{"id":365452,"date":"2026-06-18T08:19:44","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T08:19:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/365452\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T08:19:44","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T08:19:44","slug":"here-are-the-bay-areas-biggest-winners-at-the-2026-james-beard-awards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/365452\/","title":{"rendered":"Here Are the Bay Area\u2019s Biggest Winners at the 2026 James Beard Awards"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two big Bay Area winners emerged from Monday night\u2019s 2026 James Beard Awards in Chicago: Michael Tusk of three-Michelin-starred Quince<\/a> walked away with the Outstanding Chef award, and Kevin Diedrich of Pacific Cocktail Haven<\/a> won the award for Outstanding Professional in Cocktail Service.<\/p>\n

Tusk took to the stage at the Lyric Opera with his wife and business partner, Lindsay Tusk, to accept the award, thanking his wife and team. Tusk expressed some incredulity at winning the award, telling the crowd that he was surprised to be nominated for Outstanding Chef this year. \u201cIt\u2019s been a while since we\u2019ve been here, so it was a little … I don\u2019t want to say put out to pasture or something like that, but it was quite a surprise,\u201d Tusk said. \u201cBut we believe in what we do, we believe in hospitality. We\u2019re always trying to create a better team, create a better work environment for the entire team.\u201d This is Tusk\u2019s second time on the stage for the James Beard Awards; he snapped up the Best Chef: Pacific prize back in 2011.<\/p>\n

Diedrich received his award for Outstanding Professional in Cocktail Service from Killer Mike and El-P of Run the Jewels. Diedrich thanked his mentors and his team, saying, \u201cIt\u2019s about the people you surround yourself with, and they\u2019re absolutely amazing.\u201d Diedrich also cracked a joke: \u201cMy wife, who\u2019s been by my side for 17 years of marriage, she said she\u2019d never marry or date a bartender, but now she\u2019s married to an Outstanding Professional in Cocktail Service.\u201d This award adds to Diedrich\u2019s collection for 2026; Pacific Cocktail Haven also landed on North America\u2019s 50 Best Bars 2026 list<\/a> at number 41.<\/p>\n

In the lead-up to the event, the foundation trimmed down its long list of Bay Area semifinalists<\/a> from 24 local chefs, bar professionals, restaurants, and bars to just eight nominees who moved on to finalist status<\/a>. While Tusk and Diedrich received awards in national categories, unfortunately, that means a few Bay Area locals walked away empty-handed. Srijith Gopinathan and Ayesha Thapar of Ettan<\/a>, Copra<\/a>, and Eylan<\/a>, were finalists in the Outstanding Restaurateur category, with Dana Street of Fore Street<\/a>, Scales<\/a>, and Standard Baking Co.<\/a> of Portland, Maine, taking home the prize. Smuggler\u2019s Cove<\/a> was in the running for Outstanding Bar, ultimately losing to Scotch Lodge<\/a> in Portland, Oregon. Meanwhile, Harrison Cheney of two-Michelin-starred Sons & Daughters<\/a>, and chefs Sarah Cooper and Alan Hsu, of one-Michelin-starred Sun Moon Studio<\/a>, all landed Best Chef: California finalist nods ahead of Monday\u2019s event; that category was clinched by Dave Beran of Seline<\/a> in Santa Monica.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two big Bay Area winners emerged from Monday night\u2019s 2026 James Beard Awards in Chicago: Michael Tusk of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":365453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[101,103,102,16677,104,106,105],"class_list":["post-365452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-san-francisco-restaurant-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=365452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=365452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=365452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=365452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}