Let's be honest, women should celebrate – and should be encouraged to celebrate – their achievements on any and every day of the year, but International Women's Day and Women's History Month provide the perfect time to really give them the spotlight. To mark the occasion, we asked Vérane Frediani – a female film producer, director and distributor – to create a film about some of the female chefs in The MICHELIN Guide selection. Here's what she had to say:
"I've been filming and writing about the issues female chefs face all over the world for many years and my conclusion is that women need better access to finance to get their cuisine recognised by the mainstream media and publications. The problem is not their talent, their ambition or their creativity... it's often simply the lack of means that is holding women back in this industry. They can't always hire the most influential PR companies; they can't always employ a large team to be able to travel to festivals and competitions; and they can't always invest in new equipment or the most luxurious ingredients... How do you change that? By helping them to be more visible.
"Working with the Michelin communications team in order to offer some visibility for female chefs on The MICHELIN Guide platforms is a great step forward, but showing this film at the Great Britain & Ireland MICHELIN Guide Ceremony was also a great opportunity to make sure that the many male chefs seated in the room got to listen to what these women have to say. Why? Because we need them to start mentioning female professionals in their interviews as sources of inspiration instead of just their mums, grandmas and male peers. It is also a great opportunity to encourage investors, restaurant owners and the media watching these videos to question their own bias.
"Last but not least, this video is also meant to inspire talented young female chefs to believe in their dreams, to become more self-confident and to really go for it. Women want and deserve Michelin Stars, but for there to be more than just a few women on stage at the ceremonies, the business landscape has to change. I think it's very bold for Michelin to tackle the problem instead of waiting for the system to change. Michelin is not the system, its awards are just a reflection of it."
Vérane Frediani was born and raised in Marseille to an Italian-Corsican family, but is now based in London. She started her career as a film journalist and TV host, before moving on to film production. Among other projects, she directed The Goddesses of Food (À la recherche des femmes chefs) that was released in cinemas in 2017. Meeting these female heroes then led Vérane to take a stand against discrimination in professional kitchens and the food industry as a whole. She went on to write Elles Cuisinent, a book about women cooking professionally across the world, as well as Cheffes, the first comprehensive database of French female chefs.
