The menu: Gender Balance

It crept up rather unnoticed on the inside post but The Menu believes the just-announced Athrú 2016 (18/19 July) will prove in the long run to be one of the more important gatherings in Irish food as leading female chefs, restaurateurs and other culinary figures come together in Galway to convene a conference aimed at empowering women working in professional culinary arts.

Following two recent articles on the subject, including one by food writer Trish Deseine, subsequent online media kerfuffles illustrated the subject of a woman’s role in the professional kitchen and the world of professional food at large still requires much teasing out, most especially the notion that the industry is somehow immune from the gender inequality still to be found in, well, pretty much every other industry and profession out there.