Stephen and Kate are southern-born, self-taught chefs who bonded over a mutual love of traditional hospitality and farm fresh ingredients. As collaborators, we are passionate about cultivating communities and sharing meals as a way to foster artistic expression, for the chef as well as the guest. Both Stephen and Kate come to the food industry from multiple perspectives, with unique backgrounds in cooking, theater, entertainment, and the arts. Therefore, we believe that every opportunity to gather and eat is an opportunity to tell a story, to empathize and to learn.
Stephen is a chef, photographer, event host, and casting director. He specializes in both seasonal southern cuisine and warm, natural light photographs, designing and capturing evenings brimming with candor and memorable spontaneity. His innate sense of culinary skill, social engagement, and superlative photographic eye allows him to create and capture the very best of each gathering. Stephen is from Nashville, Tennessee, where he grew up working back of house in his mother's cafe. http://oxfordplaid.com/
Kate is a director and a chef, who approaches every meal as a curated and directed event for an audience of guests. She is a native Texan, taught and tutored by her mother in the kitchen. She began making Thanksgiving meals for her family at age 13, and has always been drawn to the southern tradition of cooking for large gatherings of loved ones and complete strangers. Kate is the Director of Food and Resident Chef at SPACE on Ryder Farm.
Stephen and Kate met as Resident Chefs at SPACE on Ryder Farm, a nonprofit residency program and organic farm located on the grounds of a 224-year-old family homestead in Putnam County, New York. They have collaborated as co-head chefs for exclusive farm-to-table events on Ryder Farm for the past 4 years, celebrating farm fresh ingredients and inspired by the work of the artist being presented at each event.
