Men run the kitchen at most Sacramento restaurants. Burger Patch wants to change that
For all the locally sourced ingredients and reorganized tipping structures, Sacramento’s overwhelmingly progressive restaurant renaissance remains archaic in one loud way. Peer into a kitchen and odds are men are running the show.
Burger Patch co-owners Phil and Danea Horn’s new “Gril Power” initiative, launched last week, aims for balance.
Restaurants aligned with Gril Power pledge to make at least 50 percent of their management and skilled back-of-house employees female or gender-neutral. Pushkin’s Bakery and Solomon’s Delicatessen have joined so far and already fit those criteria; the Horns want as many restaurants as possible on board by the end of 2020.
“It’s not about men vs. women,” said Danea Horn, whose vegan fast food eatery opened in midtown Sacramento earlier this year. “It’s about equal opportunity and hearing what women want to do, and offering them the training and the expertise without any bias or assumption that they wouldn’t want to do that work or they couldn’t do that work.”
Gril Power will partner with Sacramento nonprofit Women’s Empowerment, which connects homeless women with employers and provides services to help them maintain those jobs. Burger Patch is donating 10 percent of all November sales to the nonprofit as part of its monthly “Patch Match” program.
Many prominent Sacramento female restaurateurs play major roles in their business’ operations; Janel Inouye of Magpie Cafe, for example, or Bobbin Mulvaney of Mulvaney’s B&L. It’s rarer, though, to find a woman who’s scrubbed, sweated and stirred her way to a kitchen’s upper ranks.
There’s Jodie Chavious, who left Canon last year to open Shangri-la in Fair Oaks. Casey Shideler recently took over Bawk! Fried Chicken after a stint atop Taylor’s Kitchen. Allyson Harvie is Ella Dining Room & Bar’s chef de cuisine, and Molly Hawks splits kitchen leadership of her eponymous high-end Granite Bay restaurant with husband Michael Fagnoni.
Harvie, Hawks, Shideler and Binchoyaki general manager/co-owner Toki Sawada joined two-Michelin star San Francisco chef Suzette Gresham in cooking this year’s Tower Bridge dinner. But they’re exceptions in a male-dominated landscape, both in and out of the region. Just 22 percent of head chefs nationwide were female in 2018, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The historical role of women in household kitchens hasn’t translated to restaurants for several reasons. The numerous obstacles they face ascending through most industries – less tolerance for failure, having accomplishments overlooked and being held to a higher standard, among others – are prevalent in kitchens, Pushkin’s co-owner Olga Turner said.
Male chefs and owners are sometimes skeptical of their female staff’s ability to handle commercial cooking’s physical demands, Danea Horn said, leaving many women to feel they have better opportunities as waitresses or hostesses.
A lack of role models may also serve as a deterrent. Female celebrity chefs tend to be maternal figures such as Ina Garten, Martha Stewart and Rachael Ray, whereas men like Bobby Flay, David Chang and Gordon Ramsay more closely resemble the average restaurant boss. Even Sacramento culinary trailblazer Biba Caggiano rose to prominence as a home cook who gave private lessons before becoming a television personality and then opening her own restaurant.
“There are some people in Sacramento still that don’t believe in women chefs ... people in the industry,” Sawada said. “They will believe in them as cooks, but they would never believe (in) women as an equal to them.”
Family obligations can also prevent women from advancing. Daycare isn’t an option when working a dinner shift. Sawada met her husband/co-owner Craig Takehara at Le Cordon Bleu in Los Angeles and opened Binchoyaki as the pastry chef.
She still has significant influence over Binchoyaki’s menu, signs off on desserts and is in the kitchen from 3 p.m. to midnight Fridays and Saturdays, but spends much of her time taking care of their two young children.
“My husband’s able to put in those hours and do all that because I’m at home watching the kids,” Sawada said. “And then it’s vice versa — if I really need to be in the kitchen and he doesn’t have to, he will watch the kids for a couple hours until I’ve done with what I need to be done. But the daily work is all him.”
Gender equity can also temper longstanding kitchen issues such sexual harassment and mental well-being that have become more visible in recent years.
British chef Jeremy King told The Guardian stress levels in his nine restaurants decreased as he hired more women. Pushkin’s, which has an all-female line, has a blanket ban on sexual innuendos down to “that’s what she said” jokes, Turner said.
“I think a lot of men do the hiring, and they like that they can bulls--- with other men ... it’s definitely a boy’s culture,” Turner said. “It’s not (traditionally) an inclusive environment, and I think one of the reasons women do so well in our environment is you have to be kind. You’re not allowed to raise your voice at anyone, you’re not allowed to be mean, you’re not allowed to bully anybody.”
Despite the restaurant industry’s tight labor market, the people behind Gril Power think a strong female talent pool is within reach. More than half of the Culinary Institute of America’s students are female, as are all team leaders and 90 percent of “grill specialists” at Burger Patch.
Pushkin’s sees a 50-50 split of women and men applying for jobs, Turner said. If other restaurants are in the same boat, they should be able to meet Gril Power’s goal as well, she said.
“There’s no reason why that couldn’t happen. So many women are interested in cooking,” she said.