At Food & Wine,chefs are the superstars. They do more than feed us: they dazzle us with their creativity and inspire us with their dedication. We pride ourselves on our relationships with them, particularly the men and women we honor with our annual Best New Chefs awards, sponsored this year by Audi. The selection process starts when we ask food professionals nationwide to nominate brilliant new chefs who have been in charge of a kitchen in the United States for no more than five years. After winnowing the list of contenders to several dozen, the F&W staff travels all over the country on an eating marathon. This year, four of our winners came from places where we'd never found Best New Chefs before: Cleveland, Las Vegas, Honolulu and Sundance, Utah. We take that as proof that the demand for great food is spreading to every corner of the country, and chefs like the 10 here are answering the call.

1998 America's Best New Chefs | Anne Kearney
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Laurent Tourondel
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Danielle Custer
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Guillermo Pernot
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Lee Hefter
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Trey Foshee
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Rene Michelena
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Michael Symon
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Katy Sparks
1998 America's Best New Chefs | Oliver Altherr

Published November 1998