bay area chefs
Erika is co-owner and Head Chef at The Heirloom Chef. She is passionate about women’s health, social and earth justice, and prayer. She spent over 12 years championing worker’s rights across the county as a labor union organizer early in her career. Erika spent years studying and building community traveling around the Americas, Europe, and the Middle East, which has fueled her love of food and teaching her daughter about different cultures and traditions. Over the past ten years, she has worked as a chef and a doula and studied with fellow artists, herbalists, and healers to understand the importance of food as medicine and the best foods to help women throughout pregnancy and postpartum.
Chef Anna is a personal chef and professional dancer, passionate about creating food that brings people together. Every menu she makes tells a story and transports her clients on an experiential journey that highlights the joy of eating. She brings her love of local organic seasonal produce, compassionately raised sustainable meats, and wild seafood to every service.
Chef Antonio brings over 10 years of experience and a passion for cooking that began as a child helping his grandmother in the kitchen. After graduating from Johnson & Wales, Antonio was essential in opening multiple restaurants in New England. He has contributed to restaurants including StarChefs, Cochon555, and The James Beard House. He is passionate about cooking with local, seasonal and sustainable ingredients and believes that every dish should create a memory.
After being influenced by world travel and living in Hawaii for seven years, Chef Ashley began her career as a chef. She was inspired by how different cultures come together around the table and how they use their natural resources. Ashley believes strongly in using food as medicine. Working at The Center of Discovery in upstate NY during the holiday is one of her favorite culinary experiences.
Originally from Brazil, Chef Jacquelyne has called the Bay Area home for the last 5 years. She loves living here for its diverse food, culture, and locations. Chef Jackie has been a personal chef for the past 8 years and is passionate about the message that food brings, creating memories, connecting people, histories and different generations through recipes, ingredients and traditions. In her spare time she enjoys travelling so that she can discover new places, flavors and smells.
Chef Jeanelle has been in the culinary world since early childhood coming from a background of Culinarians and spending summers in Argentina learning as much as she could from her Grandparents. After completing school, she has made her passion for food into a career and has worked in various settings, from a personal chef to a corporate sous chef. She is detail-oriented and strives to give her clients an enjoyable experience.
Chef Miriam graduated valedictorian of her class from the Natural Chef Training Program at Bauman College, where she learned to cook for special diets including gluten-free, dairy-free, AIP, and paleo. Nutritionally focused food work has been her passion for over ten years. Miriam loves staying connected to farms, providing food for her neighbors, and supporting the local food supply chain.
Chef Natalie has over ten years of culinary experience and top honors from the Cordon Bleu in LA. While she can tout high-profile clients in Bel Air, CA, and the official brownie chef of the Bliss Spa in Hollywood on her resume, she credits her role as a mom of three as the most rigorous training for her current position. Natalie is famous for her family’s food mantra “…please all of our palates, be nutritionally dense, and be aesthetically pleasing…”
Chef Victor Aguilera is an award-winning chef and passionate about fine dining, traditional Venezuelan cuisine, and cannabis infusions. The renowned Latin chef brings a decade of experience and creates elevated cuisine through private and hosted events. He has made appearances in Chopped 420, GMA, Telemundo, and ABC News, and his work has been recognized by EATER and INFATUATION.
Caroline is an enthusiastic home cook but prefers to whip up a spreadsheet or organize an inbox, allowing the team to focus on what’s going on in the kitchen. As a child, she loved stopping by roadside farm stands for local sweet corn and ripe peaches during family road trips. Currently, Caroline loves exploring historic neighborhoods, hiking in nature, and discovering new bakeries and restaurants.
Born and raised in the Bay Area, Richelle loves the great variety of cultures and food she is surrounded by on a daily basis. While she loves to eat, she’s recently discovered her love for cooking as her mom began to teach her how to cook her favorite Filipino dishes. When she’s not helping The Heirloom Chef with scheduling, designing and other administrative tasks, she loves crafting, working out, drawing and reading.