Vol. 6, No. 10 | Women.

Hey Ya’ll!

On Monday, I had a 10-course meal from some of the most incredible chefs in Atlanta (and they happened to be women). It was a stroke of luck. My friend Thandi wasn’t available for it and passed my name on, and all of a sudden I had amazing food for four days, along with a great bottle of wine. Here are some of the thoughts that sparked:

• Outside of the food, one of the highlights was joining a conversation with these women later that evening on Zoom. The stories were heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time. Because of that call, Anne Quatrano is now one of my favorite people. She’s so quippy and seems so comfortable in her skin. I honestly wanted to do a whole newsletter around everything that she said, but something about it felt like a betrayal because that wasn’t my purpose of being on the call. One of the things that feels safe enough to share is that she mentioned that many people are now coming to Bacchanalia to celebrate their vaccinations. I thought that was fascinating.

• Someone else on the call said something about savoring the last bite of something. This wasn’t the context, but it made me think about how I literally do this with most meals. For example, if I have three different types of tacos, I’ll take a bite of each of them before deciding which one to eat last. I’ll even do it with two halves of a sandwich. Am I the only one that does this?

• I had two Zoom calls on Monday and they were both great. I’ve been on a total of four Zoom calls since the pandemic started…maybe five. I’ve been hearing a lot about Zoom fatigue and the thought of it sounds exhausting. I’ve always been an introvert, but pretty social and I just don’t get the same energy from a screen. I prefer people (in doses) in person. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that what each of these women said they enjoyed the most was being able to get together in person and put these meals together.

• I used to host a lunch with all women for Martell called 6pm in Cognac (because when it was 1pm in Atlanta, it was 6pm in Cognac, France). Karim Lateef was always looking for ways to uplift and highlight women and trusted me to come up with something. I really miss doing those.

• I met with a restaurant consultant last week that wanted to bring me on a project to develop the bar program. He said that it was good to have more women in the field because we brought something very unique to spaces. The spaces feel more intentional.

• I thought a lot about including this thought for women’s history month, but here goes…whew…I’ll always be a champion for women, but I’m just as concerned about making sure that men are nurtured and taken care of. When I think about the men that have hurt or traumatized me, I realize that they’ve been hurt and traumatized by a woman in their lives. Let’s break the whole cycle. Be kind to women. Be kind to men.

Hope you’re all safe and healthy!

Shannon