Oakville chef Victoria Rinsma will showcase home stories, traditions and flavours at the S.Pellegrino Young Chef Academy Grand Finale in Milan this October.

Victoria Rinsma, sous chef at Michelin-recognized Hexagon, in Oakville, Ont., has earned her place among the world’s top 15 emerging culinary talents after winning the Canadian title last year. Her signature dish, “Across the Sea and Home Again,” is both personal and deeply Canadian, East Coast comfort refined by the contemporary techniques she has perfected in the Hexagon kitchen.

“It’s the purest form of expression of my culinary journey,”she has said of the dish, which combines innovation with flavours inspired by her grandmother’s cooking. That combination helped her rise to the top in a national competition judged by some of the country’s most respected chefs.

Now she will test it under the scrutiny of an international grand jury in Milan, a panel of globally renowned chefs who will decide which of the finalists will earn the ultimate prize: S.Pellegrino Young Chef Academy Award 2024-25. The competition is considered to be one of the most prestigious stages for young culinary professionals, spotlighting not just technical ability but creativity, sustainability and storytelling through food. For Rinsma, it’s a chance to bring Canadian ingredients and identity to a global audience.

Rinsma, who hails from Pickering, Ont., found a mentor in Hexagon’s executive chef, Rafael Covarrubias, who himself claimed the Canadian title in 2019 and represented the country in Milan in 2021. His guidance has provided both technical support and a roadmap for navigating the high- stakes atmosphere of an international culinary competition.

That sense of continuity, of one generation of chefs lifting the next, is helping to elevate Canadian cuisine, which is increasingly defined on the international stage by diversity, regionality and innovation Rinsma’s work at Hexagon exemplifies that blend, pairing locally driven ingredients with precise globally informed techniques.

In Milan, she will share the stage with peers from every corner of the world: chefs from Hong Kong, Panama, Slovenia, South Africa, the United States and the United Kingdom. Each chef will present a dish shaped by their own culture and training, mentored by some of the world’s leading chefs. Together, they represent the future of gastronomy.

For Rinsma that future is rooted in memory as much as ambition. By channelling her grandmother’s East Coast flavours into a dish crafted for one of the world’s most demanding culinary competitions, she bridges past and present, home and away.

www.sanpellegrinoyoungchefacademy.com
@victoriarinsma