50 Next and S.Pellegrino Young Chef Academy Unveil 2022 Hospitality Pioneers

The organisation behind The World’s 50 Best Restaurants and The World’s 50 Best Bars has unveiled its 50 Next list of future leaders in the food and drink sector aged 35 or under. The list also celebrates individuals over the age of 35 who have recently set out on a new career path.

The list, now in its second year, is a celebration of 50 young people who will go on to shape the future of gastronomy and aims to be inclusive and people-focused.

A list rather than a ranking it is divided into seven categories: Gamechanging Producers; Tech Disruptors; Empowering Educators; Entrepreneurial Creatives; Science Innovators; Trailblazing Activists; and Hospitality Pioneers, a category supported by the S.Pellegrino Young Chef Academy.

The list was unveiled at a special event in Bilbao, celebrating both the Class of 2022 and 2021 and featuring a series of talks from top chefs, including Academy members Joan Roca, Dominique Crenn and Mauro Colagreco.

Find out more this year’s 50 Next Hospitality Pioneers 2022 below.

Debora Fadul

Born and raised in Guatemala City, chef Debora Fadul has devoted her career to exploring the spiritual dimension of food and highlighting the value of Guatemalan gastronomy through different projects: Diacá restaurant, the Crece platform, the pop-up restaurant EN, and Estudio Diacá, a sensory lab and collective think tank exploring ingredients and mapping what she calls the “Sensory Ecosystem”.

Jackwing Yao, Lola Lao and Tiger Liang

These young female mixologists are shaking up the Chinese cocktail scene thanks to their bold and creative approach to mixology. Behind the bars, respectively, of SanYou in Guangzhou, Hope & Sesame in Shenzen and Hope & Sesame in Guangzhou, they are exploring new ingredients, utilising traditional Chinese spirits and local products, and introducing new infusion and distillation techniques to create modern ‘haute mixology’ drinks.

Javier Rivero Yarza

Javier Rivero Yarza is the chef and co-owner of AMA Taberna in Tolosa, as well as ENEA in San Sebastián, in the Basque Country, where he seeks to implement different and more caring ways to approach hospitality. That includes nobody working more than eight hours a day or five days a week, and staff training that provides tools to become better professionals. He also wants cooks and producers to get paid fairly, avoiding precarious working conditions, and making it possible for teams to grow together.

Mette Søberg

Danish chef Mette Søberg is the head of research and development at Noma in Copenhagen. Together with her team, she's been developing innovative dishes and three different menus every year inspired by their local producers, products they find nearby and the flavours they get to know through their travels around the world. This creativity helped the restaurant win its third Michelin star and to be named The World’s Best Restaurant in 2021.

Michael Elégbèdé

Third-generation chef Michael Elégbèdé is the chef and owner of ÌTÀN Test Kitchen in Lagos, Nigeria, where his cuisine tells the stories of the different regions, ethnic groups, ingredients, landscapes, and traditions of his country. In 2019 he put together a team of like-minded peers to launch Abòri, a local collective movement aiming to facilitate sustainable growth in Nigeria's food system. He also created a web platform (Aböri Marketplace) during lockdown connecting farmers and local producers to the public.

Mmabatho Molefe

Born and raised in KwaZulu-Natal province, in South Africa, Mmabatho Molefe is the chef and owner of Emazulwini, a Cape Town restaurant where she showcases African ingredients and celebrates Nguni cuisine and her culture as a modern Zulu woman. At Emazulwini she offers her contemporary take on traditional Zulu cuisine through shareable dishes that also demonstrate how South African cuisine doesn't have to be "heavy, slow-cooked and monotonous in colour".

Santiago Lastra

Hailing from Mexico City, chef Santiago Lastra has picked up the nickname ‘The Nomadic Chef’ for his culinary travels, which includes stints cooking in Spain and Denmark, as well as over 20 other countries. Opening Kol in London during the pandemic he has since won the restaurant a Michelin star for the inventive use of largely British ingredients to create a modern Mexican menu that is served alongside biodynamic wines and agave spirits, and artisan craft imported from Mexico.

Zineb Hattab

After working for some of the world’s best chefs, engineer turned cook Zineb Hattab opened her own place, KLE, in Zurich in 2020, a vegan restaurant in which she is going back to the roots of cooking while making a bold statement on plant-based food, health, sustainability, and the wellbeing of hospitality workers. A great inspiration for young women, Hattab's determination led her to turn her life upside down to pursue her true passion in a male-dominated environment – with no formal training in cooking – and to make her own path in the world of restaurants.