Each year the James Beard Foundation selects the chefs it considers the best from 10 regions across the nation, honoring them with awards often dubbed the "Oscars" of the food world.
The Beard awards honor chefs, restaurateurs and cookbook writers who follow in the footsteps of James Beard, considered the dean of American cooking when he died in 1985.
The foundation recently named the top regional chefs of 2008. They are:
Great Lakes
Carrie Nahabedian of Naha in Chicago
Cooking came early to Carrie Nahabedian. As a teenager, she cooked her way through entire Provence cookbook from her mother's Time Life series. Later, she turned down her acceptance at the Culinary Institute of America, deciding she she could learn more from practical experience.
After building her reputation as a strong, all-around chef in Chicago, Nahabedian, 49, was tapped by the Park Hyatt. She then became executive sous chef at the new Four Seasons Chicago.
Nahabedian stayed with Four Seasons for 10 years, including stints in Santa Barbara and Los Angeles at Beverly Hills before returning to Chicago eight years ago to open Naha.
Using French technique, Naha combines her Armenian roots, California lifestyle and Mediterranean influence to produce innovative dishes. She emphasizes locally farmed ingredients and handcrafted items, producing entrees such as crisp Chesapeake Bay soft shell crabs and white corn grits with a wilted salad of pea shoots, tomatoes and braising greens, macadamia nut brown butter and candied Meyer lemon.
Mid-Atlantic
Eric Ziebold of CityZen in Washington
Eric Ziebold is known for his unique style of modern American cuisine in a city where steakhouses and politics once dominated. Changing the menu every month, Ziebold keeps it simple and fresh, but certainly not boring.
The 36-year-old mixes his own interpretations and classic French style to serve up specialties such as pan seared duck breast with fois gras or poached Maine lobster with roasted beech mushrooms.
He's also been known to favor unusual animal parts, such as calf's brains and tripe.
He left the renowned French Laundry in California's Napa Valley after eight years to open CityZen in the Mandarin Oriental hotel in 2004.
A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, Ziebold began his career in Washington at Vidalia before heading west as a chef de partie at Spago Restaurant.
Midwest
Adam Siegel of Bartolotta's Lake Park Bistro in Milwaukee
When he was just 9 years old, Adam Siegel was addicted to television cooking shows. By 14, he was helping at his stepfather's restaurant. From there, it was a short step to culinary school at Kendall College in Chicago.
Siegel, 35, received his formative training at Spiaggia under chef Paul Bartolotta. He spent three years at Spiaggia, then asked Bartolotta to arrange for him to study with chef Julian Serrano at Masa's in San Francisco.
After two years there, Siegel ventured to Italy for a year at the Michelin two star Ristorante San Domenico in Imola with Chef Valentino Marcattilii. Siegel returned to the U.S. to work with celebrity chef Todd English.
In his own restaurant, Siegel offers a modern take on traditional bistro fare. He tries not to mix too many ingredients and relies on tried and true flavor combinations.
New York
David Chang of Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York
At age 30, David Chang is awash in praise. Food & Wine magazine named him one of the country's Best New Chefs in 2006, GQ and Gourmet magazines both named him 2007 Chef of the Year, and the James Beard Foundation declared him 2007's Rising Chef of the Year.
All this for a chef with a temper, who loves pork fat and would rather not serve vegetarians.
Chang's first generation Korean family wanted him to go into law or finance, but he studied religion at Trinity College in Connecticut and graduated without a plan.
During his early 20s, he traveled, living in London, teaching English in Japan, before returning to the U.S. and eventually enrolling in culinary school.
He worked at Mercer Kitchen and Craft in New York, and later returned to Japan, where he worked at a small soba shop, then at a restaurant in the Tokyo Park Hyatt, followed by a year at CafDe Boulud in New York.
He says he decided to open his own restaurant with partner and co-chef Joquin Baca after becoming disenchanted with fine dining. On his own, Chang whips up dinner offerings of crispy lamb belly with cippolini onions, violet mustard or spicy pork sausage and rice cakes with Chinese broccoli and crispy shallots.
Northeast
Patrick Connolly of Radius in Boston
Once the St. Louis native moved east for culinary school at Johnson & Wales University, Patrick Connolly never looked back. After school, he remained in Providence at Empire restaurant.
Moving to Boston, he climbed the ranks at Radius to become executive chef.
Now 30, he focuses on seasonal ingredients and classical technique. The modern French menu includes spice-crusted skate wing with black tahini, roasted cauliflower and braised rhubarb.
Connolly, who was inspired by Thomas Keller's "French Laundry Cookbook," says he is obsessed with the craft of cooking, executing and perfecting a dish.
Northwest
Holly Smith of Cafe Juanita in Kirkland, Wash.
Holly Smith spent five years as second-in-command at the Dahlia Lounge in Seattle and a year as sous chef at Brasa before buying Cafe Juanita in 2000. She swiftly took the 28-year-old destination dinner house to a new level using innovation, artistry and fresh ingredients.
Gourmet magazine has praised the 41-year-old Smith's cooking, which combines Northern Italian cooking with a Northwest sensibility.
Smith grew up in a Maryland family that frequently cooked together. After college, she attended the Baltimore International Culinary College and gained experience in Ireland with master chef Peter Timmons.
Menu offerings include seared foie gras with rhubarb confit, candied ginger and vin santo.
Southwest
Lachlan Mackinnon-Patterson of Frasca Food and Wine in Boulder, Colo.
Lachlan Mackinnon-Patterson has French culinary roots, but he passionately serves up cuisine from the Friuli region of northern Italy.
Mackinnon-Patterson, 33, attended the Ecole Gregoire-Ferrandi in Paris, an intensive culinary program that accepts only 12 foreign students in each class.
From there he honed his skills in the French tradition at Jamin in Paris and the French Laundry in California. He left the Laundry in 2004 to open Frasca, inspired by his travels to Italy and his love for the region.
Mackinnon-Patterson uses farm-raised ingredients and seasonal produce to create rustic yet elegant meals. Common dishes at the neighborhood bistro include poached pacific halibut with carrot puree, pea shoots and brown butter or sweet peas, goat cheese and apple wood smoked bacon.
South
Michelle Bernstein of Michy's in Miami
After culinary school, celebrity chef Michelle Bernstein, 39, trained with world renowned chef Jean Louis Palladin at the Watergate in Washington and honed her skills at Alison on Dominick and Le Bernardin in New York.
She then headed to her native Miami where she worked in several restaurants before taking the helm in 2000 at Azul. There she created a menu that blended Asian, Caribbean and French influences with the Latin flavors of her childhood.
In 2006, she opened Michy's where she creates her own "luxurious comfort food" combining an eclectic range that includes Bernstein's Jewish-Argentinean background and classical French training.
All of the food such as crispy sweetbreads or cod with a mustard-miso rub comes in full or half servings intended for sharing. Bernstein was a co-host of the Food Network's Melting Pot, a show that presented the traditions, stories and recipes of her Latin background.
Southeast
Robert Stehling of Hominy Grill in Charleston, S.C.
Robert Stehling grew up in Greensboro, N.C., with parents who grew most everything they ate.
Today, the 45-year-old uses seasonal, local ingredients to create food that tweaks the region's classic dishes, such as fried chicken with spiced peach sauce.
Stehling was an art student at the University of North Carolina when he took a job washing dishes at Crook's Corner, a restaurant in Chapel Hill founded in 1982 by Bill Neal.
In 1987 he moved to New York and cooked for nine years in restaurants such as Arizona 206, Sarabeth's, Monkey Bar and Home before following his wife to Charleston in 1996.
While working with Neal, Stehling says he learned that techniques from international cuisines could be applied to traditional Southern dishes. One specialty is sesame-crusted catfish with sauteed okra, deep fried cheese grits and peanut sauce.
Pacific
Craig Stoll of Delfina in San Francisco
Craig Stoll was dissatisfied working at many large restaurants in the Bay Area, so he opened Delfina so he could serve the rustic food he loves to cook. The menu changes daily at Stoll's 10-year-old restaurant, emphasizing seasonality and simplicity halibut baked in a fig leaf with fingerling potatoes and prosecco-caper butter or grilled calamari with warm white bean salad.
Much of the 43-year-old's cooking is inspired by his stint at a culinary school in Italy in 1992. Daily cooking demonstrations by renowned Italian chefs and field trips to restaurants and artisan food producers gave him the experience and inspiration to open Delfina with his wife.
