CHEF NUTCHA PHANTHOUPHENG

Chef Nutcha Phanthoupheng is the award-winning proprietor and executive chef of Baan Lao Fine Thai Cuisine in Richmond, British Columbia. Raised in the rural Isaan region of northeastern Thailand, she grew up farming, foraging, fishing, and cooking alongside her mother. Experiences that became the foundation of her approach to food and her deep connection to traditional Thai cuisine. Before becoming a chef, Nutcha worked as a registered nurse and cancer researcher, bringing an enduring focus on health, nourishment, and care into her culinary practice.

After moving to Canada, she returned to Thailand to train with leading chefs in Royal Thai cuisine and earned credentials from institutions including The Blue Elephant, the Mandarin Oriental Hotel Bangkok Cooking School, and Bussaracum Royal Thai Cuisine. In 2022, she became the first Thai chef in Canada to be named Maître Rôtisseur by La Chaîne des Rôtisseurs. Her restaurant, Baan Lao, was ranked No. 12 on the inaugural North America’s 50 Best Restaurants list in 2025 and has received national and international recognition, including Canada’s Best Restaurant at the World Culinary Awards. Nutcha was also awarded the King Charles III Coronation Medal for her contributions to Canada and her community.

In Feeding the Diaspora, Chef Nutcha brings the flavours and traditions of Thailand into an intimate conversation about womanhood, motherhood, and the matriarchs who keep culture alive. Drawing on memories of cooking beside her own mother, she explores how food becomes a language of care and how the rituals passed between women can carry identity, memory, and a sense of home across lineages. Later in the evening, writers, artists and entrepreneurs gather around the table to reflect on womanhood, motherhood, identity and the often unseen ways women carry culture across generations.