“How do you respond to the #MeToo movement in a way that’s more than a reactionary thing?” chef Edward Lee asks. “We wanted to do something smaller and quieter but something we thought could last for years and create change,” he says of the LEE Initiative, a week-long mentorship program that pairs five Kentucky-based cooks with a respected chef from restaurants around the country.

When I first started cooking, it was very much all male. But, I think, more and more it’s becoming an equal environment where you see a lot more women in the kitchen, and a lot more women leading kitchens. So, in that respect, it’s really positive. But there is still that current of male-run restaurants and male-invested restaurants, and it still creates an environment where it’s very hard for women to actually do their job in a nurturing environment.