female chefs to break through the ranks. One of the few who did find her way to fame was Eugénie Brazier, a French chef who was the first to earn three Michelin Stars in 1933. Though it took several decades, the impact of even just one female chef receiving such high accolades told others in the industry that it was possible, even if the fight to get there would turn out to be brutal. So, these chefs kept working, slowly but surely making progress. With each new restaurant opening or award, female chefs were taken more seriously, proving their worth in the industry one step at a time.  

         It has taken well over a century to tear down some of the wall that has been put up to block women out of the kitchen. While now 20% of head and executive chefs are female, there is still considerable work to be done. Stigmas around who is capable of hard work in a kitchen are still ever present, along with biases about if women are mentally and emotionally tough enough to fit in with male chefs. The industry also has a pervasive sexual harassment problem, perhaps not surprising when considering that there are few females in a given restaurant, working alongside dominating men with large egos. The culture, which was called out during the #metoo movement has certainly been brought to light. Famed personalities like Mario Batali and John Besh have been publicly shamed in the industry, but the knowledge that this harassment exists doesn’t make things easier for women. It is just another reminder that women can’t be in complete control of their own bodies, men have to assert themselves, even in an industry where the work is so rigorous and taxing that every chef is proving they belong every single day.

Padma Lakshmi, now a household name known for her role on Bravo’s Top Chef and for her own Hulu series Taste the Nation, began writing her first cookbook in the 90s. An immigrant from India, Lakshmi grew up in the US reconciling the mixture of cultures surrounding her while also struggling to be taken seriously as a woman of intellect in the working world. She began modeling at 21, something she used to launch her 1999 cookbook, which opened the door to a career in food. After several successful shows, cookbooks and articles, Lakshmi is a food icon now, but it wasn’t always this way. She has noted in several interviews that in the early days of her career, and even now, many men in the industry didn’t take her seriously. One New York Times writer, who was reviewing the second season of Top Chef, criticized Lakshmi and her outfits, rather than focus on her pedigree with food. Being a person of color and a woman, she has also explained in interviews, made it even more challenging to be truly seen for her talent. She even told the New York Times that she had trouble selling her show, which ended up on Hulu, for a long time, as if no one would take her seriously despite having proved herself for decades. Despite these challenges, Taste the Nation has blown up, collecting rave reviews from fans and foodies alike. Lakshmi uses the show to discuss her own experience rising in the industry, but also works to break down cultural barriers through food, helping to combat other negative stereotypes about the industry and the people who work in it. She has also spoken out several times to advocate for more diversity, within gender and race, in the industry.

Kristen Kish, a contestant on season 10 of Top Chef, was the first woman of color to win the show, beating twenty other acclaimed chefs for a huge cash prize and a feature in Food & Wine Magazine. Having worked under Barbara Lynch, a legendary Boston restaurateur, Kish was already a powerhouse and revered in the food community, but after leaving the show with a victory, she knew she needed to walk away from the traditional confines of a fine dining restaurant. Similar to a lot of younger chefs her age, Kish grew up watching chefs cook on TV and felt inspired to do the same. She went to culinary school and worked her way up through the ranks at restaurants. In an interview with NBC, she noted that every restaurant she had worked at prior to joining Lynch’s team had been male run. It impacted the way she saw the industry and made her lack confidence. After joining Lynch, who urged her to go on Top Chef, Kish won the season and became a household name. But upon returning to Boston and the restaurant, Kish explained that men were still getting in her way. She told NBC, “A particular male chef in the city I was living in started running his mouth that I slept with him to further my career. I never worked for him a day in my life and I’m also very gay.” Kish went on to say, “It’s a way of making women feel less than. It’s just so disappointing — can’t someone just be happy, rather than taking the thunder? That was the first hit of major reality.” Kish left Lynch’s restaurant shortly after that, but instead of letting it knock her down, she used the experience to push the industry forward. She opened her own restaurant, Arlo Grey, where 60% of the staff is female. She is also currently taking part in a documentary series centered around women in the restaurant workplace, using her platform to speak out against the culture that at times kept her back.

I mention Padma Lakshmi and Kristen Kish because they were who I grew up watching. As a child obsessed with cooking, my mother got me hooked on Top Chef before I even hit middle school. With every new season of the show, I had my personal favorites of course, but Padma and Kristen have always remained my inspirations and idols. They are the ones that urge me to cook and think like a boss. Like a powerful and strong woman. Through the years I watched Padma in awe as she tasted and judged contestants and their creations with a poise and knowledge that I yearned to have. And when Kristen came on the show in 2013, I felt like I had a personal stake in her journey over the course of the season. Maybe it was just because she worked in Boston and I was from Boston, but I think it was something about her drive and spirit and quiet concentration that drew me in. I wanted to be like her. I wanted to thrive the way she did. I got to watch countless women, like Kristen, beat their male counterparts in competitions every single episode. And I got to watch Padma send men home for making mistakes. Top Chef showed me female power.

         TV personalities and chefs were not the only people who inspired me to love to cook. When I think about my first memories in the kitchen, I think about Hanukkah. My grandmother and mother are both great cooks, and every December, my family would gather around a small electric pan and add dollops of latke mixture into hot vegetable oil. The smell would linger on our clothes and penetrate every corner of the house for days, but the latkes made all of that worth it. Crispy and slightly greasy, but filled with warm and indulgent goodness, my younger self couldn’t get enough of the latkes we made. And now, when I think back to those memories, I remember watching my mother and grandmother delicately grate potatoes and onions, crack eggs and sprinkle salt. I remember the making, not the eating. Perhaps it is because I have grown up appreciating the care the women in my family have put into preparing food, or perhaps it’s because I grew up wanting to be just like them. Whatever the reason, they were the ones teaching me new recipes and letting me lick the spoon. They instilled a belief that cooking can heal and soothe and bring people together, just like their latkes did every year on Hanukkah.

         It has taken me a long time to figure out what I want to do with my life, and I am certainly no closer than I was a few years ago, but I have concluded one thing for sure: I need to be doing something where food is involved. For a long time, I thought that this realization meant I needed to be a chef and I felt a certain sense pressure as a result. I have never been the best cook. I love to cook, but I don’t consider myself very skilled. I questioned for years if the only path to a career with food was to be cooking. It wasn’t until recently that I realized the female chefs and experts in the industry that I idolize haven’t been kicking ass and proving their male counterparts wrong this long for me to just give up. Padma and Kristen and all of the women before them have not endured male-centered workplaces and battled every day to be taken seriously, just for me to shy away from doing what I want to do. Women like Ruth Reichl and Christina Tosi have taken non-traditional paths, creating brands centered around their own love for food in exceptionally new ways. I could be like them. Or I could be like Ina Garten and write a million cookbooks, crediting butter as a staple ingredient and inspiring home cooks to entertain more. Sometimes it’s hard to remember there are many avenues to get to where you want to be, but these women have shown me it is possible. So no, I don’t want to be a chef. I don’t even think I want to go to culinary school. But I will have a career in food. I will likely have to work even harder to stand out from my male counterparts, because that is the industry. Male dominance in the food world is not completely reversed and it may never be. Maybe I’ll be writing, or photographing, or styling, or scoping out the best new restaurants, but I’m going to make it happen. So yes, actually I am going back into the kitchen, just like those elementary school boys told me to do.