Celebrity Chefs at the 2013 Show - Demonstrations, Recipes and Tastings.

Willi Galloway

Willi is an award-winning radio commentator and writer who hosts an online garden-to-table cooking show, Grow. Cook. Eat, which is also the title of her recent book. She writes about kitchen gardening and seasonal cooking on her popular blog, DigginFood.com, and pens the weekly column “The Gardener” on Apartment Therapy’s Re-Nest blog. Each Tuesday morning, she offers vegetable gardening advice on Seattle’s popular NPR call-in show, Greendays. She also teaches a joint gardening and cooking class with James Beard Award–nominated chef Matthew Dillon in Seattle. Her garden has been featured in Sunset magazine.

Laurence Jossel, Chef/Owner and Gonzalo Guzman, Executive Chef, Nopalito

Laurence and Gonzalo first met many years ago when they worked at Kokkari Restaurant. The two worked at several San Francisco restaurants before collaborating at Chez Nous and later at Jossel’s acclaimed Nopa. It was the family meals Gonzalo made at Nopa that inspired the concept of Nopalito three years ago. At Nopalito, Guzman creates traditional Mexican dishes made with locally grown and seasonably available produce and sustainably raised meats. While they do have several popular staples on their menu, many of the dish’s components change weekly to reflect seasonality and highlight what’s good at the market

Dennis Lee, Chef/Owner, Namu Gaji

Dennis was raised eating Korean food in a family of successful restaurateurs. Growing up as part of an Asian minority population in suburban Massachusetts, he experienced an amazing spectrum of foods and learned to cook working in restaurants. Dennis is also influence by Hawaiian food and of course by the ground-breaking and highly-charged food environment of the Bay Area. He is committed to using only the best ingredients – the freshest food possible including items from the family farm. His brothers and his aunt, an expert on fermented foods, are contributing to the success of his latest eating house Namu Gaji in San Francisco, which is garnering local and national acclaim for delicious fusion cuisine.

Steven Kent Mirassou

Steven’s family has been making wine for six generation. In 1996 he started the Steven Kent Winery growing Cabernet Sauvignon with a focus of making the best Bordeaux wine possible. Cabernet has been grown in the Livermore Valley since the late 1800s, but according to the Wine Enthusiast, “Steven Kent is producing today’s greatest Livermore Valley Cabernets, wines that harken back to the valley’s roots as one of California’s best wine regions.”

Leslie Sbrocco

An award-winning author, speaker, wine consultant, television host, and founder of the new multi-media company, Thirsty Girl, Leslie Sbrocco’s entertaining approach makes exploring wine, travel, and food fun. Leslie’s is the host of the PBS television series Check Please! for which she has won a coveted James Beard award, two Tasty Awards, and three Emmy awards. She is the author of Wine for Women and The Simple and Savvy Wine Guide and is working on her third book, Adventures of a Thirsty Girl. Sbrocco is also a featured judge on the PBS national series, The Winemakers, and a regular guest on NBC’s Today Show, where her humor and passion resonates with viewers.

Annie Somerville

Annie Somerville is the Executive Chef at the celebrated Greens Restaurant at Fort Mason in San Francisco. The author of two best-selling cookbooks, “Fields of Greens” (1993) and “Everyday Greens” (2003), Annie is uses garden-fresh produce and cooking based on the seasons. The San Francisco Chronicle noted that, “for beautifully prepared, superbly satisfying vegetarian fare, no restaurant compares with Greens. It is a major culinary landmark, elevating vegetables and grains to a new art form."

Appearing with Annie is Wendy Johnson, a founder of the organic Farm and Garden Program at Green Gulch Farm Zen Center in Marin, a resource of seasonal produce for Annie Somerville. A Buddhist teacher who is engaged in environmental work nationally, Wendy is an adviser to the Edible Schoolyard program of the Chez Panisse Foundation and established garden programs in schools and communities. She is the author of “Gardening at the Dragon’s Gate”.

Staffan Terje, Chef/Owner, Perbacco and Barbacco

Staffan grew up on his grandfather’s farm in Sweden. He moved to California in the mid-80s and worked in several Napa and San Francisco restaurants prior to co-founding Perbacco and Barbacco. Italian food continues to be his culinary calling; he’s a familiar figure at the Ferry Building farmers’ market. “Italian food is about the quality of the ingredients and with what care they are prepared. Food cannot be more honest than that.”

Thy Tran

Thy Tran’s classes in Asian cooking focus on techniques to empower her students. Besides imparting the secrets to making tasty dishes from a range of Asian Cuisines, the knowledgeable chef and author includes history, culture and science in her classes. She is an author and blogger (Bay Area Bites) and the founder and director of the Asian Culinary Forum.

Nico Vera

Nico Vera is the founder, food writer, and chef for Pisco Trail, where he specializes in Peruvian cuisine and Pisco mixology. Pisco Trail’s mission is to promote Peruvian food and culture through pop-ups, dinners, classes. In between sourcing ingredients in The Mission, cooking Peruvian dinners as guest chef at 18 Reasons, and preparing Pisco cocktails and Peruvian desserts for events at Omnivore Books, he shares his adventures and recipes on his blog piscotrail.com where he invites you to visit and learn more about Peruvian food and Pisco cocktails.

Anthony Strong, Executive Chef, Locanda (SF)

Anthony honed his skills with French culinary technique, but when he moved to San Francisco in 2005 to work at Delphina, he found himself tested with seemingly simple items like pizza dough and pasta.  A couple of pilgrimages and an intensive summer in Italy brought him up to speed.  Strong was recently awarded Rising Star Chef 2012 by the San Francisco Chronicle and had led Locanda to a Best New Restaurant award from 7x7 Magazine.