CHEF:IN Awards debut in Hamburg with seven categories

The first CHEF:IN Awards single out women across seven categories of German fine dining tonight, with a ceremony at Foodlab Hamburg crowning 2026 winners chosen from the shortlist announced earlier this month.

Doors open at 5.30pm for an aperitif; the awards show starts at 6pm, hosted by broadcaster Muschda Sherzada. Earlier in the day, a 1.30pm panel titled "The Visibility of Women in Fine Dining" brings nominees, jurors and guests together before the trophies are handed out.

The seven shortlists were pulled from the wider CHEF:IN Watch List, which launched in January 2025 with 18 names and now runs to 72 women across five specialisms: kitchen, pastry, service, sommellerie and bar. The kitchen list alone counts 27; a jury of 23 restaurant critics and industry figures, chaired by food journalist Anja Wasserbäch, picked the category nominees from restaurant visits and trade recommendations rather than open applications.

Seven categories, one Hamburg stage, and a four percent gap behind all of them.

Seven categories on the CHEF:IN stage

Chef of the Year, presented by Transgourmet Cook, lists six names: Alina Meissner-Bebrout, Julia A. Leitner, Nathalie Leblond, Rosina Ostler, Sarah Hallmann and Viktoria Fuchs. Leitner runs the kitchen at Coda in Berlin and Ostler at Alois in Munich, both Michelin-starred addresses.

The other six span Pastry Chef of the Year, Hostess of the Year, Sommelier of the Year, Bartender of the Year, Entrepreneur of the Year and International Chef of the Year, the last including Ana Roš, whose restaurant Hiša Franko in Slovenia earned her The World's 50 Best Restaurants' top female chef title in 2017. Craft Guild's own 2026 graduate award named its winners in the UK the same week, a reminder that recognition schemes for kitchen talent are multiplying well beyond Hamburg.

Founder Denise Snieguolė Wachter frames the evening as a correction, not a celebration: these women, she argues, already run the kitchens, cellars and dining rooms in question — they have simply lacked a stage built around them rather than around a single name.

Why the awards exist now

The starting point is a gap. About 4% of Germany's Michelin-starred head chefs are women, a figure CHEF:IN cites as the reason the platform launched at all rather than waiting for guides to close it on their own. CHEF:IN's own shortlist announcement in early September set out the same logic before any winner was named.

Sponsors underwriting the first edition include Transgourmet Cook, Pommery, AKI Caviar, Rosenthal and Zwiesel Fortessa, alongside publisher HarperCollins; chef Cornelia Poletto serves as the awards' ambassador.

Winners across all seven categories are due to be announced at tonight's ceremony. CHEF:IN says the watch list behind the trophies is built to outlast them — this is a first edition, not a one-off gesture.