Lauren Krall Ivey

The Climb

Lauren Krall Ivey trained at University of Colorado Boulder.

Today

At Olivero in Wilmington, Krall Ivey serves as Co-Executive Chef, a role that asks for both command and restraint, confidence and generosity. Her work there is shaped by a clear culinary point of view: handmade pasta at the center, with a menu that carries more than one coastal and family influence without ever losing its sense of ease. She describes the restaurant’s direction in a way that makes the food feel anchored to place and memory at once: “We also use flavors and techniques from Spain and Italy and inspiration from the sailor in his family -- his grandfather, who traveled from Seville to New Orleans and married into an Italian family.” In that one sentence, the cooking gathers its map. Spain and Italy are not distant references but part of the menu’s current language; Seville and New Orleans become part of the same emotional geography; family history is folded into the practical, everyday work of the kitchen. That same balance appears in the way she talks about hospitality. “We create a unique, approachable menu. We also focus on hospitality and having a well-trained, welcoming team.” Nothing here is treated as separate from anything else. The menu must invite the guest in; the team must know how to meet that guest with ease and confidence; the room must hold both with warmth. Under Krall Ivey’s direction, the work is as much about how a meal feels as how it tastes.

In Their Words “We also use flavors and techniques from Spain and Italy and inspiration from the sailor in his family -- his grandfather, who traveled from Seville to New Orleans and married into an Italian family.” “We create a unique, approachable menu. We also focus on hospitality and having a well-trained, welcoming team.”

Recognition

Lauren Krall Ivey has received James Beard Foundation, Best Chef of the Southeast Award semifinalist (2025). The arc worth noting is Krall Ivey’s progression from University of Colorado Boulder to kitchen leadership, including her time as Executive Chef at Death & Taxes, and now to her role as Co-Executive Chef of Olivero in Wilmington. Each step points toward the same durable strengths: control of technique, an instinct for hospitality, and a culinary identity that is specific without becoming rigid. Her recognition rests in that specificity. At Olivero, the work is not presented as a performance of complexity, but as a daily discipline: making pasta by hand, shaping a menu that feels inviting, and leading a well-trained, welcoming team. The result is a restaurant defined less by flash than by care, and a chef whose title carries the quieter authority of consistency and intention.