Women in Industry Panel

This panel discussion, led by Meeru Dhalwala, will dig into ways we can facilitate change in our establishments in order to make it more sustainable for women to have long and fruitful careers in our industry. 

Our Panelists, Restaurateur Shira Blustein, Chef/Restaurateur Renée Lavallée, Butcher Taryn Barker and Chef/Forager Robin Kort will share their experiences navigating a career in hospitality.

Meeru Dhalwala, Co-owner and Chef, Vijs

Meeru Dhalwala was born in India and moved to Washington DC with her parents at a young age. In February 1995, she moved to Vancouver, BC and has since been cooking and running the kitchens and menus at Vij’s and Rangoli restaurants. (Rangoli closed after 17 years in May 2020 due to the Covid 19 pandemic).

Meeru is a self-taught creative chef who erased traditional boundaries within Indian cooking. She holds a Master of Science in Development Studies from Bath
University, UK, and brings her passion for humanity into her business and cooking practices. She is one of Vancouver’s most prominent promoters of women in business, climate change and sustainability, and healthy-elegant home cooking.

Meeru wrote the three Vij’s cookbooks: Vij’s—Elegant and Inspired Indian Cuisine, which won Cuisine Canada’s 2007 Gold Award for Best Cookbook, and Vij’s at Home: Relax, Honey, which placed second in the Best Indian Cuisine Book in the World category at the 2010 Gourmand International World Cookbook Awards in Paris, France. The third cookbook, Vij’s Indian—Our Cherished Recipes and Stories, with Penguin-Random House was released in October 2016 and was shortlisted for best Indian Cookbook at the 2017 Gourmand International World Cookbook Awards.

Meeru has spearheaded an annual international food fair called “Joy of Feeding” that is held at the UBC (University of British Columbia) Farm Centre for Sustainable Food Systems. Joy of Feeding is a celebration of sustainable foods, multiculturalism, farming, world music and brings in over 500 guests. It features 15 home cooks of various heritages and professions showcasing their culturalfavorite foods. After a hiatus during the pandemic, Joy of Feeding was relaunched in autumn 2022.

In addition to her intellectual curiosities and enjoyment of all things that bring the world of humans together through food, Meeru enjoyed being a chef/judge on Food Television Network’s “Wall of Chefs” for seasons 1 and 2.

Meeru’s kitchen is fully staffed by women—all of whom hail from villages in thePunjab, India—to experiment with various cooking techniques and spice combinations. All of Vij’s recipes are original and Meeru’s focus is to cook creative Indian dishes with local and sustainable ingredients.

Outside of Vij’s, Meeru is a member of many boards of organizations that focus on farming and farmers, and science and technology as it relates to our climate
crisis. Notably, she is on the Faculty Advisory Board for Land and Food Systems at the University of British Columbia, and speaks regularly at many public events. Meeru also volunteers regularly with Vancouver Food Stash Foundation, a non-profit that deals with rescued fresh foods (produce, dairy, meats and poultry, seafood) from regional grocery stores, thereby preventing edible foods nearing their best before dates turning into food waste.

In winter 2022, Meeru founded My Bambiri Foods, an online organic baby and toddler food company. All My Bambiri baby foods are her original recipes and sourced from regenerative BC organic farms. My Bambiri baby foods are sold via income-based pricing where customers select the prices they can afford relative to their incomes and financial agency. The goal is to make healthy foods for baby and the planet accessible to as many families as possible, irrespective of their incomes.

For her professional and community work, Meeru has received honorary doctorates from both University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University.

Personally, Meeru is mom to two adult daughters. She travels regularly to New York City and Toronto to visit her family and close friends from childhood.

Shira Blustein Founder + General Manager

Before becoming a restaurateur, Shira was playing music in punk and indie rock bands that toured extensively through Europe and North America. Those years spent travelling as a vegetarian were both enlightening and frustrating. On a good day, she would find an amazing dish from a street vendor that involved the freshest local produce, created with love. More often than not, however, she would find herself stuck between a brick of tofu and a hard place.

It became Shira’s mission to create a vegetable forward dining experience where creativity reigned, and the uniqueness of ingredients were openly explored and celebrated. Shira and her team have been dedicated to establishing meaningful connections with local farms, foragers and wineries, showcasing the amazing terroir driven food and wine BC has to offer. Since opening in 2012, The Acorn has been critically acclaimed internationally, and was recently named the Number 1 best vegan restaurant in the world by Big Seven Travel.

The Acorn is a MICHELIN GUIDE recommended, award-winning, vegetable-forward, farm-to-plate restaurant and bar located at the heart of Vancouver’s Main St. It is a destination for diners seeking the best and most creative meals made from fresh, locally sourced ingredients. Carefully crafted dishes from our zero-waste kitchen cater to vegans and gluten free diners while ensuring that even the staunchest meat eaters leave fully satisfied.

Renée Lavallée

Renée Lavallée was born and raised in Shawville, Quebec. She left home at an early age to attend George Brown College in Toronto. After close to twenty-five crazy years in the business, including many stents in restaurants around the world, Renée now calls Nova Scotia home.

After a brief hiatus to raise her family, Renée jumped back into the ring to open The Canteen – an award-winning sandwich shop in Downtown Dartmouth. After less than three busy years The Canteen opened up a brand new full-service restaurant and take-out shop called Little C only two blocks from its original location. In 2021, The Canteen received 5 Golds and 3 Silvers in various categories for The Coast’s Best of Halifax Awards, including Best Restaurant.

In April 2020, at the beginning on the COVID-19 pandmic, Renée and her husband/business partner launched The Canteen Community Kitchen which went on to supply over 10,00 meals to those in need through The North Grove Community Food Centre. They then went on to launch a new YouTube channel called The Canteen Cooks, which focuses on teaching viewers how to produce restaurant quality food out of their own kitchens.

Renée has a long list of professional accolades and has been the spokesperson for a number culinary brands and organizations including Taste of Nova Scotia, Select Nova Scotia, Community Food Centres Canada, Dairy Farmers’ of Canada and more. In 2017, Renée was voted as Best Chef for The Coast’s Best of Halifax Awards five years in a row and was named the 2018 Culinary Ambassador of the Year by Taste of Nova Scotia.

In 2019, Renée appeared as a contestant on Food Network Canada’s hit series, Top Chef Canada – Season 7. She appeared in seven of eight episodes finishing in the top five. The Canteen then went on to be featured on Food Network Canada’s Big Food Bucket List. In 2020, Renée then went on to appear as a judge on several episodes of Food Network Canada’s new series, Wall of Chefs.

Renée is an ardent supporter of local farmers, fishers and various other types of food producers. She can often be spotted at any number of local farmers’ markets with her husband and business partner Doug, daughter Zoe and son Philippe in tow.

Taryn Barker

Taryn Barker has held numerous positions in the meat and food industries for over 15 years. She started out her career at the age of fifteen as a customer server in a small family run butcher shop, and now is the owner and head butcher of The Little Butcher in Port Moody BC. The Little Butcher practices whole animal butchery and works with local food banks like Food Bank On Wheels and Share Food bank to reduce food waste and help ensure food security for many local families. The Little Butcher takes pride in supporting other local businesses, farmers and makers with an approximate 95% of products sold being from British Columbia. The shop won Best New Business in their inaugural year and has won Best Butcher Shop every year for the past nine years.

Taryn is constantly pushing herself to try new things and has had the opportunity to travel abroad and compete in butchery competitions in New Zealand and Brazil. Through online tryouts in 2018, she became a member of the first Canadian butcher team, Butchery Team Canada, who competed in The World Butchers Challenge in September 2022. Taryn was recognized as Port Moody’s 2019 Young Entrepreneur of the Year and was a finalist for the Tri-Cities 2019 Young Professional of the Year. Taryn is very active in the community and is currently the president of Shop Local Port Moody and was also part of the Port Moody Economic Development Committee for two years. Taryn’s favourite thing about butchery – “The art of the industry. It’s constantly changing and there are always new things to learn and try.”

ROBIN KORT
Chef/Sommelier/Forager/Owner

In a lifetime of living, harvesting and cooking between the Coast Mountains and the Pacific Ocean near Vancouver, BC, Chef Robin has gathered an abundance of delicious local plants, wild mushrooms and fresh seafood into culinary repertoire. Her cooking has been influenced by her mother, grandmother and many chef mentors from around the world along the way.  Spain, Italy and Japan have long cooking traditions of using similar ingredients to her home, so regular pilgrimages to those places honed her cooking style. Her passion is sharing her collected research with you, connecting the dots from wilderness to plate and revealing delicious secrets from the forest to sea. Her advice is to gently follow the seasons and harvest what is offered freshest each month; shoots leaves in spring, summer seaweeds, flowers, fish and fruit, fall roots and mushrooms, winter seafood. Take the utmost care to pick only what is abundant and leave the rest for other beasts.