Coco Reinarhz

Meet Coco Reinarhz, a multi-award-winning chef who spent his childhood at his mother’s side in her restaurant in Kinshasa and later trained at the Ecole Hotelière de Namur in Belgium. He is passionate about pan African fine dining and building communities.

Q & A with Coco

Question: What’s your goal/vision for this conference?

Answer: I would like to address the topic of Pan-African fine dining and explain that it is our role to change how we view and promote our cuisine.

Question: Name one person in this broader industry whom you look up to or a person who you really admire and why.

Answer: I truly admire my mother, Maria Reinarhz, as she really was at the forefront of African cuisine and was devoted to it. She always wanted to show how sophisticated, healthy and tasty African cuisine is and was a real force in empowering through education and teaching.

Question: Fill in the following: Transformation in this industry (name your specific field or cause) will happen when….

Answer: Transformation in African gastronomy will happen when we, as Africans, start believing in ourselves and discovering how powerful we are.

Question: What would you love people to know about you and your work?

Answer: I hope to be remembered as a person who strongly believed in Africa and viewed our cuisine as one of the most important parts of our cultures. My work is all about documenting our history and allowing our traditional cuisine to move forward with its time.