2025 is already shaping up to be a big year for Thailand – Bangkok was ranked Time Out’s second-best city for food, Gaggan was named the best restaurant in Asia and Chef Tam Debhakam earned the title of Asia’s Best Female Chef. Now, Chef Pichaya ‘Pam’ Soontornyanakij is being crowned the World’s Best Female Chef 2025.
Prior to the World’s 50 Best Restaurants 2025 awards ceremony in Turin on June 19, several laureates have been revealed, the first being the World’s Best Female Chef 2025. The title voted on by a panel of 1,120 gastronomic experts from around the globe has sparked discussion among critics about whether culinary awards should be divided by gender.
The World’s Best Female Chef was first presented in 2011 and over the years it has highlighted diverse culinary styles and the global influence of female chefs. However, in the 14 years since its inception, no Asian chef had won the title – until now!
Chef Pam is no stranger to recognition in the culinary world. Last year she was named Asia’s Best Female Chef, further solidifying her status as one of the industry’s brightest stars. Her journey began with a career shift from journalism to cooking and at just 21 she won a young chef award. She then moved to New York to study at the Culinary Institute of America, where she trained under the renowned Jean-Georges Vongerichten. After returning to Thailand, she became a judge on Top Chef Thailand.
In 2021, Chef Pam opened Potong in her family’s 120-year-old Chinese herbal pharmacy building in Bangkok’s Chinatown. With her husband, she transformed it into a multi-storey restaurant. The tasting menu, featuring progressive Thai-Chinese dishes such as her signature fragrant roast duck, celebrates her family’s heritage while offering a memorable sensory experience across the restaurant’s five storeys. Since its opening, Potong has earned international acclaim.
It’s not just awards that make Thailand proud. At just 35, Chef Pam is already making a big impact on future generations of women. In 2024 she co-created the Women for Women Scholarship, which each year offers a young woman from an underprivileged, rural Thai background the opportunity to take up an all-expenses-paid culinary internship at Potong.