Cooking
Feeding the Future: Women Leading the Next Food Revolution
For International Women’s Day 2026, Les Dames d’Escoffier London (LDE London) brings together bold, influential women from across food, hospitality, farming, and sustainability for a powerful conversation about who is shaping the future of food and how.
Feeding the Future: Women Leading the Next Food Revolution shines a spotlight on women driving change from the ground up. From chefs and writers to hospitality leaders and a new generation of female farmers, growers, and food producers, this session explores how women are reconnecting food with nature, challenging established systems, and building more resilient, sustainable models for the future.
Through candid conversation and lived experience, the session will explore:
• Who is leading change across today’s food system, from soil to service
• How women growers and producers are redefining sustainability, seasonality, and scale
• Why collaboration across sectors is essential to building a food system that truly works
• What needs to change next and where real momentum is already building
We invite you to be part of a conversation that goes beyond celebration to action, recognising women who are not waiting for permission, but actively shaping the next food revolution.
Women leading. Systems shifting. The future of food in motion.
Broadcaster, writer, and one of the UK’s most authoritative voices on food and food culture. Long respected for her clear-eyed analysis and advocacy, Sheila has consistently highlighted the vital connections between kitchens, communities, and the farmers and producers behind them, particularly women whose work is reshaping how food is grown, valued, and understood.
Founder of Ballymaloe Cookery School and one of Ireland’s most influential food educators and advocates for sustainable, local food systems. Ireland's best-known cook and best-selling author. She is a passionate and committed teacher with multiple awards to her name.
Multi-award-winning chef and the visionary behind Apricity, a Green Michelin-Starred restaurant in London, renowned for its celebration of conscious cooking and joyful dining. With an unwavering commitment to seasonality, sustainability, and veg-forward cuisine, Chantelle is one of the UK’s most prominent voices championing a more ethical and environmentally responsible food future.
A pioneering ethical entrepreneur, renowned for founding the world’s first certified organic pub, The Duke of Cambridge, in Islington in 1998. Raised in a self-sufficient communal environment in Hertfordshire, she developed an early commitment to sustainable and social responsibility. In 2009, she was awarded an MBE for her services to the organic pub trade. Geetie’s latest venture, The Bull, in Totnes, exemplifies her philosophy of “radical hospitality,” blending organic, seasonal cuisine with eco-conscious design and operations. Geetie and her husband, Guy Singh-Watson, founder of Riverford Organic Farmers, also operate Baddaford Farm, a collective of six ethical businesses committed to sustainable agriculture and community engagement.
A former events industry leader turned progressive estate custodian. After 17 years in operations, including work with Glastonbury and co-founding London’s largest independent promoter responsible for venues like Printworks, she returned to Dorset in 2019 to manage the Chettle estate.
As the guardian of this 860-acre community, Alice prioritises social justice and environmental resilience. She maintains 36 dwellings at affordable rents, has transitioned tenant farmers to organic practices, and revitalised the village with a local shop and holiday accommodation. Viewing herself as a custodian rather than a landowner, Alice is currently working to transfer the estate to a charitable community trust to ensure its sustainable future.
• Welcome drink
• Three canapés designed especially for the evening
• Panel discussion
• Networking
All profits support LDE London, a non-profit charity, and its work championing women across food, drink, and hospitality.
Find out more by visiting www.lesdameslondon.org
“LDE London’s vision is a world where women in food, beverage and hospitality are visible, valued, and fully supported to lead, locally and globally.”
