Chef Gabriel Rucker of Le Pigeon and Little Bird Wins Best Chef Northwest at James Beard Awards

Portland chef Gabriel Rucker won the James Beard Foundation award Monday night for “Best Chef Northwest”. Rucker beat fellow nominees Greg Denton and Gabrielle Quiñónez Denton of Ox, John Gorham – Toro Bravo, Naomi Pomeroy – Beast, Gabriel Rucker – Le Pigeon, Adam Sappington – The Country Cat,
Cathy Whims – Nostrana and Justin Wills of Restaurant Beck in Depoe Bay, OR.

Rucker, who won the foundation’s Rising Star Chef of the Year award in 2011 is chef at the highly regarded restaurants Le Pigeon and Little Bird in Portland.

Other accolades include Food & Wine’s “Best New Chef” distinction in 2007. He and Meredith Erickson with Lauren and Andrew Fortgang, will release their first cookbook, Le Pigeon: Cooking at the Dirty Bird (Ten Speed Press), on September 17, 2013. Forwarded by Chef Tom Colicchio, the cookbook is a serious yet playful collection of 150 recipes celebrating Rucker’s high-low extremes in cooking, combining the wild and the refined in a unique and progressive style.