René Redzepi, chef of Copenhagen restaurant Noma has won the Best Chef top 100 award that was announced in the first ever virtual show on September 23.
The event, which had to take place in Rotterdam but was cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic features chefs from 31 countries and includes 34 new names. Spain is the top performer with its 15 chefs in the list.
Last year’s winner Bjorn Frantzen placed second while chef Dan Barber (who also won two additional awards) placed third.
The full list can be found here.
This annual awards gala has always been a global event with chefs from all over the world, travelling from far away to attend the hottest culinary gala. To guarantee everyone’s safety and taking the current COVID regulations into account, this year the world’s leading culinary platform decided to go back to their roots, presenting their Top100 through an online show and hosting hybrid conferences like Area Talks and Food Meet Science.
“We decided not to cancel this year’s event, but to organise it in a #VIRTUAL2020 form. By doing this, we hope to provide a message of strength and positivity to the whole gastronomic world. Cancelling the evening completely would mean demonstrating and highlighting the fragility of the fine dining world and this is not a right message to give. We are far from each other – everyone is at home, at work, in their countries or cities – yet so close, and even more together than before” said Cristian Gadau, Creative Director of The Best Chef project.
The Best Chef rising star award was won by Brazilian Manu Buffara. Rafa Costa e Silva from Brazil won the social media award called Fol-Lovers. This category had been introduced in 2018 to value the opinion of the audience of the Best Chef’s followers on social media.
The best pastry chef award went to Xavi Donna from Spain while the Food art award went to Alex Dilling from the UK. The best chef new entry award winner was Dan Barber from the USA who also won the Best Chef voted by chefs award. Ras us Munk won the best Chef Science award for his research, experimental techniques and transformation.
The Best chef legend award went to Michel Bras, a chef who is no longer active in the kitchen but who still has a crucial impact on the world of gastronomy
Auction for Isabelo Charity
The Best Chef Awards 2020 did not end on 23 September. This year, the winners have decided to donate their awards to an auction that is being organised as from Thursday 24 September.
All information is available here. The total amount collected in the auction will be transferred to Isabelo Charity – a project led by Margot Janse, Dutch Chef. Isabelo was born in 2009, because no child can learn on an empty stomach.
The Best Chef is a concept that was born in 2015. It presents the “Haute Cuisine” world through a digital and social marketing platform, positioning and establishing itself in the digital world as one of the first groups dedicated to serving only the greatest of chefs. The Best Chef’s strategy and its close contacts with followers resulted in more than 1.2 million social media followers, mainly in Europe, Asia and the United States
The Best Chef Awards, is a network of world’s best chefs and social media influence. The chefs are awarded based on their skills, experience and accomplishments. They are selected through the voting done by their peers and a group of professionals. Each year, 100 new chefs are selected by The Best Chef’s collaborators and added to the previous year’s Top100 list. Next, all the chefs included begin to vote for their peers. The chefs have 10 choices, counting for 1000 points to 100 points, in order to decide who will be the last 100 chef finalists. They vote for the chef as a person, recognising his talent, experience, potential as well as his personality. Also culinary professionals, photographers, artists, and fol-LOVERS vote for their favourite chefs in the Top100 list. The culinary professionals vote via a secured survey. In the last stage of the voting procedure the fol-LOVERS can vote via the web page of The Best Chef.
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