The Future We're Growing
A letter from our Executive Director: Shaping the next chapter with purpose, optimism, and your ideas
Dear friends,
Ten years ago, I got on a plane to Denmark. I was curious, nervous, and ready to throw myself into an experiment called MAD. What put me on that plane? My brother. And a healthy amount of rage.
He’d just quit his job as executive chef of a neighborhood restaurant in suburban Virginia — after the screaming owner told him, one more time, that he was worthless. That’s it. That’s the whole story. A talented person, treated without dignity, care, or respect. That wasn’t good enough for me. So, I decided to do something about it, in the industry I knew best.
A founding belief of MAD is that community can help us become better versions of ourselves — and help us build better futures for hospitality and the world. That belief still drives everything we do at MAD, which makes what I’m about to say harder to write.
We’re in a difficult place. The anger René Redzepi spoke about openly —the toxic cultures, the dignity deficit in professional kitchens— became the subject of serious accusations and damning press coverage this spring. The reaction online was fast. The consequences for MAD were immediate: we lost more than 65% of our annual operating budget in ten days. That is a significant and painful new reality.
We had to cancel our Los Angeles programming. We had to say goodbye to colleagues who built MAD from the inside — from Symposium to MAD Mondays. And starting in June, we’re putting MAD Digest on pause.
And yet. (You knew there was an “and yet.”)
Grief is real. So is momentum. Our remaining team is still here, still working, and we know exactly what MAD is for. Restaurants, bars, coffee shops, and lunch cafeterias offer crucial spaces for human connection, curiosity, and care. MAD exists to offer that same space to the people making those places run. We shine a light on what works. We build skills, imagination, and friendships. We are, stubbornly, still doing that.
Here’s what continues:
We’ve spent these hard months not just cutting, but asking ourselves hard questions about where MAD can actually be useful to you. If you have ideas — baked, half-baked, napkin-scrawl-level unformed — please send them. Seriously. We read them, and they change our thinking.
That process is already reshaping MAD Academy this fall: we’ve split business and leadership into two distinct courses, because they’re different things that deserve different attention. We’ve remade our environmental program. Every hour of programming will leave you with something you can use when you get back to work on Monday. And every seat at MAD Academy will be scholarship-supported this year.
MAD Camp will welcome more than 400 culinary students from across Denmark — because someone needs to remind the next generation that this industry is worth fighting for.
My meditation practice has a line I keep returning to as we navigate this time: don’t water the weeds. Water the flowers. Put your energy toward the futures you actually want to build. Rebuilding MAD is practice, daily. An organization, like a garden, needs positive attention.
So, we’re still here. Our full library of free videos is available online. Academy is open. MAD Camp is coming. And Symposium… we’re already dreaming about the future.
If you want to help right now, here’s how:
Chip in — your gift directly funds our scholarships and every free resource we provide
Put our library to work — MAD Video, MAD Digest, the archives. Use them. Share them with your sous-chef, your sister-in-law, your former college roommate who went into finance and secretly misses cooking
Lend your voice — send us an idea for how MAD can serve you better
Stay close — join the conversation
I hope you’re with us.
With gratitude,
Melina
We’ve always seen MAD Academy as our long-term contribution to building a stronger, healthier industry. That’s why we’re excited to bring it back in a renewed form — focused on learning from the best, connecting as a community, and leaving with ideas and tools you can put to work immediately.
Applications close on June 12, 17:00 CEST
Thank you to YETI® and our generous partners for supporting
MAD Academy 2026.
Thank you, Melina, for this inspiring note. You can count on our support!
<3 keep growing.