Dan Barber began farming and cooking for family and friends at Blue Hill Farm. It was there that he was first introduced to, and gained a deep respect for, locally grown and seasonal produce. Blue Hill at Stone Barns marks the second incarnation for family proprietors Dan, David, and Laureen Barber. The original Blue Hill restaurant in Greenwich Village, New York, opened in 2000 and was named after the former Berkshires home of David and Dan’s grandmother. Blue Hill Farm is located in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, and remains in the Barber family to this day.

Since 2000, Barber has seen Blue Hill grow from a noted neighborhood restaurant to most recently receiving a 3–star New York Times review. In the summer of 2002, Food and Wine featured Barber as one of the country’s “Best New Chefs.” He has since addressed local food system issues through op–eds in the New York Times and his writing has been incorporated into Best Food Writing 2004 and Best Food Writing 2005. Barber has been featured in The New Yorker, Gourmet Magazine, Martha Stewart Living, and was named part of “the next generation of great chefs” in Bon Appetit’s 10th annual restaurant issue.

In 2004, Barber opened Blue Hill at Stone Barns and Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture. As the restaurant’s chef/owner and the center’s creative director, Barber focuses on the issues of pleasure, taste and regional bounty–and how these imperatives are threatened. Barber helped to create the philosophical and practical framework for Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture and continues to help guide it in its mission to create a consciousness about the effects of everyday food choices.

Frank Bruni of The New York Times awarded Blue Hill at Stone Barns 3-stars and both Blue Hill and Blue Hill at Stone Barns have received “Best New Restaurant” nominations from the James Beard Foundation. In the spring of 2006 Barber was awarded “Best Chef: New York City.” Barber serves on Harvard Medical School’s Center for Health and the Global Environment advisory board and has been working with such organizations as the Kellogg Foundation, New York City’’ Greenmarkets, and Slow Food USA to minimize the political and intellectual rhetoric around agricultural policies and to instead maximize the appreciation for good food.