We’ve reached the ultimate class within the 2025 CultureMap Tastemaker Awards. These are the nominees for Chef of the Yr.
This yr’s nominees are an achieved group. They maintain Michelin stars and acquired Bib Gourmand designations. They’re James Beard Award semifinalists, finalists, and winners. They’ve competed on High Chef and been featured in nationwide publications corresponding to Meals & Wine and The New York Occasions.
In fact all of them serve persistently well-prepared dishes that maintain diners coming again repeatedly. They’re additionally leaders and mentors who’re guiding the subsequent era of cooks who will make their very own mark on the eating scene. Many are concerned in various native nonprofits, together with I’ll Have What She’s Having and the Southern Smoke Basis.
Who will win? Discover out tonight, April 3, on the Tastemaker Awards celebration at Silver Avenue Studios. We’ll dine on bites from this yr’s nominated eating places and sip cocktails from our sponsors earlier than revealing the winners in our quick and candy ceremony.
A really restricted variety of Common Admission tickets stay. Purchase yours earlier than they promote out.
Listed below are the nominees for Chef of the Yr:
Aaron Davis, Viola & Agnes
For years, Houston meals obsessives have been making their approach to Kemah to pattern Davis’ tackle soul meals, however the chef’s fame has lastly grown past the Bayou Metropolis. The New York Occasions included the restaurant on its listing of “50 Favourite Locations in America Proper Now,” hailing for his “rustic Southern cooking.” Diners at Viola & Agnes will discover expertly fried seafood, a gumbo with a darkish, smoky roux, and specials that might vary from oxtails to child again ribs. All that high quality requires a bit persistence, as Davis and his small group make every order as they’re acquired. The wait is value it.
Benchawan Jabthong Painter, Avenue to Kitchen
“Chef G,” as she’s identified to buddies and admirers, has come a great distance for her pop-up days of serving Thai omelettes on the City Harvest farmers market. She earned a James Beard Award at Avenue to Kitchen’s unique location subsequent to a fuel station, and the restaurant’s transfer to a bigger dwelling within the East Finish allowed her to additional develop her imaginative and prescient of recent Thai delicacies. She continues to be impressed by nice elements — try the issues she’s doing with Australian wagyu, for instance — in addition to common journeys to Thailand.
David Skinner, Ishtia
After spending 10 years dazzling diners with theatrical shows at Eculent, the chef determined to change issues up by looking for inspiration from his Choctaw heritage. The result’s a restaurant that’s nonetheless in contrast to every other eating expertise in Houston however with dishes that make the most of elements from Native American farmers and foragers. Now that Ishtia has been open for just a few months, Skinner plans to roll out new menus, together with one thing he calls the “meat trolley.”
Emmanuel Chavez, Tatemó
It’s laborious to consider that Chavez solely began promoting nixtamalized tortillas on the City Harvest farmers market 5 years in the past. In that quick period of time, he’s emerged as one of many rising stars in Houston’s culinary scene, incomes three James Beard Award finalist nominations, a Meals & Wine Greatest New Chef award, and a Michelin star. Whereas his ardour for masa is obvious in each chunk, it’s his therapy of his group and his assist for different Houston cooks that basically stands out. That generosity will gas no matter he does subsequent, as a result of it doesn’t seem to be one, 20-seat restaurant on the jap fringe of Spring Department is a ample stage for his expertise.
Evelyn Garcia and Henry Lu, Jun
Included among the many semifinalist nominees for Greatest Chef: Texas is that this dynamic duo of previous and and present High Chef contestants. Like a proverbial culinary Captain Planet, they’ve mixed their powers — her deep information of Mexican and Salvadoran flavors along with his mastery of Chinese language delicacies — into a complete that’s better than the sum of its elements. Collectively, they’ve created memorable bites corresponding to carrots with salsa macha and and beef tartare with sesame buñuelo, together with an ever-evolving array of seasonally-inspired fare. Past their expertise within the kitchen, they’ve used Jun’s success to advertise up-and-coming cooks by internet hosting pop-ups and collaboration dinners.
Felipe Riccio, March
Veteran Houston restaurant followers could recall Felipe Riccio as a line prepare dinner at Reef who hosted the occasional pop-up to showcase his love of pasta. Now, he’s main the kitchen on the metropolis’s Michelin-starred temple of Mediterranean fantastic eating. At March, Riccio combines his pleasure for feeding individuals with years of expertise and a rigorous, research-focused method to capturing the soul of the area that the restaurant is showcasing that season. The mix of data and keenness has created a restaurant that continues to enhance, elevating the chance that it might be among the many first eating places in Texas to earn a second star.
Jason Ryczek, Little’s Oyster Bar
The California native has totally embraced his new dwelling in Houston. At Little’s, he showcases each Pappas Eating places’ fame for Gulf Coast fare corresponding to redfish and snapper and his personal ardour for sustainably-sourced elements. Seasonal adjustments and nightly specials give Ryczek the chance to problem his group to maintain the menu recent. Whereas he’s tailored to Pappas’ famously beneficiant parts, plans for an omakase-style tasting menu will give the chef to indicate off his love for an much more elevated expertise.
Manabu Horiuchi, Kata Robata/Katami
Winner of Chef of the Yr in 2019, Hori-san is as soon as once more nominated in a class that he may, if we’re being trustworthy, win yearly. Simply in case anybody was taking Kata Robata’s constant excellence with no consideration, Katami serves as a reminder that he stays one in every of Houston’s prime cooks. Partially impressed by a visit to Japan, Hori-san makes use of Katami to showcase extra prime Japanese elements, together with a number of preparations of wagyu.
Mayank Istwal, Musaafer
The chef’s luxurious tackle Indian delicacies helped lead the Galleria restaurant to a Michelin star. Alongside an a la carte menu with loads of decisions, Istwal shows his expertise in a seasonal tasting menu that places an Indian spin on world flavors. Along with his skills within the kitchen, the chef’s heat character exemplifies the nice and cozy service that’s a core part of each meal at Musaafer. All of these qualities will serve him nicely because the restaurant prepares to open its second location in New York Metropolis.
Thomas Bille, Stomach of the Beast
As this week’s James Beard Award finalist nomination for Greatest Chef: Texas demonstrates, the meals world is making its approach to Spring to pattern Bille’s eclectic fare. Whereas the unique iteration of Stomach of the Beast targeted totally on tacos, the brand new location gives Bille with the power to showcase the total vary of his expertise. Mexican flavors stay on the coronary heart of the restaurant, however the eclectic menu affords a world perspective, together with every part from handmade pastas to lamb shank rendang.
Victoria Elizondo, Cochinita & Co.
Chef, entrepreneur, cookbook creator — when Elizondo units her thoughts on one thing, she achieves it. From humble roots as a pop-up, she’s grown Cochintia & Co. right into a multifaceted enterprise that features each its restaurant within the East Finish and a thriving wholesale enterprise that provides totopos and tamales to various Houston-area connoisseur grocers. A brand new location inside Lindale Park espresso store A 2nd Cup will convey her tacos and different Mexican fare to much more Houstonians.
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The Tastemaker Awards ceremony is delivered to you by Stella Artois, Chardon, Jim Beam Black, Ritual Zero Proof, Seedlip, Valencia’s Tex-Mex Storage, Hornitos, Ghost Hill Natural Vodka, PicMe Occasions, and extra to be introduced. A portion of proceeds will profit our nonprofit companion, the Southern Smoke Basis.
