Jody Adams

Chef Jody Adams is the culinary master behind Rialto, a warm, yet sophisticated restaurant that has received countless kudos over the past 12 years. Adams’ cuisine consists of, quite simply, “food I love to eat,” she says.

The connection between food and happiness began at an early age for Jody. Her mother was an adventurous cook and passed along an appreciation for European cooking, and, more importantly, European living. When she graduated from Brown University with a degree in anthropology, Jody took her first culinary position as part-time help to Nancy Verde Barr, a food writer and teacher. In her apprenticeship, Jody assisted in the classroom and helped test recipes for Nancy’s cookbook on Italian immigrant cooking, We Called It Macaroni (Knopf, 1991).

After deciding on a career in the restaurant business, Jody worked her way through the ranks of Boston’s best restaurants. She began as a line cook at Seasons restaurant in the famed Bostonian Hotel under chef Lydia Shire in 1983. Three years later, she helped open Hamersley’s Bistro with Gordon Hamersley as his sous chef. In 1990, she took the executive chef position at Michela’s in Cambridge. While at Michela’s, Jody developed her reputation for carefully-researched regional menus that combined New England ingredients with Italian culinary traditions.

In September 1994, Adams opened Rialto with restaurateurs Michela Larson and Karen Haskell, forming the Sapphire Restaurant Group partnership. At Rialto, Jody developed a menu to include French, Spanish and Eastern Mediterranean cuisine. Four months after the new restaurant’s opening, The Boston Globe awarded Rialto four stars, the newspaper’s highest rating, proclaiming that, “eating Jody Adams’ food at the stunning new Rialto is like stepping into a winter greenhouse just at the moment a spectacular hothouse orchid bursts into bloom, filling the senses.”

With her husband, Ken Rivard, Adams published her first cookbook, In the Hands of a Chef: Cooking with Jody Adams of Rialto Restaurant (HarperCollinsPublishers, January 2002). It is a collection of recipes that follows her passions and palate as she cooks for family and friends and encourages cooks to spend time in the kitchen.

Adams is now the sole owner of Rialto Restaurant and on February 9 will introduce a new Italian-inspired menu, as well as a new dining room.

Outside of the kitchen, Jody is actively involved in organizations that support hunger relief and children’s issues, such as Partners in Health, Share Our Strength, the Greater Boston Food Bank, the Brookline Public Schools and Community Servings.


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