Chef
Holly Smith
- Discipline
- Chef
- Based in
- Seattle, Washington, United States
i. Biography
Northern Italian cooking in Kirkland is the operating frame for Holly Smith’s work at Café Juanita: Italian food and wine handled through Pacific Northwest products, not by imitation of place but by disciplined sourcing. Since 2000, the restaurant has been built around a menu that shifts with season, supply, growers, and producers, treating availability as a working constraint rather than a marketing line.
Coming Up
Culinary formation for this kind of restaurant starts with study, travel, and station work before ownership. Holly Smith’s foundation runs through Colby College and Baltimore International Culinary College, followed by an externship at Master Chef Peter Timmons in Ireland. The pattern is practical: formal education, outside context, and exposure to kitchens where technique has to meet place. Professional service adds its own training: repetition, timing, hierarchy, and the discipline of a full room. A restaurant role at Milton Inn in Baltimore preceded Smith’s move west, where she became sous chef at Dahlia Lounge in Seattle from 1993. Work as chef de cuisine at Brasa in Seattle followed, extending the command of line execution, menu structure, and restaurant pace. Long-term ownership changes the craft from cooking alone to stewardship: sourcing, staffing, standards, wine alignment, and the repeated decisions that make a place legible over time. Smith has been chef and owner of Cafe Juanita since 2000, and chef owner of Poco Carretto Gelato since 2008, linking daily production to a larger Northern Italian-inspired point of view.
At Work Now
Northern Italian food and wine using Pacific Northwest products is the stated specialty, with a modern and local approach to bringing food and wine together in innovative and dynamic ways. The kitchen’s reference point is Italy, but the working materials come from the surrounding region: farms, waters, seasons, and producers that determine what can be cooked well at a given moment. A frequently changing menu requires more than substitution; it requires a kitchen able to read produce, meats, and seafood as they arrive. Here, seasonality functions as a production method. Northern Italian cuisine provides the structure, while Pacific Northwest supply determines the immediate choices. Support for organics, sustainability, sustainable agriculture, local sourcing, and relationships with artisan Italian producers and winemakers gives the restaurant’s food and wine program its operating network. The craft here depends on buying decisions as much as technique: growers, producers, vineyards, and resourceful land use all shape what reaches the table. Northern Italian-inspired cooking connects Smith’s Kirkland dining room and Poco Carretto Gelato within the same broader practice. The through line is restraint in ingredient choice, attention to wine and food together, and use of tradition as a working reference rather than a fixed script.
Signature
Signature dishes include Beet Salad with Bombolino.
Peer Recognition
Holly Smith has received James Beard Foundation: Outstanding Chef in the U.S. Semifinalist (2020). Recognition has attached both to the room and to the cooking: Best Restaurant Service nomination for Cafe Juanita (2009), Best Chef Northwest (2008), and Four stars for Cafe Juanita. For the trade, those honors point to the combined work of hospitality, menu identity, sourcing, and sustained execution in one restaurant over time.
Profile updated July 2026
FAQ
Asked of Holly
What is Holly Smith's current role?
Holly Smith is owner and executive chef of Café Juanita.
Where did Holly Smith train or study?
Holly Smith trained at Colby College and Baltimore International Culinary College.
What recognition has Holly Smith received?
Best Restaurant Service nomination for Cafe Juanita (2009).
