James Beard Finalists Revealed: The Surprises, Snubs, and Secrets!!

The 2026 James Beard Award Nominee finalists were just announced, so Adrienne and Joe dive headfirst into the biggest surprises, omissions, and things they’d like to see happen this year. In this episode, we discuss: The biggest names to make each of the lists Why weren’t there any Caribbean restaurants represented? An explanation on how the awards process works What they’d like to see changed, and why the regional layout may need a makeover Adrienne Cheatham is a member of the James Beard Awards subcommittee Follow the show: @chefscutpod Follow Adrienne: @chefadriennecheatham Follow Joe: @insta.flamm

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  This week on The Chef's Cut, Joe and I are talking about the recently released James Beard Awards finalist list. We're starting with the biggest shockers. I was sure they were gonna make the nominee list. How judging actually works.

• 0:17Joe Flamm?

  Can you shed a little bit of light of like, what are they looking at? What are they looking for?

• 0:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  And what we would like to see change.

• 0:23Joe Flamm?

  Buckle in. This has been my beef for years, and I will die on this hill.

• 0:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  But first, Chef's Cut Nation, we need 10 seconds of your time. Please take a moment to just rate and review the pod wherever you're listening. It really helps. All right, let's go.

• 0:42Joe Flamm?

  It is shortlist season.

• 0:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  James Beard Shortlist. It's an exciting time.

• 0:49Joe Flamm?

  The list is short and the feelings are high.

• 0:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  I am so excited for this year. So many great people made the list, and I want to be there to cheer them on, and I just want to be there to hang out with all my friends. You included.

• 1:00Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. Yeah, no, I think the most exciting thing, when I see the shortlist every year, is getting to see everybody who's coming to Chicago. You know, like, Ayesha's coming, my buddy Vinnie from Cordelia in Cleveland got nominated on the shortlist. Like, he's coming to town. Him and I did No Kid Hungry together in DC last summer. So, super excited to have him back for it. Just a great list. It's such a cool event for the city of Chicago. You know what I mean? It's a huge one for us. We love it. So it's always exciting having the best of our industry come to, you know, what I think is the best industry city and get to experience it for a weekend.

• 1:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  And you know what? This is gonna sound silly in comparison to everything you just said, but one thing that I love about it is chefs look like dirty little boys all day. Like, we're wearing baggy pants, baggy jackets, aprons. And this is like the one time of year that everybody like gets dressed up, like hangs out together, and it's just a different feeling for that.

• 2:00Joe Flamm?

  It is the best. It's so funny, like, seeing all the chefs. You're like, oh, look at you. You feel like a proud parent, like, oh, you put a suit on. You know what I mean?

• 2:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  You put on a tie.

• 2:10Joe Flamm?

  All the people who you only have seen, like, gross after work or like really early at the farmer's market, where it's like, you know. And then it's like, oh, wow. Look at us, huh?

• 2:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean, it's, it's a crazy time. Like, we've been waiting for this for a couple of months. The long list came out, what, end of January? So I don't know, there were some surprises this year. There are some amazing, amazing chefs and restaurants nominated. To be clear, everybody on the list deserves to be there.

• 2:36Joe Flamm?

  No doubt, no doubt. I feel like it's always a matter of, it's never like, oh, I can't believe this person made it. It's always a surprise. It's like, ooh, that person. And there's just not enough room for everybody, right? It's, it's always a surprise of who left off. So looking at the shortlist this morning, age, knee jerk reaction, biggest takeaway.

• 2:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay, so for me, one of the biggest surprises was this past year, and even on the pod, like, we've been talking to so many people about Caribbean cuisine and the rise of Afro Caribbean cuisine. It's all over the press. Some of the best new restaurants in the country from city to city are focused on Afro Caribbean cuisine. But when the shortlist came out, I didn't see that representation there, even though there were some restaurants on the long list. So that was a big shock to me because that was such a huge story this year that I thought there would for sure be representation on the shortlist. What was your like knee jerk first take when you saw the list?

• 3:34Joe Flamm?

  I think my biggest reaction was one, lack of New York on the national. I think lack of Chicago as well. Lot of California, lot of Texas.

• 3:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 3:46Joe Flamm?

  I thought that was really interesting. Lot, a lot of Texas.

• 3:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Texas had five, yeah.

• 3:51Joe Flamm?

  Texas is really, really big. So is California, both huge, huge markets. But I think I was really, really surprised to see. It's like Chicago, I feel like has on years and off years. But New York, I felt like that was extraordinarily surprising when you look at the, the big national ones. When you go from, you know, chef to restaurateur, to restaurant, to emerging, to best do, to outstanding bakery, all those like.

• 4:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 4:20Joe Flamm?

  And I will say it's cool. It's cool seeing a lot of the smaller markets on there, you know, looking at outstanding, I think outstanding bakery. Might have the most eclectic list. You know, you have Sisters Bay, Wisconsin, you have Anchorage, Alaska, Bethlehem, New Hampshire, Bozeman, Montana.

• 4:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 4:37Joe Flamm?

  And then Charleston, South Carolina. Like Charleston, South Carolina is the biggest city on that list.

• 4:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's crazy.

• 4:43Joe Flamm?

  So best new restaurant, like looking through that you have, it's a crazy, again, you have the mix here. You have two restaurants from Missouri, one in St. Louis, one in Kansas City, which I will say, Kansas City has a market. If you have not been, ton of fun stuff happened there. Kansas City is a super fun city. I think it's a really slept out city. It's great. You have a Milwaukee restaurant on there, a Houston restaurant on there, obviously massive city. Philly, I felt like Philly had a big year. You got one in New York, you got Lay, is it Lee, Lay?

• 5:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  Lay, Lay Wine Bar. They've been getting, it's, there's been like a ground swell of support for them for the past year. I've been hearing about them from everybody. Tons of write-ups. They were just in Bon App this week. What I found really interesting is some of these restaurants are very wine focused too. So like you have Maison Bar of N in DC.

• 5:33Joe Flamm?

  DC.

• 5:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Lay Wine Bar, like a lot of these places are very wine focused, like kind of wine bar restaurants. So that seems to be a big trend this year.

• 5:43Joe Flamm?

  Well, even if you go to outstanding restaurant, you know, stayed on that same tip, you see Four Horsemen there, which you know what I mean? It's like the wine bar of wine bars. You know what I mean? It's that you could argue is the coolest wine bar in the United States.

• 5:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 5:57Joe Flamm?

  Owned by like the coolest dude in the United States named Murphy from LCD Sound System.

• 6:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. It's great. I've been there twice. I mean, I love, I love Four Horsemen. It's, it's like really set, set a new wave. It's been open for like 10, 12 years and it really like set a new tone for the types of wine focused restaurants and the types of food places do. It's, it's great. It's really special.

• 6:19Joe Flamm?

  I've been there in different iterations of it and every time I thought it was spectacular. So I think we gotta get it to, you know, outstanding restaurant tour, because obviously I did not make the shortlist. I don't know if you're there.

• 6:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  I know. I was very sad about that.

• 6:32Joe Flamm?

  But honestly.

• 6:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  I was really hoping that I could be cheering you on in Chicago this year.

• 6:36Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. And I mean, I think for, you know, we're a restaurant group that's, you know, Arguably five years old at the oldest, but like really a couple of years old from, you know, when we expanded. And I think so for us to be longlisted was a huge accomplishment this year. So I don't think I had any thoughts that we would make the shortlist. And I think, you know, the shortlist is, is stacked this year, but it was surprising seeing, you know, I thought, I thought our, our boy Simon would be on that shortlist for sure. I mean, he's been on a, he's been on a generational tear.

• 7:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 7:12Joe Flamm?

  That one was really surprising to me, especially because there's nothing from New York on that list.

• 7:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  He created a whole new genre and concept of steakhouse, updated the style that a steakhouse could be, and has turned this restaurant concept into a now global powerhouse brand. And the food is really good. You're right. Like that was a big shock. And when you didn't make the shortlist, I mean, like you said, it was your first year being nominated. A lot of people first year may not make it on to the shortlist, but you can be up again next year.

• 7:46Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 7:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  And more people will be paying attention. More people will be thinking of that. And then second year could make it to the shortlist.

• 7:53Joe Flamm?

  No doubt.

• 7:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  But yeah, Simon, I was, I was shocked.

• 7:56Joe Flamm?

  That was probably the most surprising. The outstanding chef category, I thought it was surprising that one, it's you got three California chefs on that list. You got one from Grand Junction, Colorado, and then one from Mystic, Connecticut. On a year where it's like that longlist included, you know, greats like Missy Robbins.

• 8:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. Last year, we had Youngsick. Youngsick won last year. Like New York, we had a really strong year last year. In outstanding chef, we had Gabrielle Cruther and Youngsick Yim. Youngsick won. And this year, Gabrielle Cruther didn't make it to the shortlist, which I was, I was shocked by.

• 8:30Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. I also think it's interesting too, when you see stuff like the chef from Catbird Seat was up for outstanding chef, but didn't make the shortlist, but the restaurant did for restaurant. You know what I mean? So that's always like an interesting one to be of like, how that affects voters, like in their favor or not in their favor, right? All that being said, I, I think it's, it's always interesting. You know what I mean? Seeing who's, who's left off.

• 8:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  But there is somebody that we do have to give a special congratulatory shout out to who's been on the pod that made it to the finalist list.

• 9:01Joe Flamm?

  Our girl Ayesha.

• 9:02Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ayesha Nurgaya, shoot cat.

• 9:05Joe Flamm?

  You know, the other one I want to give a shout out to, and this is, this is a, this is a small off the beaten path one, but best chef Midwest, Zach Baker at Cal Luccenzo.

• 9:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh.

• 9:15Joe Flamm?

  Up in, up in Wawa Tosa.

• 9:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wawa Tosa.

• 9:19Joe Flamm?

  Tosa, Tosa as they call it, up in Milwaukee. I ate at Cal Luccenzo, I think it was a year and a half ago, we went up to, to visit a friend at Marquette. And it's, I think it's one of the best Italian restaurants in the Midwest.

• 9:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow.

• 9:34Joe Flamm?

  It's a small, little, you know, husband, wife place, crazy goods, super simple, like just unreal. And I saw that he made the shortlist. Super, super happy for them as well, as well as my Balkan brethren down in Balkan tree box down in Missouri.

• 9:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay. So I have a question, Joe. Top five biggest surprises. It can be restaurants, it can be other categories. What's your top five surprises of long list that did not make it to the shortlist? Cause we agree, the shortlist is excellent, but what surprised you? Top five long list that didn't make it?

• 10:16Joe Flamm?

  I would say top five, Simon Kim restaurateur. That was number one. I would say outstanding chef, Missy Robbins not making the shortlist. I think as far as outstanding restaurant goes, I mean, Via Carota not making the shortlist. Like I was surprised, I couldn't believe I hadn't won already. Like that's in, in my mind, that's institution level of restaurants in New York. I think it's one of the, the all time greats. So like that one to me was, was, was really, really surprising. And then I think, you know, for me, it's like looking at, I, you know, I have to go in my own backyard and talk about Great Lakes a little bit, right?

• 10:55Joe Flamm?

  So looking at the long list for, for Great Lakes, um, that we got three Ohio and two Chicago. It is kind of surprising, you know, Tai Dang not making the shortlist. He's been listed a bunch of times. Christopher Young over at Maxwell's, I was really, really surprised to not see him make the shortlist. I think what he's doing there is really, really good. And then the other one off that list, that ladder four wine bar in Detroit. Is everybody I've talked to up there is like, that place is crazy good. Another wine focused place. You know what I mean? Talking about, you know, some things that are trending, but, but them not making it. And also like, you know, Rishi and Zubair have been on a just tear.

• 11:40Joe Flamm?

  Of opening restaurants in Chicago. You know what I mean? And they're all good. You know, Mira was the one on the list, but you know what I mean? They have, uh, they have the, the, the coach house and lilac tiger and they just opened NADU. And so, um, I was kind of surprised to not see them shortlist, but those were my biggest ones. Where, what do you think?

• 11:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  So I was surprised by Kasama. I was surprised Red Hook Tavern, Gabrielle Cruther, Simon Kim. And then I'm, I'm really conflicted about this because in the best new restaurant category, I had two of the best meals of the year. At Kabawa and Bong. Bong is a Cambodian restaurant in Brooklyn and Kabawa with Paul Carmichael Afro Caribbean Pan Caribbean cuisine. Two of the best meals. And I thought it was going to be a death match in best new restaurant between Bong and Kabawa. And neither of them made the shortlist. So that was shocking.

• 12:33Joe Flamm?

  And I feel like Kabawa is the one where it's like every person I've talked to who's been, has been like, yeah, that's, it's, it's it.

• 12:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah. So yeah, I mean, that's, that's my top surprises from this. Um, and again, I thought Caribbean cuisine. Afro Caribbean cuisine had such a huge year. Kabawa not making the list was a huge shock to me. I was sure they were going to make the nominee list.

• 13:03Joe Flamm?

  Speaking of the nominee list, you sitting on New York, you have been a little, you know, in center baseball on this. Cause I don't know, I don't know who sits at Chicago. You know what I mean? I don't know who judges it. And I don't know the criteria. Like, can you shed a little bit of light of like, what, what are they looking at? What are they looking for? Cause I remember back in the day when I worked for Tony, like, well, the log list would come out. They used to, if you had won a James Beard Award, you got to vote. So him as a James Beard Award winner, he would get set a log list and it was like a log, like Scantron form, right?

• 13:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 13:35Joe Flamm?

  And you would go every region and you would, I think you'd get to click, you'd get to vote maybe like two or three per region, if I remember correctly. I don't know. And some were one. And it was always fun. Like him and I would go through together. Like I always looked forward to it. We'd talk about all these chefs and, you know, talk about all the places we ate that year and which ones we thought were the best. It was a cool thing. But I don't think they do that anymore, right?

• 13:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  I don't think so. They've changed the process significantly to make it more of a level playing field. It's a cool process because every category has different criteria, so to speak. Like, you know, outstanding bakery, a brick and mortar has to have been open for three years. Um, you know, best chef in a region has to have been cooking in that region for X number of years. It's a really cool process because it does look at restaurants holistically, from how the staff is treated, to how the restaurant is run, to the guest experience.

• 14:34Joe Flamm?

  Buckle in. This is, this is my, this has been my beef for years and I will die on this hill. I wish I had a giant map around me to explain this. The regions are like reverse gerrymandering. They make zero fucking sense.

• 14:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh no, tell me more, tell me more.

• 14:57Joe Flamm?

  All right, so just we're best chefs, all right, we go region by region. California, that's a region, that's fine, California can have California. You know, New York gets New York State, right? That's great, they need, they need New York State, it's a big region, I get that. We get Texas, gets Texas, totally understand that. This is my, my, my beef with this shit.

• 15:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Talk to me.

• 15:19Joe Flamm?

  Is best chef, Great Lakes, okay? And best chef Midwest. So, Great Lakes, you have Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio. Midwest, you have Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Nebraska, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. So, one, Illinois has got to be Illinois, Chicago's got to be a something. You know what I mean? Like, they got to let just Illinois be Illinois, because it screws up the region, where it's like, this year, best chef, Great Lakes, it's two Chicago, three Ohio, which is not usually the case. It's usually four Chicago, one from somewhere else.

• 15:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, that's true.

• 15:59Joe Flamm?

  So, it's not fair for the rest of the region. So, Great Lakes should be Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Minnesota.

• 16:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay.

• 16:05Joe Flamm?

  That should be Great Lakes. Illinois should be Illinois. Needs to be separated out, would open up the field, would make way, way more sense, because also, all those places around the Great Lakes.

• 16:19Joe Flamm?

  So, it feels fair.

• 16:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 16:21Joe Flamm?

  I'm not, I'm not fucking stretching here.

• 16:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  No, no, that's, that's reasonable.

• 16:25Joe Flamm?

  And then it opens up the Midwest to, you know what I mean? I think more of like, seeing more stuff from Iowa, from the Dakotas, from Nebraska, you know, there's, is, uh, you know, there's a good amount of Missouri this year, which is kind of surprising.

• 16:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  And Missouri got four this year.

• 16:39Joe Flamm?

  I mean, it's, you know, the Midwest, it's like, you look at it, it's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight states, and you have representation from half, right?

• 16:50Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 16:51Joe Flamm?

  So, it makes it feel like it's, it's too big. Like, I'm not saying you have to have all from all, but it's like, you know, same as Great Lakes, you have Illinois, and you have Ohio, you have no Michigan, no Indiana this year. And I mean, Indiana rarely gets it, but still, doesn't matter. The other one, I think, the, the other most egregious one is mid-Atlantic.

• 17:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  DC, Virginia, Maryland.

• 17:11Joe Flamm?

  DC, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania.

• 17:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 17:17Joe Flamm?

  I think... Like, that one to me is crazy too. You know what I mean? Cause it's like, you, you look at it this year especially, it's like you have four Philly, one DC. I think Pennsylvania stands on its own too. Cause you have two major cities there in Philly and in, you know, or you do Pennsylvania, Jersey. Cause you have that weird, you know, like border.

• 17:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right.

• 17:40Joe Flamm?

  And then you throw mid Atlantic. It's also like Pennsylvania is not in the mid Atlantic. Mid Atlantic, mid, mid, what about midway to what? Midway to fucking, midway to fucking Ohio?

• 17:55Joe Flamm?

  In what geography world are we fucking living? This is insane, dude.

• 17:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  Is that, what is, okay.

• 18:01Joe Flamm?

  I know there's a map in the kitchen at the James Beard house. I've seen that fucking shit. Tell someone to look at it.

• 18:07Adrienne Cheatham?

  If I were a basketball team in Pennsylvania, what region would I be in?

• 18:11Joe Flamm?

  You'd be in the east.

• 18:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, okay. Got it. Okay. Well, you know what? We can go by basketball rules for this.

• 18:17Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. Um, it seems like they're going by like the new ones where like they restructured all the conferences. But that's the biggest thing. I think they need to look at the regions. I think the regions are wildly antiquated. I think if they redid that, it would be better. It would be so much better. It'd be more interesting. It would be more, you know, I mean, it's never gonna be fucking fair, right? You know what I mean? It can't be fair. That's not life, but I think it would, it would make it. I, I think it would make it better. And I don't think it's like a crazy, crazy ask. But that would be the biggest thing I would change if they ever cared what I thought about anything, which I don't think they do.

• 18:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  They are always evolving the process to try to make it better, make it more fair, make it more equitable. And take things like that into account. And I know there has been discussion about regions before other people have brought this up. I've heard, you know, people from Florida are like, Florida should be its own region. Because you've got eight hour, nine hour drive, well, 10, if you count the Florida Keys. Between North Florida and the Florida Keys. So getting coverage on a state that large is really difficult if you've only got two judges in Florida.

• 19:28Joe Flamm?

  Sure. And I mean, they go all the way from Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana.

• 19:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Puerto Rico's also southeast. So that's a huge, you know, that swath to cover. So there has been discussion about that before, but it is, it is really interesting. I mean, clearly you've thought about the, uh, the regions before.

• 19:49Joe Flamm?

  Big time. It's, it's a, it's a passion of mine.

• 19:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  I love that, Joe. This has been so fun breaking this down and we will definitely, are we going to be in Chicago this year? Can we hang out?

• 20:01Joe Flamm?

  I mean, I'll be in Chicago. Are you coming out for the awards?

• 20:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean, I go every year. It's always like me and my sisters, like hang out weekend. And, you know, Stephen, we all kicked it last year. We had our podcast launch party.

• 20:15Joe Flamm?

  So we run it back. We might, we might have to run it back. Might have to run something back, age.

• 20:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  I think we should, we should have another get together Sunday before the awards. How about Rosemary this year? Maybe. Ooh, that'd be fun. Open up the windows, get a little street action.

• 20:33Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. I mean, it's June, so it could possibly be nice out. Maybe.

• 20:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  You never know with Chicago though.

• 20:39Joe Flamm?

  Never know. Never know.

• 20:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  Joe, this has been such a blast. I can't wait to see who gets called when those envelopes are opened in June.

• 20:48Joe Flamm?

  Yep. So we'll have a good recap when it's over age. Till then, buddy.

• 20:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's it for this episode of the chef's cut. Be sure to subscribe wherever you're listening, especially if you're watching us on YouTube where you can get full length video of every episode and follow us at the chefs cut pod on IG for Joe Flamm. I'm Adrian Cheatham and this has been the chef's cut. Life beyond the past.