2026 Keynote Speakers
Chef Stephanie Izard
Stephanie Izard, recipient of James Beard Best Chef: Great Lakes and Food & Wine Best New Chef, is the Executive Chef and Owner of Girl & the Goat, Little Goat, Duck Duck Goat, and Cabra in Chicago, along with Girl & the Goat and Cabra in Los Angeles. She opened a new restaurant in the spring of 2025: Valley Goat, located in the heart of Silicon Valley. Izard also won the coveted title of Iron Chef in 2017 and was the 4th winner of Bravo’s Top Chef. Izard jumped back into television in 2023 with the release of The Curious Chef, a Tastemade television series where she visits home cooks to get a taste of their time-honored recipes and traditions, alongside numerous appearances, as both acompetitor and a judge, on shows including Tournament of Champions, Hell’s Kitchen, Superchef Grudge Match, Guy’s Grocery Games, Chopped, and more.
A James Beard Best New Restaurant nominee, Girl & the Goat has been praised by high-profile publications such as Saveur, the New York Times, and Food & Wine. Little Goat Diner, Stephanie’s highly successful follow-up to Girl & the Goat, features classic, Americana cuisine in a diner setting. In March 2016, Stephanie opened her third restaurant, a Chinese-inspired concept called Duck Duck Goat, and in 2019, Stephanie’s Peruvian-inspired eatery, Cabra, opened on the rooftop of The Hoxton, Chicago. Most recently, Izard opened her first two restaurants outside of Chicago: Girl & the Goat and Cabra, both in downtown Los Angeles. Izard’s first book, “Girl in the Kitchen,” was released in 2011, and her second book, “Gather & Graze,” was released in April 2018.
More information on Stephanie Izard can be found at www.stephanieizard.com
Dr. Trent Ford
Dr. Trent Ford is the Illinois State Climatologist and has been with the Prairie Research Institute at the University of Illinois since 2019. He is an expert in climate and climate change and its interactions and impacts, especially as they relate to water. Trent leads climate and drought monitoring, research, and data collection for the state of Illinois. He and his team work with communities, industries, and state agencies on issues related to weather, climate, and climate change in Illinois, and engage the general public through online, media, and educational outreach. A native of Roanoke, Illinois, Ford earned a bachelors in geography from Illinois State University before completing his masters and PhD at Texas A&M University.
Eric Snodgrass
Eric Snodgrass is a Senior Science Fellow and Atmospheric Scientist at Nutrien Ag Solutions who develops predictive, analytical software solutions to manage weather risk for global production agriculture. He provides frequent weather updates that focus on how high-impact weather events influence global agriculture productivity. His current research uses machine learning to better understand field-level weather impacts on yields in the US and to increase confidence in long-range weather prediction. He presents his research as a featured speaker at over 100 conferences annually where he provides logistical guidance and solutions to weather sensitive financial institutions, farmers, commodity traders, and other stakeholders.
He was recently awarded the Educator Award in 2023 for Distinguished Service to America’s High Technology Agriculture by the Mid America Croplife Association. Snodgrass is a co-founder of Global Weather and Climate Logistic, LLC and Agrible, Inc which were both acquired by Nutrien Ag Solutions in 2018. From 2006-2019, Eric was the Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he taught over 20,000 students across a wide range of course work in Atmospheric Science. He won many prestigious teaching awards at the University of Illinois including College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Teaching Excellence award, the Campus Teaching Excellence Award and the Campus Teaching Excellent Award in Online and Distance Education.
Erika Allen
Erika Allen is the CEO for Urban Growers Collective, President of Green ERA Educational NFP, and Co-Owner of Green Era Sustainability Partners. Her work exemplifies a strong commitment to sustainability with her dedication to the eradication of environmental injustice and promotion of regenerative, urban agriculture within Chicago. Her commitment to the public sector through the promotion of sustainable agriculture, forging economic opportunities for low-income individuals and creating access to healthy food has made a strong and considerable impact. Erika has dedicated her professional career to public service, developing sustainable community food systems and addressing structural racism and its inherent barriers to justice.
Previously, Allen founded and was the Director of Growing Power – Chicago for 15 years from 2002 to 2017, and was a Chicago Park District Commissioner from 2012 to 2018. She is the Co-Founder of the Chicago Food Policy Action Council, serves on the Board of Grow Greater Englewood and Leadership Council for Growing Home, and is an Advisor and Stewart for the Community Food Navigator project. She also serves on the Growing Justice Advisory Committee. Allen has been appointed by Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker for the Illinois Leadership Council for Agricultural Education (ICAE) for a 3 Year term (2022-2024), and was selected in 2022 by the Biden Administration to join the Farm Service Agency (FSA) Committee for Illinois. Allen holds a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and her MA in Art Psychotherapy from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She received an Honorary Doctorate Degree in Public Health from the University of Illinois at Chicago in December 2022. Erika presented her TEDxChicago talk, "Environmental Alchemy for Sustainable Food Systems” in September 2024.