Southern-born, Jennifer Hill Booker traveled to Paris to study French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts only to discover that rustic French and Southern dishes use many of the same ingredients. She used this as the basis for culinary exploration in her cookbooks, Dinner Déjà Vu: Southern Tonight, French Tomorrow and Field Peas to Foie Gras: Southern Recipes with a French Accent. Chef Jennifer’s culinary path has not always been a linear one. She earned her Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Tulsa; eighteen months later graduated first in her class with an Associate of Occupational Science from Oklahoma State Institute of Technology. Extensive travel while married to a United States Army Officer pushed Jennifer to blaze a trail that fit her unique situation-a female African American chef, living abroad. As a result, her first culinary company Your Resident Gourmet was born. She is an Impact Fellow with the James Beard Foundation, a Georgia Grown Executive Chef for the GA Department of Agriculture, the Culinary Explorer for the Georgia Department of Tourism and Travel, and is the founder of Cast Iron Chronicles dinner series. Chef Jennifer is an active member of the prestigious Atlanta chapter of Les Dames d’Escoffier International, a member of SlowFood-Atlanta and of Atlanta’s No Kid Hungry Atlanta Society. Chef Jennifer currently sits on the James Beard Foundation Scholarship Committee.
Weaving her love of traditional Southern cuisine with her belief in incorporating healthy, seasonal foods and her classic French training, Chef Jennifer created a unique style of cooking that she terms Modern Southern Healthy Cuisine with a French Accent. Chef Jennifer shared this brand of cooking through her cooking segment ‘Chef Jenn to the Rescue,’ on CBS46’s Atlanta Plugged In, many television appearances, with original recipes in such publications as Waste Not Cookbook, Southern Living Magazine, Garden & Gun and Essence Magazine as well as her Food Network debut as a finalist on Cutthroat Kitchen. She has worked with such renowned chefs as Jeff Henderson, Tyler Florence, Tiffany Derry, Giadia Laurentis, Patrick Neely, Master Chef Daryl Shular and Mashama Bailey. Her website, ChefJenniferHillBooker.com provides information about healthy eating, food trends, culinary travel, and recipes that reflect her unique culinary point of view of Modern Southern Healthy Cuisine with a French Accent. Her cookbooks, Dinner Déjà Vu: Southern Tonight, French Tomorrow, and Field Peas to Foie Gras: Southern Recipes with a French Accent, are available at many national retailers including Pelican Publishing Company, Barnes and Noble and Amazon. Chef Jennifer’s newest kitchen resource, Your Resident Gourmet Cooks! Spice Line, celebrates cooking with spices like Baby It's Cold Outside Chili Seasoning, Duck Duck Chicken Poultry Seasoning & Rub and Shimmer Sugar Cocktail Rimmer. There