From beverage makers to TikTok influencers, chefs, and even a company turning potatoes into disposable plastic wrap, our 2023 Game Changers are working in many different parts of the food and drink world. But the one things they all have in common? They're innovating and switching up the way things are done, for the better.
Meet the people and companies changing the culinary world for the better. The 2023 Food & Wine Game Changers come from many corners of the culinary landscape. Their ranks include drink-makers, TikTok-ers, chefs, retailers, an artist and urban planner, and even a company turning potato waste into …
Retreat at Currency Exchange, artist Theaster Gates’s café and culinary incubator located in Chicago’s Washington Park neighborhood, launches careers and changes lives. Just after the final warming bowl of chicken udon soup prepared by chef Ariya Taylor had been served, the packed dining room turned …
Two beverage industry pros are bringing Mexico’s oldest drink to the U.S. market for the first time, with astonishing success. While many of us were tending to sourdough starters in March 2020, Rafael Martin del Campo was tinkering with tepache. The sweet and sour fermented pineapple beverage, often …
Thanks to her Rooted for Good initiative, America’s ninth-largest winery has emerged as a leader in sustainability. When Katie Jackson was growing up, her backyard was her parents Jess Jackson and Barbara Banke’s Stonestreet Winery in Sonoma County. “I played in the vineyard and made forts out of …
At her shop in Brooklyn, retail entrepreneur Lisa Cheng Smith and her team are giving a platform and an identity to Taiwanese products and makers. There’s dried fruit, and then there’s the chewy, tender, almost juicy dried fruit sold by Taiwanese-American grocer Yun Hai, which defies your …
The chef hopes as a cooperative venture, Reem’s California will serve as a model for others. A thick mountain range of fog shrouds San Francisco, clinging to the city like an unsure child to its mother’s legs. It’s 5 a.m. Most of the city inhabitants are still asleep, but Reem Assil is awake, …
Great Wrap and its founders are seeking to solve the world’s plastic waste problem with a compostable cling wrap made from potato waste. While working as an architect, Julia Kay had a realization that will, perhaps, end up changing the world. “I was excited by architecture because you’ve got the …
Meherwan Irani has played a pivotal role in reshaping how America sees, eats, and thinks about Indian cuisine. After moving to America from India for grad school, chef Meherwan Irani quickly grew frustrated with the generic buffets that seemed to be the status quo in South Asian restaurants. “This …
Maui Nui humanely harvests Axis deer, a threat to Hawaii’s native species, and transforms them into venison. How to Help Hawai'i Our hearts go out to everyone affected by wildfires in Maui. Please follow Maui Rapid Response and Maui Food Bank to see how you can help. In the 1860s, eight chestnut …
Silversea Cruises offers never-before-seen access to exclusive food experiences, Michelin-starred restaurants, and more, through its culinary S.A.L.T. program. In the summer of 2022, a small group of eight food-obsessed travelers had the incredibly good fortune to spend an afternoon cooking and …
Real estate developer Tishman Speyer reinvigorated a New York City icon by building a new community of chefs. Last December, while eating pasta in brodo at Jupiter in Rockefeller Center, EB Kelly glanced up to see Lee Hanson and Riad Nasr from the neighboring French brasserie grab seats at the bar. …
“Don’t call me if you want to paint a mural,” Simms says. “If you’re serious, I’m going to come with a serious plan.” Dia Simms has a thing about animals. A 20-year veteran in the spirits industry, she is the CEO of Lobos 1707, a tequila company named after a wolf, a team player known for its cunning …
For two decades, New Zealand-based Heilala Vanilla has been dedicated to quality and sustainability. When your slogan is “the good vanilla,” how do you honor that promise? For Heilala Vanilla, doing “good” is much more than just tasting good. This New Zealand–based company is equally dedicated to …
While a simmering debate around induction threatens to boil over in the kitchen, innovation in the space is heating up more than ever. Nothing has created hot air in the past six months quite like the great gas-versus-induction debate. Everyone, from home cooks and chefs to pundits and politicians, …
FryAway, a plant-based, non-toxic oil solidifier, aims to make disposing of used cooking oil easier for consumers and easier on the environment. Well-fried foods are a delicious luxury worth making at home, but dealing with the oil afterward puts many cooks off. As a deep-frying fiend, I’ve put …
Attorney turned TikTok star Joanne Lee Molinaro brings depth and meaning to her lessons on plant-based Korean cooking. Joanne Lee Molinaro practices radical honesty. Earlier this year, one day after the deadly massacre in Monterey Park, a predominantly Asian neighborhood of Los Angeles, in which a …
