Peter Dale

Chef, The National
Athens, Georgia

A self-described “small-town chef,” Peter Dale—whose

sophisticated interpretations of Southern food have been fêted by

The New York Times, Bon Appétit, and the Atlanta Journal-

Constitution—is a world traveler who still works and resides in the

town where he grew up: Athens, Georgia.

“I like being in a small town,” he tells me at his restaurant, The

National. “I have a lot of freedom.”

As a small-town chef, however, Dale must walk a tightrope,

serving the food that he wants to make—much of it influenced by

his time in Spain—while still catering to his audience of mostly

Southerners. “People in the South eat shrimp and grits,” he tells

me as we enter his laid-back kitchen. “This is my interpretation of

that.”

He pours olive oil into a pan and adds diced chorizo. “I love

Spanish chorizo,” he says. “There’s a great fattiness that coats

your mouth and the paprika turns the oil orange.”

Sure enough, as he turns up the heat, the air becomes fragrant

with spice and the oil begins to tint red. “In the South, we

normally use bacon for this dish, but I like it better this way.”

His customers like it too. He uses sweet Georgia shrimp, a hat-