Dominique Crenn to receive the 50 Best Icon award

The World’s 50 Best Restaurants has announced that French chef Dominique Crenn will receive the 2021 Icon Award at the celebrations to be held in Antwerp, Belgium next month

At Atelier Crenn in San Francisco Crenn is the only female chef in the US to hold three Michelin Stars, which she was awarded in 2018. She was the 2016 recipient of the award for the World’s Best Female Chef.

“It is an incredible honour to be selected as the recipient of the 50 Best Icon Award this year. For my work to be recognised by my peers fills me with such pride and appreciation,” says Crenn. “I hope to use this platform as an opportunity to give back and to inspire the next generation to be true to themselves and to always enjoy the journey.”

The Icon Award celebrates an individual who has made an outstanding contribution to the restaurant industry worthy of international recognition and who has used their platform to raise awareness and drive positive change. In addition to being named The World’s Best Female Chef in 2016, Crenn has made history throughout the course of her career while blazing a trail for future chefs to follow.

Leadership and humanity

Dominique Crenn is not just an outstanding chef and restaurateur, she is an example of someone who speaks truth to power in every aspect of her life – through her leadership, humanity and endless campaigning for social justice within as well as outside of the hospitality sphere,” says William Drew, director of content for The World’s 50 Best Restaurants. “Her devotion to sustainability, her community and her restaurant teams, while achieving and delivering culinary excellence time and time again, makes her a hugely worthy recipient of this year’s Icon Award.”

Crenn owns two further venues in the city. In 2015 she opened Petit Crenn, embracing her culinary upbringing in a more casual setting. The upscale bistro is an ode to the home cooking of Brittany and the dinner parties thrown by Crenn’s mother and grandmother. Bar Crenn, a wine bar situated next door to Atelier Crenn, was opened in 2018 as an homage to the Parisian salons of the early 20th century.

The Icon Award was introduced by 50 Best in 2019 with the inaugural winner, Spanish-born chef and restaurateur José Andrés, honoured for his work with World Central Kitchen.

Tina Nielsen

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