Art Smith

Art Smith is the kind of chef who makes you feel hugged before the first bite ever reaches the table. Born and raised in tiny Jasper, Florida, he took the biscuits, fried chicken and layer cakes of his childhood and carried them into some of the most remarkable kitchens in America: the Florida Governor’s Mansion, Oprah Winfrey’s private dining room, and eventually his own beloved restaurants in Chicago, Washington, D.C. and Walt Disney World.

Few cooks have stretched Southern hospitality quite so far. A two-time James Beard Foundation honoree, Smith has fed presidents, royalty and pop stars, co-founded the nonprofit Common Threads to teach children how to cook, and well into his sixties he keeps opening new chapters, including a truly extraordinary dining project with the Vatican. This is the story of a proud son of the South who never stopped inviting the whole world to dinner.

TL;DR

• Born Charles Arthur Smith on March 1, 1960 in Jasper, Florida, a sixth-generation Floridian.
• Cooked for Florida governors Bob Graham and Jeb Bush, then spent a decade (1997 to 2007) as Oprah Winfrey’s personal chef.
• Won the 2002 James Beard Award for his cookbook Back to the Table and was named the foundation’s Humanitarian of the Year in 2007.
• Founder of Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’ at Disney Springs, famous for its fried chicken, moonshine cocktails and hummingbird cake.
• Co-founded Common Threads in 2003, teaching cooking and nutrition to schoolchildren across the United States.
• Chosen alongside restaurateur Phil Stefani to lead dining at the Vatican’s Borgo Laudato Si’ estate in Castel Gandolfo, Italy.

Art Smith key facts

Art Smith: career timeline

From Jasper, Florida to the wider world

Everything about Art Smith’s cooking starts in Hamilton County, in the northern Florida lowlands between Jacksonville and Tallahassee. He grew up in Jasper as a sixth-generation Floridian, surrounded by local poultry, sugar cane, pecans and citrus, and by the hearty, straightforward recipes of his mother Addie Mae. Sunday suppers, church socials and family reunions taught him early that food is at its best when it gathers people around a table, a conviction that has guided every restaurant he has ever opened.

His path into professional kitchens began, fittingly for a Florida boy, at Walt Disney World. In 1981 he joined the Magic Kingdom College Program, now known as the Walt Disney World College Program, as a young cast member. While studying at Florida State University he completed culinary internships at the legendary Greenbrier resort in West Virginia, one of America’s great training grounds for classic technique. He also spent five years working at a KFC in his youth, and he loves to joke that his mother did not teach him to fry chicken, the Colonel did.

That mix of white-tablecloth training and unapologetic fast-food honesty is quintessential Art Smith. He has never treated Southern food as something to be elevated or excused. To him, a perfect biscuit deserves the same respect as any French sauce, and that conviction would soon carry him into some very famous households.

Cooking for governors and a decade with Oprah

The Governor’s Mansion years

Smith’s first taste of high-profile cooking came in Tallahassee, where he served as chef at the Florida Governor’s Mansion. He cooked for Governor Bob Graham and his family, and later for Governor Jeb Bush, learning the diplomacy of feeding public figures: menus that impress without showing off, and hospitality that makes every guest feel like family. It was a masterclass in the graciousness that would become his trademark.

Oprah Winfrey’s kitchen

In 1997 Smith stepped into the role that would change his life, becoming the personal, day-to-day chef to Oprah Winfrey. For ten years he cooked for one of the most influential women in the world, preparing everything from healthy weekday meals to celebrations for her closest friends. Winfrey championed his talent publicly, and his warm, generous food became part of her household’s daily rhythm until he moved on in 2007 to build his own restaurants.

The Oprah years opened doors that most chefs only dream about. Smith has cooked for President Barack Obama and King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden, appeared on the Today show, Top Chef Masters, Iron Chef America and BBQ Pitmasters, and baked his celebrated hummingbird cake for Maya Angelou’s 75th birthday. In 2011 he joined Lady Gaga on her ABC special A Very Gaga Thanksgiving, and shortly afterwards he became head chef of Joanne Trattoria, the New York restaurant owned by Gaga’s parents, Joe and Cynthia Germanotta.

Restaurants from Chicago to Disney Springs

Smith’s first restaurant of his own, Table Fifty-Two, opened in 2007 in a cozy carriage house in Chicago’s Gold Coast, serving buttermilk fried chicken and goat cheese drop biscuits to a city that fell head over heels for them. The address later evolved into Blue Door Kitchen and Garden, a farm-to-table spot that still carries his Southern spirit. In 2008 came Art and Soul on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., today located at YOTEL Washington DC, where seasonal mid-Atlantic ingredients meet Low Country soul.

The homecoming that gives his flagship its name arrived in 2016, when Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’ opened at Disney Springs in Walt Disney World. The restaurant is a love letter to Florida agriculture, from the fried green tomatoes topped with shaved country ham to the moonshine cocktails on the back porch. It has become one of the most popular table-service restaurants on Disney property, and its kitchen reportedly goes through tens of tons of chicken every year to keep up with demand for the famous bird.

Chicago called him home again in 2022, when Art Smith’s Reunion opened at Navy Pier with sweeping lake views and a menu of his comfort classics, many with a lighter touch. The name is a family word for Smith: his cooking school project in Jasper also carries it, part of his long-running effort to give back to the hometown that raised him.

A table at the Vatican

The most surprising chapter of Smith’s career began in 2025, when he and fellow Chicago restaurateur Phil Stefani were invited to cook for a Vatican delegation, an audition dinner of sorts. The result was announced in September 2025: the two would develop and lead the sole restaurant and catering services at Borgo Laudato Si’, the Vatican’s 135-acre ecological estate at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer retreat in the hills outside Rome, under the auspices of the Chicago-born Pope Leo XIV.

The farm-to-table project draws on produce grown on the estate itself, with a menu that leans Italian while weaving in unmistakable Chicago touches, and Smith’s longtime collaborator Hector Guerrero serving as executive chef. For a boy from Jasper who once fried chicken for the Colonel, leading the dining at a papal estate is the kind of full-circle story that even Hollywood would hesitate to write.

Common Threads and cooking as service

Smith has always insisted that food is a form of service. In 2003 he and his husband, artist Jesus Salgueiro, co-founded Common Threads, a nonprofit that teaches cooking and nutrition to children in underserved communities, showing families how to prepare healthy, affordable, culturally familiar meals. His 2009 turn on Top Chef Masters raised money for the charity, and in 2007 the James Beard Foundation named him its Humanitarian of the Year for exactly this kind of work.

His generosity has taken him around the globe. In 2012 he joined the U.S. State Department’s Diplomatic Culinary Partnership, developed with the James Beard Foundation, traveling as a culinary ambassador to promote American food and ingredients, with missions that took him from Cuba to the Middle East. In Jerusalem he cooked with the interfaith organization Chefs for Peace at The Eucalyptus restaurant, where Jewish, Christian and Muslim chefs cook side by side to show how food can bridge differences.

Service also meant learning to care for himself. After a diabetes diagnosis, Smith transformed his own health, losing well over 100 pounds, taking up running and channeling the experience into his cookbook Art Smith’s Healthy Comfort, which proves that Southern flavor and wellbeing can share a plate. His story of renewal has inspired countless fans to believe that comfort food and a healthy life are not enemies at all.

Restaurants

Awards and honours

Watch Art Smith

See Art in action in this video.

Signature dishes

Ask any Homecomin’ regular and they will tell you about the fried chicken: brined in buttermilk, fried to a deep bronze and so beloved that the restaurant struggles to keep up with demand. Just as famous is his hummingbird cake, a Southern banana and pineapple layer cake with cream cheese frosting that he baked for Maya Angelou’s 75th birthday and that counts Oprah Winfrey among its devoted fans. His goat cheese drop biscuits, fried green tomatoes with country ham, shrimp and grits, and the 100-proof Shine Cake round out a repertoire that tastes like the very best of the American South.

Cookbooks

Art is the author of books including Back to the Table: The Reunion of Food and Family (2001), Kitchen Life: Real Food for Real Families (2004), Back to the Family (2007), Art Smith’s Healthy Comfort (2013).

Personal life

Smith lives in his hometown of Jasper, Florida, with his husband, the Venezuelan-born painter Jesus Salgueiro. The couple married in 2011 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., after ten years together, and they have adopted five children. Together they devote much of their time to charitable causes, from children’s cooking classes through Common Threads to humanitarian aid projects, and Smith remains deeply involved in efforts to support the economy and community of the rural North Florida town that raised him.

Art in context

Art Smith is one of many chefs and food personalities profiled on Pickup Table 4, alongside Paula Deen and Edward Lee.

Follow Art Smith

Art Smith — official · Instagram

Art Smith FAQ

Who is Art Smith?
Art Smith is an American chef and restaurateur from Jasper, Florida, born March 1, 1960. He is best known for his refined Southern cooking, for serving as Oprah Winfrey’s personal chef from 1997 to 2007, and for restaurants including Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’ at Disney Springs.

What restaurants does Art Smith have?
His restaurants include Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’ at Disney Springs in Florida, Blue Door Kitchen and Garden and Art Smith’s Reunion in Chicago, and Art and Soul in Washington, D.C. He is also leading the dining project at the Vatican’s Borgo Laudato Si’ estate in Castel Gandolfo with restaurateur Phil Stefani.

Was Art Smith really Oprah Winfrey’s personal chef?
Yes. Smith was Oprah Winfrey’s personal, day-to-day chef for a decade, from 1997 to 2007, before leaving to focus on his own restaurants and charitable work.

What is Art Smith’s most famous dish?
His buttermilk fried chicken is legendary, headlining the menu at Homecomin’, and his hummingbird cake is nearly as famous. He baked that cake for Maya Angelou’s 75th birthday and it is a favorite of Oprah Winfrey.

What is Art Smith doing at the Vatican?
In 2025 Smith and Chicago restaurateur Phil Stefani were selected to develop and run the restaurant and catering at Borgo Laudato Si’, the Vatican’s ecological estate at Castel Gandolfo, a farm-to-table project using produce grown on the estate.

Is Art Smith married?
Yes. He married the artist Jesus Salgueiro at the Lincoln Memorial in 2011, after the couple had been together for ten years. They live in Jasper, Florida, and have adopted five children.

Sources and further reading

This profile draws on reputable references including Wikipedia, Chef Art Smith official site, Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’, ABC7 Chicago, Axios Chicago, Today.com.