Our Chefs

  • Cook at Chez Panisse & Private Chef

    Gary is committed to educating and inspiring change-makers through the lenses of cooking and experiential learning to revolutionize the global food system.

    Studying the literary traditions of the western cannon left him full of theory and starved for the real life experience that is so often missing in academia. The need to learn a practical trade led him to his first kitchen job in his small college town of Chico, Ca. His formative years cooking in Northern California restaurants laid the ground work for an interest in local food systems which ultimately lead to a five year deep dive into farming and direct marketing by working for the Certified Farmers' Markets of Sacramento. There he became intimately connected to the web of producers and consumers the are the lifeblood of California's "farm-to-fork capital".

    In 2016 Alice Waters asked him to join the team of cooks working in the celebrated kitchen of the downstairs restaurant at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California. He's been happily manning the stoves and tending the hearth there ever since. 

    His goal as a chef is to revitalize the values of slow food by gathering around the table, promoting the values of edible education, regenerative agriculture, and climate-conscious ingredients. To learn more about Gary visit www.garypodesto.net.

  • Former Cook at The Ecology Center & Chez Panisse

    The opportunity to become a cook reconnected Ryan to an intuition about food that he believes we all have, but are often separated from. Cooking at Chez Panisse and on farms has taught him how to use and trust his senses.

    He views feeding people as both an incredible privilege and responsibility. Delicious food is essential but not sufficient, and how you get there matters. Cooks decide what types of food to source, where it comes from, and what practices they support. Nourishing, well-sourced food can reconnect humans to the rest of nature and their own bodies.

    He is incredibly grateful to have spent most of his culinary career with access to wonderful ingredients, and is admittedly stubborn about pursuing a world where everyone has this right.

    Ryan's full-time cooking career was brief, and he feels lucky to continue to be surrounded by amazing chefs through Climate Farm School and occasionally play the role of Climate Farm School chef when someone else is leading a course.

    He loves teaching others what he knows and showing that good food can be extremely simple.

  • Baker & Author, Formerly Tartine

    Jennifer Latham is the author of Baking Bread with Kids from Ten Speed Press and co-author of Bread Book with Chad Robertson. She is the former Director of Bread for Tartine Bakery. She studied philosophy and journalism at UC Santa Cruz before following her love of dough into professional kitchens. Jennifer believes that healthy local food systems foster healthy people, communities, and environments.


  • Rule of Thirds


  • Saraghina Bakery

    Megan Wang is a Brooklyn-based baker with both bread and pastry production experience at Saraghina Bakery. An avid home baker for many years, she made the transition into professional kitchens in 2023 after a decade-long career in tech where she was most recently the CEO of a mission-driven organization called theBoardlist, which focused on diversifying boardrooms. She now serves as a Board Member at BoardProspects, an organization focused on improving corporate governance and oversight, while she pursues a full-time baking career.

    Growing up in Beijing, her parents endeavored to open a farm-to-table restaurant aligned with the Slow Food Movement ethos in the foothills of the Great Wall. Having observed the community surrounding The Schoolhouse, a revitalized abandoned schoolyard, and the educational opportunities it presented to discuss local sourcing, she was exposed to a hopeful future for food and also the challenges of running a small sustainable business.

    At the heart of her work has always been people, and she’s always believed food to be foundational in building community. In this next chapter of her career, she remains a student of regenerative agricultural practices — she is eager to incorporate locally sourced and freshly milled grains from the East Coast with seasonal ingredients in her exploration of cross-cultural baking and community.


  • Her Place Supper Club

    Santina has long been inspired by change makers in the food world. An early interest in nutrition led her to eventually explore what health looks like from the ground up. After studying sustainable agriculture and food systems, Santina began working on farms, learning about regenerative farming and permaculture. She currently works as a chef in Philadelphia, where she is soaking up all she can learn about cooking beautiful food and finding ways to build community around mealtimes.