New executive chef brings experience to Big Woods Restaurant Group

Challenges are one of the hallmarks of Kathy Jones' life, working as an executive chef who is underrepresented in her field.

“I love a good challenge. I’ve play the drums. I’ve been married over 22 years with two daughters and five grandchildren. I love photography and kayaking, where there are no deadlines.”

Jones' latest challenge is working as executive chef of the Big Woods Restaurant Group, based in Nashville, that encompasses 12 restaurants, breweries and distilleries across central and southern Indiana, including Bloomington, Edinburgh, Speedway, Indianapolis, Franklin and West Lafayette.

Jones has worked as a chef for more than 40 years. She is part of the 12.5% of executive chefs in America — 135,236 in April 2022 — who are women and one of only 8% of executive chefs who are LGBTIQ identifying.

Since July 2022 she's been executive chef of the Big Woods Restaurant Group, often spending nights in Nashville and other locations to better oversee kitchen operations for the company.

The evolution of culinary work

Much has changed since Jones' career began. “It wasn’t cool to be a chef in the '80s when I trained at the Culinary Institute of America.” She went to their eight-week program. She recalled she “may have been overly confident” as she headed into the workforce.

Her training included time at Florida State and she recently obtained Rice University’s certificate in diversity, equity, and inclusion. She enjoyed “learning how to have difficult conversations,” a useful skill in kitchen work and management.

Jones said she's seen other changes in the hospitality industry. “Culinary is so much more elevated now than before. With social media everyone knows immediately if you are doing things right. I’m excited people know ‘how to eat now’ and enjoy it more due to the Food Network, etc.," she said.

"The culture has changed. There was no human resources in kitchens when I started. We are making great moves in the right direction.”

As executive chef of the Big Woods Restaurant Group, Jones follows in the steps of her role models, including Anthony Bourdain and Thomas Keller. “I have all their books and care about what they have to say in the heart and the heat of everything.”

The restaurants she leads target the whole family, offering casual dining with a variety of price points, although she admits "food pricing is very difficult right now" due to production shortages and other factors.

She spent many happy years as executive chef at Iozzo’s Garden of Italy in Indianapolis, where she worked from June 2009 to April 2014. She was with them from the beginning and “enjoyed watching them succeed. I love seeing where they have gone. I loved the family feel,” which solidified in the trenches of difficult lessons one learns as an executive chef.

One of her most challenging days involved procrastination. Some of the “equipment was not great but expensive to replace.” When the health department visited, the freezer was slightly below temperature. The official made her open every piece of food and throw it in the trash. She learned “the expensive lesson of doing the right thing even when it is challenging.

“My philosophy now is you must care about the food you are cooking. Your audience can feel the love you put into the food.”

She began her care and concern for food learning respect for fish and the ocean in her childhood working with her dad, a charter boat captain in Florida. “I learned to respect fish and quotas. How we treated the ocean critically affected if our industry would be sustainable. I loved my time with my Dad on the water.”

Adding leadership with culinary work

Jones concreted her philosophies on leadership during her time at Second Helpings Indianapolis under recently retired CEO Jennifer Vigran, her mentor and role model. Second Helpings "transforms lives through the power of food" as a social service agency focusing on hunger relief, food rescue and culinary job training. Jones worked there from August 2017 through July 2022.

“They rescue over-ordered food from organizations like USA Foods, CISCO, Kroger, etc. They rescued 3.6 million pounds of food per year," she said. "They sent out 25 million meals per week to 90 partner agencies including the Boys and Girls Club. It is still so near and dear to my heart.”

Jones is pleased to connect interested partner restaurants with them by email at Kjones2@bwqoht.com. Additionally, Second Helpings trains underemployed adults for restaurant jobs with free training from professional chefs including ServSafe leading to five hours of Ivy Tech culinary credits.

Although Jones' work has earned her awards, including Celebrity Chef for Rev 2022 and the Hoosier Service Award from Indiana’s Lt. Gov. Suzanne Crouch in 2018, Jones' legacy is her ability to mentor up-and-coming chefs.

Omar Guzman Ulloa, a Mexican native, worked with her at Iozzo’s in Indianapolis when it opened in 2009. Since then, he went on to become executive chef at Cobblestone Grill in Zionsville. He returned to Mexico City to “work at world famous Pujol aspiring to Michelin star territory," Jones said, adding, "Mentoring sous chefs is very important to me. I train my sous chefs to take my job. Our role as chefs is to develop our people. We need to keep ‘culinary traditions’ alive or it dies.”

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Kathy Jones takes over the kitchen at Big Woods Restaurant Group