Chris Hastings — SPARQNOW

At-a-Glance

Winner of the 2012 James Beard Award for 'Best Chef in the South'.
Owner and executive chef of Hot & Hot Fish Club since 1995.
Opened The Side by Side restaurant in Tuscaloosa, AL in 2015.
Opened Ovenbird, a second Birmingham restaurant, in The Pepper Place development.
Competed and won against Bobby Flay on Iron Chef America in 2012.
Graduated from the culinary arts program at Johnson & Wales University.

Biography

Chris Hastings is the owner and executive chef of Hot & Hot Fish Club in Birmingham, Alabama, a restaurant he opened with his wife. He was a two-time finalist for the James Beard Award 'Best Chef in the South' and won the award in 2012.

Hastings' culinary career began in Atlanta, where he worked as a sous chef at the Ritz Carlton in 1984. He later moved to San Francisco in 1989 to help open the Lark Creek Inn, also as a sous chef.