Expanding Roots
With a best-selling cookbook out, chef Vivian Howard is branching out
Chef VIVIAN HOWARD, a James Beard Foundation Award semi-finalist and owner of Chef & the Farmer and the Boiler Room in Kinston, will host the Women to Watch Leadership Initiative Luncheon on March 7. Howard will speak about her career and plans for her new Wilmington restaurant.
Howard’s career began in New York City, working alongside husband Ben Knight in various Manhattan restaurants and operating a small catering company. The couple eventually left the city behind, relocating to Lenoir County, and with the help of Howard’s family, opened Chef & the Farmer in 2006.
The restaurant was, and in many ways still is, the first of its kind in the area. Howard and Knight set out to help transform the region’s economy by working with local farmers and creating a fine dining experience in Kingston that would draw diners from not just across the state, but across the country.
Howard’s passion for local food combined with her desire to serve the community has pushed her to evolve over the past ten years from chef to television personality and cookbook author. She is currently filming the fifth season of A Chef’s Life, a Peabody Award-winning PBS documentary that offers a window into Howard’s relationship with local farmers and community members, as well as her adaptations of traditional Southern cuisine.
In 2016 her first cookbook Deep Run Roots: Stories and Recipes from My Corner of the South, quickly became a New York Times best-seller.
Howard says that when she and Knight moved back to North Carolina, she told her family that she didn’t just want to run a restaurant for the rest of her life. It was important to her that she have multiple outlets to pursue her mission of giving the people of Eastern North Carolina a sense of pride in the foods they grew up eating.
“I think that through each of these outlets we’ve been able connect with people in a really meaningful way,” Howard says. “And that’s so rewarding.”
The past ten years have not been without struggles however. The Chef & the Farmer suffered a devastating kitchen fire in 2012, forcing the restaurant to close down for more than four months. This past fall both Kinston restaurants were impacted by the devastating effects of Hurricane Matthew. While they were not affected structurally, there were supply issues as a result of the flooding, and many of the area hotels that house those traveling long distances to dine at Chef & the Farmer, were closed.
With most of the suppliers now recovered, Howard is turning her attention to Wilmington where she plans to open Benny’s Big Time Pizzeria on Greenfield Street in the second phase of the South on Front development.
“We want it be a place where people get excited to go,” she says about the atmosphere she’s aiming for at the new restaurant. “I envision it being a place where people aren’t afraid to take their kids, but also a place where I would want to go with my girlfriends for a night out.”
As Howard’s roles have expanded, so too has the challenge to meet a growing list of needs. She’s a mother of two who often struggles to find a home/work balance that includes cooking, filming, book tours, public appearances, and more.
“I’m in an unusual situation in that I have all these other projects going on but people still come to my restaurant to eat my food so I’m not able to just walk away from the kitchen,” Howard says. “So, trying to manage it all while still being the guiding force at Chef & the Farmer has been the biggest challenge.”
For more info on the upcoming event in Wilmington with Vivian Howard, go to W2WLunch.com.
