Chef Charlie Ray

Chef Charlie Ray is a Swedish & Black American traveling creator. Her love of food began while foraging for wild mushrooms & berries with her grandparents in Gothenburg, Sweden & fishing with sticks & strings off the river banks in Stjordal, Norway before the age of five. Her passion for wild foods & living off the land only grew with age. After she studied a bachelor's in gastronomy only a few hundred kilometers south of the Arctic Circle in Umeå, Sweden, she spent months foraging for the wild menu at DILL, a Michelin restaurant in Reykjavík, Iceland. Here she became grossly aware of the problems with food waste in the western world. She refocused her aspirations & became the head chef at an anarchist kitchen, helping refugee families have access to food and the help they needed in Iceland. She went on to become the head chef of award-winning company, Värt: Sustainable Food Lab, in Gothenburg, Sweden before moving to Australia where she helped launch a restaurant working closely with aboriginal chef, Angus Adams from the Wiradjuri mob. Working with Angus allowed her to learn & experience the indigenous food culture & introduce native flora & fauna to menus in Melbourne, Australia.