12 Chefs. 12 Stories. One Culinary Celebration.
I’ve spent years building food businesses, developing menus, working with chefs and creating spaces where people come together around food. One thing I’ve learnt along the way is that there is an enormous amount of culinary talent in Nigeria. Some of it is visible. A lot of it isn’t.
There are chefs working in restaurants, caterers building businesses from their kitchens, pastry chefs experimenting with ingredients, home cooks who have spent years perfecting dishes and young people trying to find their place in the industry.
They all have something to offer. But talent alone doesn’t always create opportunity. Sometimes people need a platform, a little encouragement, access to the right people or simply the chance to show what they can do. That is part of why I created The Twelve: A Very Nigerian Christmas.
More Than A Cooking Competition
I didn’t want to create another competition where people cook, somebody wins and everyone goes home. I wanted something that could bring chefs together, introduce people to talent they might not otherwise discover and create conversations about where Nigerian food and hospitality are going.
The Twelve is open to different kinds of food professionals. You don’t have to own a restaurant or have a large following to have something worth sharing.
What interests me is what people can do with ingredients, how they think about food, how they approach challenges and what they want to build. Cooking is a skill, but there is also creativity, discipline, organisation and the ability to keep learning. Those things matter.
Why Twelve?
The number twelve has personal meaning for me. I was born in December, the twelfth month of the year. My daughter is twelve, and she was born at the beginning of a significant chapter in my journey as a chef and entrepreneur.
Over time, twelve has become part of the way I think about what I’m building. But beyond the personal meaning, I like the idea of bringing twelve different people together. Twelve chefs won’t have the same background, experience or cooking style. They won’t approach ingredients in the same way either. And that’s exactly what makes it interesting.
Nigerian Food Has Many Stories
When people talk about Nigerian food, the conversation often begins and ends with a few familiar dishes. I understand why. Those dishes are important, and people love them. But Nigerian cooking is much bigger than that.
There are regional ingredients, everyday cooking traditions, preservation methods, street foods, family recipes and techniques that deserve attention. There is also a new generation of chefs taking those foundations and developing their own approaches. I believe we can make space for both.
For me, it has always been about understanding where food comes from, learning the techniques properly and then deciding what you want to do with that knowledge. You don’t have to abandon the original dish to create something new. Food travels. Technique remembers.
Building Something That Continues
The Twelve also connects to the work we’re developing through Table 12 and Chef Dumebi School of West African Cookery. I’m interested in what happens after someone discovers they enjoy cooking.
How do they improve? Who teaches them? Where do they practise? How do they turn that interest into a skill, a profession or a business? Those are questions I’ve been thinking about for a long time. Through the school, we’re developing opportunities for practical learning, working with chefs and food professionals who have knowledge they can share.
Table 12 is part of that vision too. A training restaurant and hospitality space where learning, cooking and real service can happen together. The Twelve is another way to bring people into that conversation.
A Very Nigerian Christmas
Christmas felt like the right time to bring this idea to life. Food is such a big part of how we celebrate in Nigeria. We cook for family, friends, neighbours and sometimes people we weren’t expecting. There is always another plate. So the idea of ending the year by bringing chefs together, challenging them and celebrating what they create made sense to me.
The competition begins with a Market Basket Challenge on 28 November. On 1 December, my birthday, we’ll introduce the Final Twelve. The competition continues in December, leading to the final on 12 December and the Winner’s Dinner on 19 December.
I’m looking forward to seeing the dishes, meeting the chefs and hearing their stories. Most importantly, I want the people taking part to leave with something valuable, whether or not they win. Because this is not just about finding one winner.
It’s about discovering what is possible when we give more people a place at the table.
The Twelve: A Very Nigerian Christmas is a culinary competition created by Chef Dumebi to celebrate Nigerian food talent, creativity and professional development.
Applications close 21 November 2026
www.bistrotsamantha.com/registration
Media enquiries: hello@chefdumebi.com
