Copper & Heat

Despite the sexist stereotype of women belonging in the home kitchen, it’s clear to many women who work in the restaurant industry that men are the ones who rule the professional kitchen. Women make up just 19% of chefs and only 7% of head chefs or executive chefs, according to RestaurantHER, a recent initiative working to raise awareness about inequality in the restaurant industry.

Enter Copper & Heat, a podcast created to “explore the unspoken rules and traditions of the kitchen.” Co-created by former Boiseans Katy and Ricardo Osuna, Copper & Heat’s first season, titled “Be a Girl,” dropped last summer.

“Be a Girl” explores what it’s like to be a woman in the kitchen in the restaurant industry. Katy Osuna, who studied sociology and anthropology at the College of Idaho, couldn’t help but pay attention to the interactions and power dynamics at play while she was working in renowned restaurants like Manresa in Los Gatos, California, and decided it was time to have frank conversations about gender and the food industry.

In the podcast, Osuna speaks with coworkers and friends who are cooks and chefs in elite restaurants. You’ll hear insights and experiences from women in head chef or management positions as well as from men in similar positions.

Copper & Heat confronts the passive that’s-just-the-way-it-is attitude that pervades kitchen culture in the restaurant industry. “Men aren’t as receptive to women,” one interviewee candidly states. This is just one of the many hard truths Copper & Heat explores. Toward the beginning of Episode One, Osuna has to check her own impulse to apologize to men for calling them sexist.

But that sexism is real, and it makes gaining respect in the kitchen difficult. Employees face intense criticism and extreme stress trying to deal with the often-unspoken rules of the kitchen as they compete with each other to try and move up through the hierarchical system from dishwasher to executive chef.

“In this first season, we talk a lot about the hyper-masculine environment in restaurant kitchens and how this makes it incredibly difficult for women to break into the industry,” says Osuna. “However, the most interesting thing was talking to my male coworkers about how difficult and damaging the environment is for them.”

It’s clear that the conversations that Copper & Heat facilitates are enlightening for everyone who wants to thrive in the restaurant industry—regardless of gender.

Copper & Heat comprises 30-minute well-produced, high-quality episodes. Some topics and language are not safe for work.

RestaurantHER
Copper & Heat | @copperandheat
Katy Osuna | @krosuna
Ricardo Osuna | @richard0suna
College of Idaho | @collegeofidaho
Manresa | @manresarestaurant