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This Is A (Wo) Man's World: Egyptian-American Chef Julia El Bardai
Sharp knives, hot plates and a room full of men: that is the day-to-day business of a chef running a kitchen in Egypt and the world. The male-dominated world of the culinary arts is a harsh reality that is seldom home to a female chef. Lost in male banter and straining night shifts, many women in Egypt hesitate to take their passion to cook to a professional level. Julia El Bardai is not one of these people. Inspired by her desire to make her biggest hobby her life, El Bardai abandoned her law career one day and set out on a road less travelled by women to become a chef. On April 21, she will prove that she can compete with the executive chefs of Egypt (who are exclusively male) when she takes the cooking stage at the Cairo Capital Club for a simple yet excellent dinner.
As a woman, the dream to become a chef is seldom part of a long-standing career plan. In fact, El Bardai, who is a successful chef with her own catering service in New York today, never made it a part of her plan either. After high school, the young Egyptian-American woman pursued a law degree in the United States where she grew up. “One day I asked myself if I would want to practice law every day for the rest of my life,” El Bardai tells us when we sit down with her at the Cairo Capital Club ahead of her big event next Tuesday. Unable to confirm she could, El Bardai purchased a one-way ticket to New York City to enroll in culinary school and make her hobby her profession. With that move, El Bardai had started her journey to become a female chef in a business overwhelmingly dominated by men.
Source: www.cairoscene.com