Help us find and improve next week's Connection Finder profiles: Chefs and Foodies [closed]

+14 votes
582 views

Many of us just had a big meal with family over the weekend for the Easter holiday, so this week we're thinking about food and featuring James Beard, namesake of one of the biggest awards in the food world, in the Connection Finder next week. He could use some biography love!

We're looking for profiles of other chefs, cooks, and foodies to feature alongside him.

Here are a few of the people we're getting started on:

Can you help with these profiles, or expand their families? Adding relatives in any direction helps with connections. Every missing relative you add will make our connections to them closer.

Who else should we feature? Do they need a profile?

All profiles we feature need a good biography and a connection to the big tree. We also want each one to have an image, and the image needs to have proper source attribution explaining why it's in the public domain or why we have the right to display it.

We can't feature everyone mentioned (we only have room for eight per week), but if we don't feature a profile you work on, we may use it sometime in the future. And, of course, all contributions help improve our shared tree.

We'll make a final decision on which ones to feature early next week.

Please reply here with what you're working on so that we don't duplicate our efforts. Thank you!

To help us plan future themes, see the 2021 Example Profile Plans post here.

WikiTree profile: James Beard
closed with the note: Feature: https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1215928/which-chef-or-foodie-are-you-most-closely-connected-to
in The Tree House by Abby Glann G2G6 Pilot (731k points)
closed by Abby Glann

18 Answers

+14 votes

Perhaps New York Times critic, chef and cook book writer Craig Claiborne?

by Ryan Quinn G2G1 (1.6k points)
+9 votes
The first thing I thought of was that famous chef, Chef Boyardee! He does have a profile, but it's not connected. He came from Italy to the US and launched that whole line of products we all know today.

https://wikitree.com/wiki/Boiardi-3

He might be a good choice if we can figure out how to get him connected.
by Scott Fulkerson G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
edited by Scott Fulkerson
Here's another, but connecting him would be a huge challenge:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/%E9%AB%98%E6%A3%AE-1

Tokuzo Akiyama - chef to the Japanese Emperor and apparently was known as the one who brought French cuisine to Japan.
Would you believe that there was a real Duncan Hines? He was a famous food critic. Sadly, no profile, but I'm sure we could whip one together for him (ooo... that might have been an unintentional pun...)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duncan_Hines
There's also Robert Lewis Evans, better known as "Bob" Evans.

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Evans-22430 - he's connected, has a decent profile, but could use some updates. (Sadness... no Notables template... YET).

Or James Ray Dean (Jimmy Dean) - singer and sausage brand businessman. He'd be a bit on the periphery, as I don't think he was directly involved with the food side, just the business side.

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Dean-8028
Another without a profile. Famous chef on board the Titanic:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Joughin
+9 votes
Isabelle - do you think we might be able to put together a profile for this guy?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auguste_Escoffier
by Scott Fulkerson G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
Wow - here's another famous French chef.

https://www.cooksinfo.com/jean-pierre-clause

And another:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie-Antoine_Car%C3%AAme

I'm starting to think there might be quite a few of them...

And apparently not many (none of these 3) have a profile.

Don't forget Brillat-Savarin. He is connected and there are public domain pics at Wikimedia Commons.

Good find with Brillat-Savarin, Eva. He needs some work, but he's there!

Scott - I checked all these suggested French chefs and there's not one of them likely to be connected by the end of the week. Time permetting I'd create profiles for at least some of them - but they won't be connected. Each of them looks at least 30 steps away from a potential connection, if Roglo is any indication (it's not always a good one).

Other than Brillat-Savarin, I was going to suggest cookery columnist Mapie de Toulouse-Lautrec. She invented the detachable recipe card format for the magazine she worked with.

If beverages were included, I could suggest the Veuve Clicquot (and a few other champagne producers), but I'm not sure that works...

I was reminded of Brillat-Savarin because he was cited by my Swedish candidate, Gustafva Björklund, in her cookbook.

Another legend of fine food for someone to attempt to research (not an easy target!):

La Varenne, the chef who created the early cookbook Le Cuisinier françois, published in 1652.

+13 votes

I have two dutch ones for you:

Joop Braakhekke connected, needs an image, first dutch TV cook, restaurant owner, actor

Cas Spijkers  connected, needs an image. First cook with a michelin star in the Netherlands. Brought dutch restaurant world on a higher level. Founded cooking schools

by Eef van Hout G2G6 Pilot (187k points)
Joop braakhekke has an image now and  a written profile with sources.

Cas Spijkers still needs an image but we can't find a photograph  we are allowed to use. Still searching
+13 votes

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Mayson-23 (Mrs Beeton)

Otherwise not finding profiles of people that came immediately to mind.

by Helen Ford G2G6 Pilot (471k points)
I have been working on her and she is now very presentable:

She has images, a narrative bio, sources, and is connected.
Not to mention dying tragically young.  I learnt to cook from her book, more than one hundred years later...
+15 votes

Gustafva Björklund is connected, has portrait and bio.

Her 1847 cook book is impressive and comprehensive. It's online and I'll try to feature something from it in her bio. A bit difficult - it's just so thorough. I got stuck among all the recipes for fish. Seems that a much wider variety of fish was used back then, all needing slightly different preparation.

by Eva Ekeblad G2G6 Pilot (571k points)
+12 votes

Paula Peck (just started work on her profile. married James Peck, who was an activist)

also 

Kate Aitken - Wikipedia

I have some of their cookbooks.

by Aaron Gullison G2G6 Pilot (184k points)
+10 votes

This inspired me to check whether Peg Bracken, author of The I Hate to Cook Book, had a profile. She didn't, but it turned out to be easy to connect her. No photo, though, and someone better at writing bios would need to beef up her biography. Bracken-1211

by Sharon Casteel G2G6 Pilot (165k points)
I added an image.
+10 votes
Georgina Landemare, Winston Churchill's cook. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Young-44282
by Living Ford G2G6 Pilot (159k points)
+10 votes
Margaret Fulton, Scottish-born Australian Domestic Goddess. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Fulton-2992

Her profile will connect tonight.
by Living Ford G2G6 Pilot (159k points)
Fulton-2992-1.jpg is privacy protected, so generates a large amount of white space in the biography.
Fixed now. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
Maggie was always a favourite.
+8 votes

Too late to connect her to the tree in time for this round, but it would be great to feature Leah Chase, the Queen of Creole Cuisine, and a major figure in the civil rights movement in New Orleans. I just started a vestigial profile for her.

by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
+12 votes

Mr Bourdain's bio is nearly complete and he is connected. smiley

by Natalie Trott G2G Astronaut (1.3m points)
+12 votes
Edna Lewis--known for southern cooking

And I just got her connected!

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Lewis-22747
by Emma MacBeath G2G Astronaut (1.2m points)
+9 votes
Prosper Montagne...author of the Larousse Gastronomique.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosper_Montagn%C3%A9
by Mark Burch G2G6 Pilot (218k points)
+10 votes

I finally started a profile for Marie-Antoine Carême after finding that there was a chance to get him connected in time. 

by Isabelle Martin G2G6 Pilot (566k points)
+9 votes
Eliza Leslie, Catherine Esther Beecher, Sarah Josepha Hale.
by Kimberly Wright G2G1 (1.1k points)
+8 votes
I've begun sourcing one branch of Julia Child's family, and found a reference to California "pioneer emigration" records in 1849.  Can anyone help connect Julia back further than Ohio and Illinois?
by Janine Barber G2G6 Pilot (230k points)
+5 votes

If it's not too late to nominate - I believe I can have Amy Schauer Connected by tonight.   Australian of Prussian descent.  Has pic, has bio.

by Melanie Paul G2G6 Pilot (422k points)

Related questions

WikiTree  ~  About  ~  Help Help  ~  Search Person Search  ~  Surname:

disclaimer - terms - copyright

...