SEATTLE — I still remember the smell of the kitchen at my first job. Bleach, mixed with old fryer oil, cigarette smoke, and French onion soup. I started as a busser; clearing plates, filling waters, bringing out salads.
There was only one woman in the kitchen, the sous chef named Anna. She was impossibly tall, thin and had a dark brown pageboy haircut. She was quiet, barely spoke a word about her private life and never gossiped. Her presence didn’t seem strange to me, but in nearly 20 years working in restaurants, Anna was the only female sous chef I ever worked with. I’ve never worked for a woman head chef, just two line cooks and two pastry chefs.
Yet, women have historically been the cooks in any home. Cooking in private homes for many years was one of the only accepted jobs for a woman — especially if you were a Black woman. Even today women are usually the ones who teach others to cook — yes, even that hot, award-winning chef probably talks about how he learned something from his mom or grandma — either passing down knowledge verbally, writing cookbooks or doing the job I have now, as a food writer.
Way before I ever tapped out an article, women have been writing about food, using a pen to write their way out of the home kitchen — partially so there would be opportunities for women like Anna in that country club kitchen in the ‘90s in North Dakota.