This time last year, Time published a cover feature titled Gods of Food that came under major fire, and rightly so, for its serious lack of women. It’s “pantheon” listed 13 “gods,” nine of which were men or groups of men, and its international chef family tree was 100 percent pure dude.
In response, Eater interviewed Time editor Howard Chua-Eoan, who defended the magazine’s choices by saying bumbling things like, “we just went with the basic realities of what was going on and who was being talked about,” and “we did not want to fill a quota of a woman chef,” and then “the media covers the industry. I don’t think the media has to advocate for anything.”
So, if the media isn’t advocating for anything or anyone, what are we doing?
Yes, there’s been a longstanding gender bias in the world of food and drink, but when Melissa Buote and I starting thinking about what it would look like if we were going to report the “basic realities of what’s going on” in Halifax’s food industry we came up with the idea for this feature. We started making a list of pioneers, ambassadors and newcomers—owners, chefs, servers, food lovers—who we admired, who we were excited about. Some were people we’d covered before, others we thought deserved some spotlight, and when we stepped back and looked at our messy scrap of paper full of names it was clear that our food scene is not dominated by men, at all.
So this year we’ve replaced our New Restaurants issue with a feature celebrating 28 rad women in local food and drink. Lists are trouble, and we totally recognize this. We don’t consider this list to be an ultimate one, we have dozens of amazing names that we couldn’t fit into this feature, but it’s a snapshot of who’s making Halifax a great place to eat and drink.
Click here to read more or navigate the list below.
Renée Lavallée, The Canteen
Amber MacLean, Morris East
Ami Goto, Dharma Sushi
Annaleisa Scigliano, NSCC
Bee Choo Char, Prince George Hotel
Ceilidh Sutherland, Field Guide
Christine White, Taste of Nova Scotia
Folami Jones, Kwacha House Cafe
Gina Haverstock, Gaspereau Wines
Hana Nelson, Afishionado Fishmongers
Ingrid Dunsworth, The Cake Lady
Jenna Mooers and Jane Wright, EDNA and jane’s next door
Jessica Best, The Canteen
Kellye Robertson, Garrison Brewing Company
Kelly Neil, kellyneil.com
Lauren Marshall, enVie
Lia Rinaldo, Devour! Food Film Fest
Lil MacPherson, The Wooden MOnkey
Liz Ingram-Chambers, Le Bistro by Liz
Marie Nightingale, writer
Mary Nkrumah, Mary’s African Cuisine
Natalie Chavarie, The Food Wolf
Sheena Clark and Kathy Cooper-MacDonald, Made with Local
Stephanie Bertossi, The Bertossi Group
Tara MacDonald, Two If By Sea
Unni Simensen, Scanway Catering
Related Stories
Natalie Chavarie
Marie Nightingale
Sheena Clark & Kathy Cooper-MacDonald
Lia Rinaldo
Kelly Neil
Annaleisa Scigliano
Christine White
Folami Jones
Tara MacDonald
Real friends, fake meats
Kellye Robertson
This article appears in Nov 20-26, 2014.
I don’t know if there is a gender bias in Halifax’s food scene but you have not proven the point that there is or given any evidence. What is the point here? There aren’t any male food stars of note in the city? What’s at stake when you make the same gender assumptions as male-centric journalism?
So you feel like we should have included more men in a story that is about women in the food & drink scene? Cool idea, bro.
No. My point was: what are you advocating for with this story? Are you suggesting that there is a gender bias in the world of food and drink in Halifax? Again, I don’t know if there is, but if there is, should you not be trying to prove that point with stats or quotes from people who work in the industry rather than citing a Time magazine article? I’m not saying that you shouldn’t write a piece about women in the food and drink scene. I’m simply asking why you are.
Because we wanted to. It’s pretty simple. If you want to go ahead and name 10 chefs who get regular media coverage without including any names on this list, I’d love to hear about the diversity you think exists so wholly in the media coverage in Halifax. Please enlighten me.
It’s clearly stated that our inspiration was the Gods of Food issue, that we took a look around, that we saw a lot of women doing cool shit, and then decided to do an issue on women. That’s it. It’s neither a summation of the entire food community, nor a “best of” list. It’s an issue celebrating “some of the women who make Halifax’s food and drink scene work.” It’s right there in the title on the cover. The fact that you have a problem with this, that you have a weird “ethical issues in food journalism” perspective on this, says more about you than it does about the existence of this issue of The Coast.
Cool. You win. I was hoping this would be a more civil conversation, but whatever. This wasn’t meant as an attack at all. I’m questioning reasoning. The “basic realities of what’s going on” in our food and drink scene are that women are “running this town”? How is that not making similar simplistic gender assumptions that the Time piece did? Anyway, this is a more complicated issue than what can be articulated in a comment thread. If you’d ever like to have a convo in person, I’m all ears. Take care, looking forward to reading more of your stuff.
To the point about ‘if the media isn’t advocating for anything or anyone, what are we doing?’ I disagree. It’s the role of journalists to be objective and unbiased. Stories need to be built on facts rather than predetermined biases. It’s what gives journalists creditability. Advocacy should (and needs) to be left with PR teams and special interest lobbyist groups.
I do agree that there is (probably) a gender bias in the food and drink world (like there is throughout all industry), it is not right and the gap needs to close. That being said, arguments about the gap, and gender bias need to be built on sound facts and figures rather than broad generalizations.
If the article is going to be about kick-ass ladies and their great work in the Food and Drink industry,make that the article – it’s a great article. Don’t take on gender bias and then not take on gender bias.
If gender bias in the industry is what you want to take on, critique the industry, not the media compiling ‘best of’ lists. And if in the research of the industry you find that 50 plus ‘top restaurants’ have female chefs then take on food and drink journalists.
This is not a news story, it’s a general interest food story. (And that’s an objective and unbiased fact.)