Leif Hedendal
Chef in San Francisco, California
Leif Hedendal
Chef in San Francisco, California
I spend most of my time working as a caterer at home dinners, various pop-up restaurants, farm dinners, openings, fundraisers and meal-based collaborations with artists.
I started cooking big batches of chili as a teen and since I've worked in the kitchens of Greens, Noma and Chez Panisse.
I hope to encourage thought on all the types of creative ways art and food activism can fuel and inspire each other, and how they can be intertwined. I want to demystify cooking and get people more interested in eating healthy, whole foods by bringing together artists, curators, activists and academics working with dining, cooking and conviviality.
My cuisine focuses on highly seasonal and under–utilized vegetables, urban agriculture projects, and wildcrafted ingredients. I'm involved with the Slow Food movement and was a recent delegate at the Terra Madre conference in Turin. I've been a guest lecturer at California College of Art, San Francisco Art Institute, the Danish Royal Academy of Art, and Harvard University.