photo by Agata Schoenborn

Christine Wahnsleben | Table

“A big part of cooking is sharing a meal”, says Christine, who turned out four-star cuisine at New York’s Chanterelle and Eleven Madison Park.  When she moved to Richmond, her passion took a different tack: “I’d always loved the learning part of food; then I discovered teaching.” But local cooking classes stopped short of breaking break.  So, when Christine opened Mis En Place, her Shockoe Slip cooking school, she added the missing ingredient: the table. “Our kitchen is very social; we sit down together and create community around food.” Corporations like Capital One and MeadWestvaco book team-building classes for their employees and Christine invite her favorite local chefs to teach.  “The food world is still a boys’ club, but as Richmond becomes more cosmopolitan, our women chefs have become an innovative force.  I love to showcase them,” she says, adding “I learn as much from my classes as I hope they take away.”

~Constance Costas