It is not easy to be wholly dedicated to careers at the expense of one’s own family and social responsibilities, discovers Uma Nair as she speaks to a few women chefs around the city
Studies and research on women chefs the world over are few and far between. However, a 2014 research came as a huge surprise to Joanna James, a journalist-turned-filmmaker who is also the daughter of a female restaurateur, Val James. When she decided to make her first documentary about her mother’s journey as a chef, restaurant owner and a single mother, she had no idea that her mother’s struggle to establish herself in the culinary industry was an ordinary step among other women.
Joanna James’s film, A Fine Line unveiled as a love note to her mom in which she chronicled the difficulties that Val James overcame, from finding bank loans to babysitters — as she established her own restaurant in the early 1990s in central Massachusetts. Eventually the documentary grew into a much bigger story filled with dozens of additional voices from across the industry. “I suddenly realised that what my mother had faced was part of a larger discussion. I wanted my mom’s story to be the compelling factor that moved everything forward, but to also weave in the stories of other female chefs,” said James.
The Indian story
Moving to the Indian scene. There are few women chefs who climbed up the ladder to executive chef domains. One remembers Neeta Nagaraj of Taj Hotels who joined Jaypee. She was a front runner in research as well as haute cuisine diplomacy, if not an inspiration to many younger women chefs across the country. Despite numerous examples and testimonies on the internet, few studies have been done on the challenges and success of women chefs. Even lesser studies are done with an aim to identify the barriers women face and how they have succeeded to achieve top chefs’ positions in different specifics of culinary haute cuisine.
Fewer still are objective evaluations of an entrepreneurial path, its motives, and the advantages it offers to these women chefs. Among the few who have climbed the ladder is chef Veena from The Imperial who has a number of awards and accolades up her sleeve. Humble yet ingenious, versatile and charming, her prowess at Thai cuisine goes back to her days in South East Asia and her family kitchen in which she watched the matriarchs cook up different authentic recipes. In India there are very few executive chefs among women.
At the Imperial ever since 1996, chef Veena has been attached to the Spice Route Kitchen, as their Chef De Cuisine creating cutting edge globally-renowned menus for every season and occasion, throughout the year. In her two decade long association, she continues to create different versions of South East Asian cuisine for Neo-Thai food lovers. Spice Route’s reckoning among the best names on the global haute cuisine graph is something chef Veena is proud of.
Gender perceptions
While most might not voice it, but barriers for women chefs are many. These include gender perceptions about their skills, capabilities and conforming to the work-life balance. To face them, they have to be resilient while at the same time keep learning and continue to prove their competence at all times and at all levels. There are also very few instances of women chefs being given the chance to acquire management and leadership skills. It is not easy to be wholly dedicated to careers at the expense of one’s own family and social responsibilities.
History is full of examples of women who in pursuit of better balance moved to other niches of the profession or followed the entrepreneurial path. The need of the hour then is better time management, flexibility and opportunities for professional evolution. Studying women in management positions in this Haute Cuisine field is particularly interesting because of the dichotomy of cooking which is considered a female task in the domestic sphere and male one in the professional. In India too we are in dire need of qualitative and quantitative research so as to research gender barriers and success factors for women to leadership.
The research statistics also show that many female chefs believe that offering mentorships and apprenticeships, and having them in leadership positions, is critical to establishing equal opportunities within the workplace and policies that provide more work-life balance. Of great fame are some organisations that are set up to help advancement of career and leadership avenues for women. In India too we need organisations like the James Beard Foundation and Les Dames d’Escoffier that have established programmes aimed specifically at helping women advance within the culinary industry. Indeed this Women’s Day, we must admit we have a long way to go.