Chef Earns National Honor

A Cambridge chef stationed just two T stops away from Harvard Square was recently named one of the Best New Chefs of 2009 by Food and Wine magazine—netting an award that he said will bring some “new light” to his restaurant, but will not distract him from his present work.

Barry Maiden, who was acclaimed in March for his Kendall Square restaurant, “Hungry Mother,” said he found out about the award in a phone call last month from the magazine, which boasts a total annual subscription of nearly a million, and serves as a sponsor for the Emmy award-nominated show “Top Chef.”

“I was really overwhelmed and excited, I really thought they had the wrong number when they called,” said Maiden, originally from Saltville, Va., who rose to success in the Boston area after having worked at various restaurants since the age of 17.

Hungry Mother, which opened in March 2008, specializes in charcuterie— “all things pork and anything that can be salted, cured, pickled and preserved,” according to Maiden, who offered his assurance that “every dish is brought out and tasted and re-tasted.”

Michael Leveton, chef and owner of “Lumiere” restaurant in Newton, who employed Maiden for four years, called the Food and Wine award an honor that

“puts you on the food and wine radar for the rest of your career.”

“Barry was very dedicated to the craft and always wanted to keep the learning curve steep,” Leveton added. “His kind of energy and dedication is difficult to find.”

David V. Hale, the director of career services at the New England Culinary Institute, where Maiden studied from 1999 to 2000, recalled, “Barry was a rare combination of skill, with a great balance of confidence and humility.”

“For him it’s always been about food, not about accolades, which is the defining characteristic of being a great chef,” Hale said.

Growing up, Maiden said, he never thought he would become a chef, and spent a brief period in the U.S. Army. But cooking has always played a central part in his life. Growing up in the South, Maiden said that family dinners were always a special time.

“We grew up around the table,” he said.

In fact, the beef tongue on the menu at Hungry Mother is a family memento, according to Maiden’s cousin, Jill Howard, who added that, when he was young, Maiden was “the pickiest eater.”

Despite his newfound recognition, Maiden said he would largely continue his present work, at the most starting a few “side projects that don’t interfere with the mother-ship of what we have going on here.”

Laurie Lefevre, Food and Wine magazine’s director of corporate communications, could not be reached for comment yesterday.