As the Trump administration rolls back support for the LGBTQ+ community, celebrating queerness in the food world takes on a renewed sense of urgency this year.
Boston just celebrated its third annual Big Queer Food Fest. The prestigious James Beard Foundation has honoured three participating chefs: Boston chef won a best chef award, and chef of Nashville was a semi-finalist. of New York received the foundation鈥檚 leadership award for her work training incarcerated youth in the food and hospitality industry.
The three chefs joined Here & Now in the studio.
You鈥檙e here for the Big Queer Food Fest. The culinary world has historically been a place that has been dominated mostly by white men. Tell me about your journey.
Arnold Myint: 鈥溾�奍 was born and raised in the business. So I was born in Nashville, Tennessee. My parents opened the first Asian market and Thai restaurant in the [1970s].
鈥淚 actually did not pick food as my career to begin with. I was a professional figure skater and I toured the world and ate my way around the world and then ended up falling into food as an excuse to stay in New York 鈥檆ause my dad would pay for education. So I faked culinary school, but I fell in love with it. And now my parents passed. So I just took over the business with my sister and now I cook full time and I love it.鈥�
Mavis-Jay Sanders: 鈥溾�奍 don鈥檛 wanna say that the industry has been dominated by white men. 鈥奍 wanna say that they are the people who made the organizations that shine a light on people. And so that鈥檚 who they highlighted. But when you think about who feeds people, I鈥檝e never been in a kitchen where there isn鈥檛 some queer component, you know, that is a mainstay or a backbone of it, or some ethnic component that is a mainstay or a backbone of it.鈥�
Karen Akunowicz: 鈥溾�奡o much of our queer history is not told because folks had to be in the closet because it wasn鈥檛 safe for them to be out. So their stories have not been told or represented in the way that they should be because they could not be their true selves. And in a time right now, in 2025, when our community is being erased, we are going back to that time our trans brothers and sisters are being erased, our community is being erased. And that鈥檚 very reminiscent of so much of queer history.鈥�
What鈥檚 the importance of creating safe spaces for queer people to work in food and safe dining spaces?
Myint: 鈥溾�奀ooking has always been a safe space for me. The kitchen has always been a place where the misfits always got to come together and support each other. You know, whether you鈥檙e a rock star or fully tatted, we鈥檙e all gonna have a beer and a whiskey at the end of the night.
鈥淚 never felt more comfortable than being in a kitchen at my early years, you know, with all the other bros and the dudes in there too, throwing down because it was just like, at the end of the day, what we鈥檙e serving on our plate has nothing to do with what we do after being in the kitchen. Right? So I鈥檝e always felt that the kitchen has always been a safe place for minorities, for all genders, all races. And that鈥檚 how I treat my kitchen now, too.鈥�
Sanders: 鈥溾�奍 think there鈥檚 also something very special about the fact that your kitchen is like your family鈥檚 kitchen. Right? So that is definitely gonna be a space that was like created for you. And because of that, and it is like a family environment, it鈥檚 going to be open and like your parents want to protect you. They wanna make sure that you have a good space.
鈥淐oming from fine dining restaurants, not so much. I definitely did work in, you know, some male-dominated kitchens, white men, like cis-hetero kind of situation. In the kitchen, we were targeted. The hard part about being like a [masculine] queer woman is people don鈥檛 take sexual harassment seriously. They look at you and they鈥檙e like, 鈥極h, no, it鈥檚 fine.鈥� Or like, even like I had like a gay man, he was a little more effeminate counterpart at a restaurant at one point, and you know, he was being harassed, but it was also by people who were down low who were afraid of coming out and were like super, like masculine. And so I think that there are special places that are very unique, but there鈥檚 a lot of places that can be harmful. 鈥夾nd it is incumbent. And that鈥檚 why I love like being in this space right here and with these leaders, because you鈥檙e talking to the people who have fought to shine a light on what our industry should look like across the board.鈥�
How do you think about the workplace you want to create?
Akunowicz: 鈥淲e opened Fox & the Knife six and a half years ago and we opened Bar Volpe three years ago, and we always felt very clear about the kind of space we wanted. A space that was inclusive of everyone and where everyone was accepted exactly how they are and for who they are. We care what your pronouns are. Some of it鈥檚 just common sense in how you would want things done, and unfortunately, that鈥檚 not the way that I was necessarily raised in restaurants.
鈥淚t was not always the kindest place coming up in kitchens. I was almost always the only woman. And as somebody who鈥檚 queer and has been my entire life and is more feminine presenting, I always got the like, 鈥榊ou鈥檙e not really gay. You鈥檙e not really queer.鈥� And I was like, 鈥榤m, yeah, I am.鈥� And the harassment that I encountered was a little bit different. I definitely had moments where I fought back or was angry and I definitely had moments where I was like, 鈥榟a ha ha.鈥� And you kind of like get along to go along. 鈥夾nd I鈥檓 not proud of that, but like as a 24-year-old person in a kitchen trying to be in a career that I was very passionate and dedicated to, you know, there鈥檚 a lot of that as well. And you just don鈥檛 want anyone to have to go through what you went through.鈥�
Myint: 鈥溾�奙y fine dining experience was somewhat different, I guess because I鈥檓 a male maybe. I was younger and I just really just hunkered down and let my work speak for what I could do. It makes me sad to hear this from your angle because I think I would probably be working next to you, not even realize that鈥檚 happening. So it鈥檚 interesting to see the perspective.鈥�
Akunowicz: 鈥溾�奍 think there鈥檚 the piece of putting your head down and working hard, right. It鈥檚 just you鈥檙e not always acknowledged for the work that you do in the same way. I was passed over for promotions and passed over to move up to the next station. When I was a line cook, when I knew that I was working harder, doing more and was a much better cook than the guy standing next to me and was looked over for things like that.鈥�
Is there a particular moment in your career that led you to where you are now?
Sanders: 鈥娾�漎es, I used to work in fine dining restaurants. I love it. I love the pomp and circumstance. Do not get wrong with me. I鈥檒l put gold leaf and caviar on anything.
鈥淎nd one day, I was working in this restaurant and they had been doing like a series of popups. They were bringing up all these like world-famous chefs in every single day there was a different chef, different menu.
鈥淎nd I was leaving one night and the streets were flooded with people yelling, 鈥業 can鈥檛 breathe.鈥� It was a time when Eric Garner had been murdered, and . And people who were protesting and literally screaming at the top of their lungs that they can鈥檛 breathe. And it took a second, I went back into the restaurant and it was guttural. And I was like, 鈥極h, I have to go do something else.鈥� I have a talent. I could make a decision in that moment. I could keep doing food in a way that is just ego-driven or I could turn and do something that I feel like was really gonna change the world on a human level, not just an ideation of pretty plates.鈥�
Akunowicz: 鈥溾�奍鈥檝e done every job that there is to do in a restaurant, and I was living in Boston and I was working as a cocktail waitress and I was working at Planned Parenthood, and I had to have two jobs because I couldn鈥檛 make ends meet otherwise.
鈥淚 was talking about going to grad school. I was applying to school to get my MSW, my master鈥檚 in social work. And my girlfriend at the time looked at me and said, 鈥榶ou know, I know like what you wanna do and you wanna help people, but you really only ever talk about what you would do someday if you owned your own restaurant.鈥�
鈥淚 always say that was an aha moment, but it was also an oh s*** moment, right? I was like. Oh man, I鈥檓 gonna do this for the rest of my life. I have to be honest with myself. I鈥檓 not gonna have a real job. And I got really quiet. And I got really quiet for about two weeks because when I鈥檓 thinking about something, I鈥檓 an internal processor, not an external processor. 鈥夾nd so thought about it, thought about it, and two weeks later I enrolled in culinary school.
Myint: 鈥娾�滻t鈥檚 more recent than my resume reads. I didn鈥檛 feel really taken seriously when I was trying to pursue different projects in Nashville. And it took my parents鈥� passing, it took both of their deaths, for me to really hone in on healing.
鈥淚t was a place of discovery of my roots. I was just kind of this like the gay next door that can do everything. I can iron a linen, I can pick a wine list, I can decorate a restaurant, design great concepts, but like cooking my mother鈥檚 food and the flavors of my heritage really gave me my voice.
鈥淪o really, I feel like I鈥檓 in my prime in the last three years of my cooking career. My identity is clear, my vision is clear, and like my cooking is very, very signature.鈥�
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