Amy Brandwein, Chef-owner of Centrolina, is a James Beard Foundation Award semifinalist for Best Chef Mid-Atlantic.
 
Ruth Gresser, chef-owner of Pizzeria Paradiso, is a semifinalist for the Outstanding Restaurateur award from the James Beard Foundation.
 
Polly Weidmaier's and husband Chef Robert Weidmaier's Marcel's restaurant is a semifinalist for the James Beard Foundation's Outstanding Hospitality award.

​Patty Collette of PattyCakes, Inc. was named among the "Most Recommended" wedding cake bakers in Washingtonian Weddings magazine for the 25th consecutive year.
 
Toni Tipton-Martin , Pati Jinich, Kristen Hartke and Mary Beth Albright all are IACP 2020 Cuisinart Awards finalists. Mary Beth Albright: Corporate Online Video Series, Secret Table. Kristen Hartke: Narrative Beverage Writing With or Without Recipes, Now, There is Zero Proof That Alcohol Makes a Great Cocktail, NPR The Salt. Pati Jinich: Individual Online Video Series,  #MustEat  and Culinary Television Series, Pati's Mexican Table. Toni Tipton-Martin: Cookbook Awards,  Jubilee: Recipes from Two Centuries of African-American Cooking .  The winners will be announced March 28 at the IACP annual conference in Pittsburgh, PA. 

Pati Jinich interviewed The Washington Post Food Editor Joe Yonan at the Connecticut Avenue Politics and Prose on Tuesday, February 4 about his newest book, Cool Beans: The Ultimate Guide to Cooking with the World's Most Versatile Plant-Based Protein. In his book's acknowledgements,  he thanks Kristen Hartke for her "expert recipe testing, invaluable insight and good-natured outlook."

Johanna Mendelson Forman will lecture at Tshingua University in Beijing to the Schwarzman Fellows in February on Culinary Diplomacy and Social Gastronomy.   Then she will join Venezuelan chef and Chopped  winner Adriana Urbina who is now based in New York on a State Department visit to Peru to promote women entrepreneurs in the food space in Peru. 

Amy Riolo just released her first, private label EVOO- a blend from the Abruzzo region of Italy.  Trappeto di Caprafico, the award-winning estate where the oil is made, is one of the most popular stops on her Heart of Italy and Grape and Truffle Cuisine and Culture tours.

Toni Tipton-Martin's  article "The Legacy of Pralines," with recipes from her new book,  Jubilee: Two Centuries of African American Cooking, appeared in the December issue of Southern Living Magazine.  ​

Johanna Mendelson-Forman will be a speaker on Culinary and Gastrodiplomacy for the "Cooking the Nation" event hosted by New York University in Abu Dhabi.  The event will celebrate the decision by Abu Dhabi to brand the country's cuisine as "Nomadic" and feature the work of Hanan Sayed Worrell who wrote Table Tales: The Global Nomad Cuisine of Abu Dhabi. Johanna also moderated a panel discussion on November 5 for the School of International Service Global to Local: Food Insecurity program that included Ellen Kassoff-Gray as a speaker.
 

Tambra Raye Stevenson will be a panelist with Dr. Jessica Harris and Dr. Psyche Williams-Forson at the 5th Annual Smithsonian Food History Weekend on Saturday, November 9 at 10:30 am at the American History Museum. The moderated panel, "Women Saving Communities Through Food," will focus on women and food activism in American history. Tambra's children's book, Little WANDA Finds a Cure For Nana will be available for purchase at the museum store.  Click here for more information.  ​

​Wendy Bazil reports that the garden writer for the Washington Post wrote an article about the front yard "farmette" that is cultivated by her colleague at the Montgomery County Food Council. Wendy did a plant-based cooking demonstration at the colleague's open house which featured produce from that garden. Read about it and Wendy in the article.
 
Janis McLean, executive chef of the Sound Bites Café at National Public Radio, and Nancy Baggett, author of The Art of Cooking with Lavender, recently teamed up to present a lavender demo and menu for the NPR staff. Said Janis, "Everyone who came in to the cafe was wowed! And the recipes were beyond outstanding!" 
 
The highest "hurrah" to our own Nora Pouillon, named as Les Dames d'Escoffier International's 2019 Grande Dame. She will officially receive this recognition at the LDEI National Conference in Nashville later this month. The owner of this country's first certified-organic restaurant, Restaurant Nora, she has been a member of our Chapter since 1991. Her support of DC Les Dames has been unwavering. Over the years she's hosted many events and meetings in her restaurant space. In fact, Restaurant Nora was where we held our annual meeting in June 2017, the very month she closed the restaurant after its unparalleled 38-year run.