Edible Cities

Canada

Claude GAUDREAULT

Claude Gaudreault (M. Ps.) is an expert in strategic coaching as well as in the assessment of senior managers. Claude is known for her outstanding ability to combine her organizational psychology expertise with her solid knowledge of today’s business world and her experience in management. Based on her many years of research and practice, Claude’s approach to coaching engagements pairs a solid understanding of the needs of the sponsoring organization with a focus on the optimization of the client’s potential as a contributor.

Claude is recognized for her capacity to grasp the organizational and personal stakes in each engagement and to balance providing judicious advice while allowing her clients to maximize their personal capacity to design and implement their own interventions. A francophone coach, Claude is based in Montreal.

Key Accomplishments

• Claude is a frequent speaker/conference presenter on Assessing Leadership Potential and the High-Achieving Manager for organizations including the Association des MBA du Québec, the Chambre de commerce du Montréal métropolitain and ressources humaines et en relations industrielles agréés du Québec, and the Université de Montréal. She has also been a Lecturer in Organizational Behaviour at École des Haute Études Commerciales

• As a recognized authority in the field, she has given numerous Human Resource Management topic interviews on television channels TVA, RDI and Canal Vie, and has contributed to magazine articles in Les affaires, PME, Châtelaine, Premières en affaires et Premiers en affaires.

Experience

Adapted to the needs of today’s business world, Claude’s coaching has been acknowledged by the numerous senior executives she has coached who have demonstrated their satisfaction by repeatedly approaching her for her strategic insight and coaching expertise

Claude is Founder & President of Perspective, Psychologie Organisationnelle Inc. She was Senior Consultant & Manager for two other consulting firms. Her clients have included Cirque du Soleil, Glaxo Smith Kline, Bell Média, TC Transcontinental, Price Waterhouse Coopers, Hydro-Québec, Société Radio-Canada.

Sweden

Christina MERKER-SIESJÖ

Christina Merker-Siesjö is the founder and boardwoman of the successful social enterprise and women´s cooperative Yalla Trappan in Rosengård, Malmö.

Christina has been working with questions regarding diversity, integration and equality for many years. Among many things she was elected into the board of a cooperation between a public authority and NGOs. She shares her experiences of the startup with Yalla Trappan in the book “Yalla Trappan – så gjorde vi”. 

Her work effort is filled with passion and knowledge and characterized with a huge amount of commitment for those who has little and needs a lot.

In 2017 she was rewarded with the glory price “Årets yrkeskvinna” by Business and Professional Women BPW.

UK

Carolyn STEEL

Carolyn Steel is an architect (MA (Hons) Cantab RIBA) and a leading thinker on food and cities.

Her 2008 book Hungry City: How Food Shapes Our Lives has won international acclaim, and her concept of ‘sitopia’ (food-place) is widely recognised in the emergent field of food urbanism.

Carolyn has been a visiting lecturer and design tutor at Cambridge University, London Metropolitan and Wageningen Universities, and was inaugural studio director of the London School of Economics Cities Programme.

A director of Kilburn Nightingale Architects in London, Carolyn writes and broadcasts regularly and is in international demand as a speaker, and spoke at TEDGlobal in 2008.

France

Apollonia POILÂNE

Apollonia Poilâne (1984) is the third generation to run the bakery founded in 1932 by her grandfather in the Saint Germaine-des-Pres district of Paris, and developed both in France and internationally by her father Lionel Poilâne.

Cradled in a bread basket by the passion that her father vowed to his craft, Apollonia naturally chose her path. She feeds her own passion by learning and working in the bakery on the Rue du Cherche-Midi, where her father also learned his trade.

Following the accidental death of Ibu and Lionel Poilâne in 2002, Apollonia and Athena ensure the continuity of the family business.

From 2003 to 2007, Apollonia presided over the company while studying economics in Boston. Organizing regular exchanges with her teams, phone calls, emails, video conferencing, and frequent trips between Boston and Paris enabled her to work full-time overseeing her managers.

Apollonia fully adheres to her father’s philosophy: favor quality over quantity. She is also a worthy successor to the “retro-innovation” culture dear to Lionel Poilâne: take the best of the past and combine it with the best of the present. Apollonia has not changed the manufacturing methods. More than 85 years after the founding of the bakery, Poilâne ® breads are always leavened, handmade and baked over a wood fire. At the same time, Apollonia is resolutely turned towards the future.

Since she took the business over, Apollonia opened 2 more boutiques in Paris (the Buttes-Chaumont bakery opened in Nov 2017), a second UK address in Chelsea London, and the first Poilâne bakery in Antwerp, mid 2016. The introduction of new products (a gingerbread, small spoon shaped cookies, granola, a Pepper Loaf, buns, Yule logs, cornbread, buckwheat biscuits…), and the development of the dealer network, in France and abroad, testify to the will of Apollonia to move forward and pass the family business one day to a 4th generation Poilâne.

France

Anne-Sophie PIC

Anne-Sophie Pic was born into a long line of chefs. She grew up in Valence (France), watching her father daily at work in his restaurant. Her first career choice was in commerce which took her overseas, notably to Tokyo and New York. After a stint in luxury goods, she interned in the Champagne region where she discovered a passion for blending wines. This drew her back to the family restaurant where she was to train under her father. Tragically, he died suddenly and she was forced to learn on the job, using only her intuition and natural ability. “All I had to guide me in the kitchen was my sense of smell and my palate”, she says.

Since then, she has gone on to great heights, through her love of technique, her boundless creativity and her gift for enhancing local produce. «My cooking is all about the balance of strong aromatics and delicate presentation, » she says. Her refined yet cutting edge approach has won her multiple accolades, including the rare honour of obtaining three Michelin stars consistently since 2007. In addition, she has been named Chef of the Year 2007, Best Female Chef in the World 2011 – the Veuve Cliquot award in the World’s 50 Restaurants list, Knight of the Legion of Honour in 2011…

Having successfully maintained the family business in Valence – the 5 star Maison Pic Hotel and 3 Michelin starred restaurant, Ms Pic has expanded into new ventures such as  the Michelin-starred La Dame de Pic in Paris (opened in 2011) and London’s La Dame de Pic ( which launched in 2017 in the Four Seasons Ten Trinity Square) as well as the two-Michelin Hotel Beau-Rivage in Switzerland. To pass on her culinary knowledge to a wider audience, she also set up the Scook cooking school in Valence in 2008 and has published her personal recipes under the same title.

UK

Alex KRATENA

Alex is the founder of industry non-for profit P(OUR) and former Head Bartender of Artesian, London, where he has led the bar and his team to win multiple awards. 

Artesian was recognized as Number 1 for  four consecutive years in the World’s 50 Best Bar Awards. Alex has also collected several personal awards including “Best International Bartender” (2012), at Tales of the Cocktail and “Bar Personality of the Year 2013” by Imbibe Magazine. 

In November 2015, Alex left Artesian to pursue a new joint project with Simone Caporale and Monica Berg. 

Alex has been featured in Creators list 2016 as one of the 40 most influential individuals shaping the future of global bar industry.

Italy

Franca ROIATTI

Franca Roiatti is responsible for the communication of the Milan’s food policy and the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact.

As a journalist, she has worked for radio, TV, newspapers and magazines. A passionate of food and sustainability issues she is the author of two books and a documentary on the land grabbing phenomenon and the alternatives ways to produce and purchase food.

She has lectured and has participated in several conferences, workshops, and expert panels on landgrabbing, food policies, food security, and sustainable food production.

Ireland

Fintan KEENAN

Fintan Keenan is a native of Ireland but now lives in Denmark where he works as an organic grain farmer and flour miller on Mørdrupgård (Kornby Mølle).

Together with Per Grupe they specialise in growing heritage varieties of grain specifically for organic flour production. On average they grow over 150 varieties yearly in test plots for research and development purposes. The test plots can range in size from 1m2 to one hectare.

Fintan is currently working on reviving heritage varieties of wheat that were once grown in Ireland. Together with his brother, who’s based in Ireland, they have identified, sourced and sown 17 heritage wheat varieties that were last seen in Ireland in the 1930’s, the results of which will be seen at the harvest in 2018.

Additionally, Fintan designs and builds tailor-made flour milling plants for the production of quality, wholesome, artisanal flour. This includes manufacturing stone mills that are specifically suited to the grain types from the local region where the flourmill will be based.

Sweden

Edith SALMINEN

Born in Finland, raised in Vietnam, studied in France and Italy, and now settled in Sweden, Edith is an eclectic food professional who gets her kicks from all things food.

As a social-anthropologist and holistic gastronome, she works with projects that are anchored in observing and analyzing various food related patterns, trends and behavior in society and in cultural expression.

Currently, Edith manages a food space called Gro’up in Malmö where food and food culture are used as social tools to drive change and raise awareness in the Swedish foodscape.

Germany

Denise LOGA

Denise is the co-founder and managing director of the Berlin-based Sustainable Food Academy, which offers B2B services for executives working in food business contexts. Their approach is to contribute to more sustainable and economically viable food systems while exploring multidisciplinary future food scenarios, innovative catering solutions and effective customer communication.

Denise is a sustainability expert and trend scout with the thematic focus on “Future Food“. She also has a background in international climate policy and develops answers to questions like: In what way will changing societal values and planetary boundaries impact our diets in the future? How will the consumption preferences of next generations reshape current food business structures and value chains? How do food companies and customers communicate more successfully with each other? 

As a strategic policy consultant, project manager and researcher, Denise previously worked for the United Nations (UN), the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in the areas of climate policy & economic development. She acquired professional experience in various countries (China, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Philippines, Vietnam, UK, Peru, etc.) by advising diverse public and private decision-makers. 

Denise holds a bachelor’s degree in “International Business / East Asian Management (B.A.)” and a Master (M.Sc.) in “Development Management“ from the London School of Economics and Political Sciences (LSE).

Norway

Monica Berg

Monica Berg is one of the leading bartenders to come out of Scandinavia, with a background from Oslo, Norway.

She is highly praised for her innovative flavor combinations and experimental techniques, as well as her minimalistic and elegant style when it comes to cocktails.

After moving to London in summer 2013, she joined Jason Atherton’s famed Michelin starred Mayfair restaurant, Pollen Street Social, where she honed her food & drinks paring skills.

Since leaving the restaurant, she has continued her pursuits in the culinary world, focusing on projects that include both kitchen and bar. This includes food pairing pop ups and events in Barcelona, Lima, Copenhagen, New York and Edinburgh

In 2015, Monica was awarded the Linie Honorary Award, an award given to individuals for their great ambassadorship for Norwegian food and drink culture.

Today Monica works on various projects, the latest being Himkok, a unique distillery bar in Oslo, where she was part of the bar & creative team from 2015-2017. The bar was Top 10 for Best New International Cocktail Bar at Spirited Awards 2016 and was included in Worlds 50 Best Bars 2016 & 2017.

She is the co-founder of P(OUR), an industry non profit, which works to share knowledge within the drinks industry through an online platform (www.pourdrink.org ) and an annual Symposium.

Denmark

Melina SHANNON-DIPIETRO

Melina Shannon-DiPietro is Executive Director of MAD, the non-profit organization founded by René Redzepi of restaurant noma. MAD inspires and assists chefs, servers, and the food community at large to make a difference in their restaurants, communities and the world at large – and improving how food is grown, cooked, eaten, and discussed around the world—now and in the future.

Melina has been building programs, public dialogue, and partnerships that transform our understanding of food, community, and environment for fifteen years. Prior to MAD, she was Director of Food & Revenue Strategies for Friends of the High Line, the organization that transformed an abandoned elevated rail line into one of New York City’s best-loved public parks. Melina began her career as co-founder of the Yale Sustainable Food Program.

Originally from Albany, New York, Melina now lives in Copenhagen, Denmark.

USA

Lisa ABEND

Lisa Abend is a correspondent for Time magazine. Based in Copenhagen, she also writes frequently about food and travel for AFAR, Saveur, The New York Times, Vice, and other newspapers and magazines.

She is the author of The Sorcerer’s Apprentices: A Season in the Kitchen of Ferran Adrià’s elBulli.

Colombia

Leonor ESPINOSA

Although she studied Art, graduated in Economics and then worked in advertising, today Leonor Espinosa makes cooking her profession and source of inspiration.

In charge of the Leo and Misia restaurants in Bogotá, she has proveen to be one of the most creative and talented chefs of Latinamerica. In 2017, Leonor won the Basque Culinary World Prize 2017, a prize for chefs who transform society through gastronomy, for her work at Funleo: a foundation with witch she vindicates the ancestral knowledge of Colombian populations, especially indigenous and Afro-Colombian.

Espinosa is committed to generating processes of culinary innovation that integrate the different actors of the food chain, into structures that serve to connect the knowledge and needs of rural communities with the opportunities and demands of big cites.

Italy

Lara GILMORE

Lara Gilmore was born in Washington, DC in 1968.

Before meeting her husband and chef, Massimo Bottura, she worked in New York at the avant-garde performance space The Kitchen and at Aperture Magazine. After a fateful encounter with the chef in 1993 in New York City, she moved to Modena and the couple opened Osteria Francescana two years later in 1995.

Lara and Massimo have a shared passion for contemporary art that has altered the look of the restaurant over the years and tainted the kitchen with ideas from outside the culinary forum. She has worked in the culinary world for more than 20 years as an integral part of the behind-the-scenes team of Osteria Francescana, ensuring its growth and working on international marketing and communications. 

Together with Massimo, Lara launched “Food for Soul” as a way of redefining the role of traditional soup kitchens. Lara continues to dedicate her ideas and energy to making “Food for Soul” reach the wider community and involving professionals from all over the world in the mission of the non-profit organization. She also worked closely to Massimo to realize the cookbook “Bread is Gold” on over 50 chefs’  recipes and personal experiences at “Refettorio Ambrosiano”, Food for Soul’s pilot project in Milan (Italy).

UK

Kate HOFMAN

BA (Hons) English Literature and Education, MSc Environmental Technology and Business

Kate always wanted to work for a business that improved the world. Prior to starting GrowUp Urban Farms, Kate worked as a change management consultant for IBM, working on large-scale business and IT transformation programmes.

Whilst on a sabbatical year studying at Imperial College London, Kate fell in love with the idea of aquaponics as a sustainable way of commercially growing food for London, the city she grew up in and has lived in all her life.

Kate founded GrowUp at the start of 2013, London’s first commercial aquaponics urban farming business. She thinks that innovation and sustainability are at the core of the best businesses. She’s passionate about proving that urban food production can make a meaningful contribution to the way we feed people in cities, at the same time as creating skilled training and job opportunities.

GrowUp has been listed at the “Virgin Media Business Disruptors to Watch 10” in the annual Sunday Times Virgin Fast Track 100.

Joanna Savill

Joanna Savill is a longtime journalist and events director who specialises in food, travel and gastronomy. She has written for most major food publications in Australia, edited the country’s most prestigious restaurant guide and presented a long-running TV series on Australia’s many diverse food cultures, farmers and artisan producers.

She is widely known for her support of all aspects of the food and restaurant industry – from the farm to the table – and for her deep concern for our food future.

She has supported Parabere Forum since the first edition in Bilbao and is a strong champion of its objectives.

Australia

Indira NAIDOO

Indira Naidoo is one of Australia’s most popular broadcasters.

During her 30-year award-winning journalistic career, Ms Naidoo has hosted and reported for some of the country’s most distinguished news and current affair programs – including ABC’s LATE EDITION nightly news and as an anchor and reporter for SBS TV’s the WORLD NEWS TONIGHT.

In recent years Indira’s journalistic interest has shifted to the role global environmental issues play in conflict, poverty and food security.

She has been the media manager for consumer advocacy group CHOICE where she created the much-anticipated, now yearly, SHONKY awards, and in 2008 was a Geneva-based sustainability consultant with the United Nations’ trade development arm – The International Trade Centre.

In 2009 Indira was selected from 2000 applicants to be trained by former US Vice President Al Gore as a climate change presenter and launched Al Gore’s second film ‘An Inconvenient Sequel.

Her first book, the best-selling ‘The Edible Balcony’ published in 2011, about growing food in small spaces, has been released in London, Hong Kong and New York. Her second book – ‘The Edible City’ – about community gardening – was published in 2015.

Indira has designed two award-winning gardens for the Australian Garden Show Sydney, in Centennial Park, and through her garden company helps community groups build their own food gardens. In 2017 Indira was a guest presenter on ABC TV’s longest-running garden program ‘Gardening Australia’.

For the past 10 years Indira has also been an ambassador for Sydney’s homeless crisis centre the Wayside Chapel.

She helped establish the Wayside Chapel’s award-winning rooftop vegetable garden and conducts garden classes for its homeless visitors. In 2017 she hosted the ratings-winning TV series ‘Filthy Rich and Homesless’ for SBS TV which shone a spotlight on the growing problem of homelessness in Australia.

Denmark

Trine HAHNEMANN

Trine Hahnemann is a well-known personality in Danish food and food culture. As the owner and CEO of Hahnemanns Køkken she is behind about 3000 daily lunches in private and public companies in the Copenhagen area. The company works towards a sustainable lunch. A chef and food writer, she is an enthusiastic advocate for sustainable solutions, organic sourcing and food cooked with love.

Trine spends her time cooking, writing, and is often used as a keynote speaker across the world. She has talked and cooked at TEDxKrakow and at The Nordic Council of Ministers event at Rio+20.

She is the co-founder of the on-going Rye Bread Project launched in NYC. Trine has written nine cookbooks in her native Danish and also four in English.

USA

Stephanie SWANE

Stephanie Swane is the publisher and editorial director of Modernist Cuisine’s in-house publishing department The Cooking Lab. She develops and leads new publishing projects and partnership opportunities. She has brought over 25 years of experience working on custom books, global sales, brand management, foreign rights, and licensing to the team.

Stephanie leads the editorial team in writing and publishing Modernist Cuisine’s latest book released in November 2017, Modernist Bread, a 2,642 page multi-volume set. Over the last four years she has traversed the globe to help the team research bread from every imaginable angle. Stephanie has met with experts in baking, milling, agriculture, production, history, fermentation and beyond. She regularly attends industry workshops and conferences that cover all aspects of baking, from commercial production to cereal science.

Prior to joining Modernist Cuisine, Stephanie worked with publishers that include Becker&Mayer!, Simon & Schuster, Penguin Putnam, Reader’s Digest Children’s Publishing, and Golden Books. She has worked with a diverse group of global brands, retailers, wholesalers, publishers and licensors, ranging from Williams-Sonoma to NBC/Universal, CBS/Paramount, Hasbro, Fox, Disney/Lucasfilm, Barnes & Noble, Target, Phaidon Books and Amazon Publishing.

She holds a M.A. in Media Studies from The New School and B.A. in Fine Art and Art History from University of Wisconsin-Madison.

When not working on the next Modernist Cuisine project, Stephanie can be found in her Seattle garden. True to her North Dakota farming roots, she enjoys growing native vegetables and fruits, including varieties of wheat and rye. She loves all things fermentation—from pickling to beer brewing. An avid artist and crafter, you can also find her selling her art at fairs around the city. Stephanie is also an active member of BBGA, AACI, PNBA, ABA, Maine Grain Alliance, IACP, Real Bread Campaign, AIB, NW Science Writers Association and NW Editors Guild.

Australia

Ronni KAHN

Ronni Kahn is the Founder and CEO of OzHarvest, Australia’s leading food rescue organisation.

Driven by a passion to make a difference and stop good food going to waste; she started in 2004 with one van in Sydney.  After changing the law to make it safe for companies to donate surplus food, she has grown OzHarvest nationally and is now taking the unique food rescue model global.

Before she rescued food, Ronni had a successful events business for many years, where she realised the huge amounts of food going to waste.

She grew up in South Africa and spent nearly 20 years on a Kibbutz in Israel, before moving to Australia in 1988. Ronni is now a powerhouse in the fight against global food waste and was awarded Australia’s Local Hero of the Year in 2010 for her work as a social entrepreneur.

 Ronni enjoys swimming and walking at Bondi Beach and practices yoga daily.

Denmark

René REDZEPI

René Redzepi is head chef and co-owner of noma in Copenhagen, Denmark. In February 2017, noma closed its original location after 14 years. In February 2018, noma will reopen in a new location on Refshaleøen, with an even stronger focus on seasonality.

Redzepi is the author of Noma: Time and Place in Nordic Cuisine,  A Work in Progress, and recently announced an upcoming series called the Foundations of Flavour intended for home cooks. The first in the series, Foundations of Flavour: The Noma Guide to Fermentation, will come out in October 2018.

In 2011, he founded MAD, a nonprofit organization that brings together a global cooking community with a social conscience, a sense of curiosity, and an appetite for change. In August 2017, MAD launched VILDMAD, a program and app for people of all ages designed to teach everyone how to be a forager, and how to cook everyday meals with wild ingredients.

He is married to Nadine Levy Redzepi, and together they have three daughters; Arwen, Genta and Ro.