Bay Area native David Nayfeld boasts a venerable restaurant pedigree having worked alongside some of the most esteemed names in the industry. He graduated from The Culinary Institute of America, and has worked at award-winning restaurants around the country including Aqua, Joël Robuchon at The Mansion at MGM Grand, and Eleven Madison Park.
In 2015, Nayfeld partnered with Matt Brewer to start Back Home Hospitality in San Francisco. Their first restaurant, Che Fico, explores Italian fare through the lens of California with handmade pasta, pizzas and house made salumi plus dishes from his family’s Jewish-Roman heritage known as “Cucina Ebraica.” Che Fico has been named one of Bon Appetit's Top 10 Best New Restaurants in America as well as one ofEsquire Magazine's Best New Restaurants. Nayfeld also was named Star Chefs 2019 Rising Star Chef. Since then, Back Home Hospitality opened four more restaurants: Che Fico Alimentari, Che Fico Parco Menlo, il Mercato di Che Fico, and Che Fico Pizzeria.
Nayfeld’s commitment to the hospitality industry goes beyond the kitchen.He was one of the founding members of the Independent Restaurant Coalition (IRC), a trade group formed in 2020 as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic to advocate for independent restaurants. The coalition wrote a bill with members of Congress that secured $28.5B for vulnerable restaurants across the country, and Nayfeld earned a seat on the IRC board of directors, a peer-elected position, where he continues to work in support of the restaurant industry. He also was awarded both the Jefferson Award for public service for his pioneering program “Family Meal” which fed people in need as well as the Golden State Warriors Impact Warrior Award for community leadership.
Most recently, Nayfeld was named a semi-finalist for the 2023 James Beard Foundation Award for Outstanding Chef.
Joshua David Stein is a journalist, author and editor. He has served as the editor-at-large at Fatherly and OUT magazine, the editor-in-chief of Blackbook and Avenue and the senior editor at Departures. His work has appeared in the New York Times, New York, Esquire, GQ, Hemispheres and many other publications. Previously, Stein was the restaurant critic for the Village Voice and the New York Observer. He is the co-author of books such as Notes from A Young Black Chef, with Kwame Onwuachi; Il Buco: Stories & Recipes, with Donna Lennard; the Nom Wah Cookbook, with Wilson Tang; Why I Cook? with Tom Colicchio, and Vino, with Joe Campanale. His children's books include Can I Eat That?, What's Cooking? Brick: Who Found Herself in Architecture; Solitary Animals, Lunch from Home and more. He currently lives in Brooklyn with his two sons, Augustus and Achilles.
