Thomas Zacharias | Chef & Founder

Thomas is a chef with nearly 15 years of professional cooking experience, and arguably a lot more if you count the early start he got in his grandmother’s kitchen in Kerala. The first phase of his career was centered around European cuisine, starting out as a line cook at Le Bernardin, New York City’s famed three Michelin star eatery in 2009. But in 2014, a culinary expedition across India made him rethink his entire approach to food. He went on to helm the kitchen at The Bombay Canteen as Chef Partner, finding inventive ways to showcase indigenous ingredients through contemporary regional Indian cuisine. In 2022, Thomas decided to bring together some of his passions—storytelling, working with local produce, and nurturing connections between people within the Indian food system—and founded The Locavore to do good through what he knows best: food. Apart from chasing culinary adventures, Thomas also moonlights as a karaoke singer, and tends to his sprawling collection of house plants in his urban jungle of an apartment.