How Chef Angela Dimayuga Is Evolving the Hotel Restaurant Experience
The challenge of being a chef is not only to create interesting, distinctive dishes—it’s about creating a memorable experience. That feat becomes even tougher when in a hotel setting, where guests don’t necessarily come to take in the food, but to rest their heads at night after a long day of sightseeing or business meetings.
Angela Dimayuga’s perspective on it all? Challenge accepted.
The former executive chef at Mission Chinese began her role as The Standard’s creative director of food and culture in May. Now, she’s focused on elevating the hotel group’s dining experiences while cultivating a more unique sense of identity there. (After all, many of The Standard’s hotel locations are in bustling metropolises, where the food scene is only becoming increasingly saturated.) “I’d love to change the misperception that a hotel restaurant is just a hotel restaurant,” Dimayuga says. “I am focused on incorporating my restaurant perspective to bring in new elements to help evolve the brand.”
Dimayuga has long pushed the boundaries of her profession. Yes, she was involved in defining one of Manhattan’s buzziest downtown hotspots, but her perspective on her craft surpasses just food. She frequently collaborates with everyone from artists to fashion designers—a quick peek at her Instagram proves she has killer Kenzo-filled style, plus she recently designed a line of bathing suits in partnership with Everybody.World—and sees the culinary scene as an opportunity to merge all of these creative forces together. “This role was created especially for me,” she says. “I had been doing a lot of collaborative work with artists, farmers, activists, designers, and had the opportunity to continue a lot of these partnerships with my new role. My work touches all elements of food, beverage and culture—and where they meet.”
As a result, one of Dimayuga’s first projects was launching The Standard’s “Chefs Stand Up” dinner series, which directly benefits the ACLU’s immigrant rights project, defending immigrants against discrimination. Held through December, the hotel group is hosting nine pop-up dinners across The Standard’s locations in Miami Beach, New York’s East Village and downtown Los Angeles—three dinners held at each location—featuring both established and emerging chefs who create special menus for their respective evenings. In addition to the food, each participating chef will also put on their own art display.
How Angela Dimayuga Is Elevating the Standard Hotel’s Dining Experience
Dimayuga saw the series as a way for both chefs and restaurants to use their platforms to highlight good causes—especially causes that directly impact their kitchens. “Immigrants make up the backbone of the entire [hospitality] experience, and they often don’t have enough visibility,” Dimayuga says. She added that the nine participating chefs, who come from diverse backgrounds and cities, are all using their dinners to highlight individual causes that are important to them. “All of them have some sort of activism in their work,” Dimayuga said. “The way they run their restaurants are inclusive and different. For instance, one of the Miami dinners is based on what it’s like to party at a quinceañera. They’re doing a buffet dinner, and they got DJs celebrating songs from different cultures.”
At the first dinner in New York, held on October 18, Portland-based chef Naomi Pomeroy used her night at The Standard to highlight recipes from leading female chefs. “I thought, why not celebrate using recipes directly from women that I love and respect, through their passionate tale of food from other cultures,” she explained. Drawing inspiration from four chefs with diverse cooking styles—Diana Kennedy (Mexican), Madhur Jaffrey (Indian), Paula Wolfert (Mediterranean) and Edna Lewis (Southern)—Pomeroy dished up a stellar menu including Caesar salad, scallop ceviche, duck curry with mango chutney, flat bread, Cretan greens, and black-eyed peas.
As for future projects? Dimayuga has a few other ideas cooking. At The Standard’s East Village location, she hopes to implement the first-ever mushroom farm in a hotel, where the hotel will use and sell mushrooms grown in temperature- and humidity-controlled tanks. In addition, she will continue stocking new brands that are aligned with the hotel’s mandate and values, such as Yesfolk, a new single-original, barrel-aged kombucha brand.
She also plans to continue working with emerging chefs on special one-off events or series. “When I moved into this role, I was most excited about bringing opportunities to emerging talent,” she says. “Now that I have a larger platform, The Standard can be a place for us now—it can continue to be a place to work and play, but host folks also trying to push the envelope. I look forward to sharing the space with more women, more QTPOC, to celebrate immigrants and marginalized folks that would normally not see themselves represented.”
