The Founder, Justine Reichman, and The Creation of NextGenChef

NextGenChef is organized as a benefit corporation. In its first iteration, we worked with an NGO and a non-profit to run recipe contests in Mexico City, where I lived at the time. I partnered with a top chef, Maycoll Calderón, to choose the winning recipe. The winning recipe was to be added to his restaurant menu and a portion of proceeds returned back to the winner & their family. After returning back to California, Cooking Together Marin was born. It was to be the next iteration of our work in Mexico, but here in the United States. Our efforts in Mexico were focused on helping those that had limited means, but after Cooking Together Marin, I realized this was more than trying to feed those less fortunate - in my mind we needed to approach this movement from a bigger more global change. At that time NextGenChef was born.

NextGenChef is a culinary platform dedicated to supporting local, affordable, and regenerative food businesses.

NextGenChef works exclusively with mission-driven emerging food businesses to help nourish our members with the tools they need for successful integration into the professional culinary and food industries. We support businesses and concepts at the ideation stage and mentor those who are ready to go-to-market.

Justine’s goal for NextGenChef is Linkedin for everyone in the food and provide a platform that supports community, education, and innovation and inspires businesses and consumers to make more informed decisions and have greater access to healthy food. She takes great comfort in her craft using from the words of Mahatma Gandhi who said, “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others