Pioneer Award
It all started as a wild idea to align the voice of the leading American Chefs to sustainably support good food as an inherent right for all, not just the privileged. The challenge was to get these incredibly busy top chefs together and focused long enough to congeal this wide-reaching subject. Such an opportunity arose at the Oldways Preservation and Trust Conference in Hawaii, as many of our forward-thinking chefs were in attendance. Early the last morning of the conference, fueled by Bloody Mary’s and tropical Mimosas, Jimmy spearheaded a brisk conversation that grew and congealed into the Charter of the Statement of Principles. Jimmy was elected as the founding Chairman, with the first official duty to personally pay the bar tab for the morning gathering. Armed with this new found mission, this illustrious band of chefs went forward to propagate the Statement of Principles to their own cities across the USA.
Chefs Collaborative was officially founded by Jimmy in 1993, along with Co-Chairpersons Larry Forgione and Catherine Brandel as well as many illustrious chefs such as Wolfgang Puck and Alice Waters. Greg Drescher, Dun Gifford and Sara Baer Sinnott of Oldways Preservation and Trust incubated the forming of the foundation. The foundation grew across the country with local chef groups and national chef retreats to further these noble principles into action.
Jimmy was instrumental in forming the Charter and Statement of Principles celebrating the pleasures of food but equally recognizing the impact of food choices on collective health, global environment, and cultural vitality. Jimmy was recognized for his contributions to the Collaborative with the esteemed Pioneer Award in 2012.
FoodArts Magazine Coverage of the Forming of Chefs Collaborative
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