A Luncheon First Course

By Sandy Hu
The latest from Inside Special Fork

Wouldn’t you love to spend a week working with a leading winery, caterer or a specialty farmer for hands-on learning and mentoring? Each year, a few professional women who have had a minimum of four years of work experience are selected for this invaluable opportunity as winners of Les Dames d’Escoffier’s (LDEI) Legacy Awards.

The mentors, women who are tops in their fields, are all distinguished members of LDEI who volunteer for this program to give back by sharing their knowledge. The award program is supported by a donation from The Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts, which was created by Julia Child in 1995 to support non-profit organizations sharing her commitment to educate and encourage others.

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Home from St. Louis

By Sandy Hu

A good conference challenges you to learn new things, re-evaluate what you know and recharge with fresh ideas. And that was exactly how I felt, returning yesterday after four days in St. Louis at the annual Les Dames d'Escoffier (LDEI) conference.

As our website states: "Les Dames d’Escoffier is the only organization of its kind: a worldwide philanthropic society of professional women leaders in the fields of food, fine beverage and hospitality. The invitation-only membership, composed of 28 individual chapters across the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, is highly diversified and reflects the multifaceted fields of contemporary gastronomy and hospitality.”

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