Joshua Skenes Joins Food & Wine's Best New Chefs 2011

It's official! Joshua Skenes has been inducted into Food & Wine magazine Best New Chef-dom. It doesn't come as a huge surprise because Skenes' food at Saison has been stunning critics near and far since it opened as a pop-up in 2009. And Food & Wine already called out Skenes' papardelle with sea urchin and cauliflower as one of the best dishes of 2010. For those unfamiliar with Saison, the restaurant has revamped everything since it's nascent pop-up days. It may be time to get acquainted.

Here's the full list of ten Best New Chefs across the country as it was released a bit ago:

· Viet Pham& Bowman Brown, Forage, Salt Lake City, UT
· Jason Franey, Canlis, Seattle, WA
· Bryce Gilmore, Barley Swine, Austin, TX
· Stephanie Izard, Girl & the Goat, Chicago, IL
· James Lewis, Bettola, Birmingham, AL

And we'll refer you to Eater National for the full press release.

· Food & Wine Magazine's Best New Chefs 2011 Announced [-EN-]
· All Previous Saison Coverage [~ ESF ~]

Skenes actually sprouts miners lettuce chest hair now that he's on the Food & Wine short list. [Photo: John Lee]