Interview with Kike Gallardo

We recently sat down with chef Kike Gallardo, a culinary artist whose approach begins where all life does — in the soil. 

With a deep respect for the earth and its natural rhythms, Chef Gallardo draws inspiration from the ground up, creating dishes that honor the ingredients’ origins, and the farmers who cultivate them. 

By forging a direct relationship between soil and plate, Chef Kike Gallardo invites diners to reconnect with the land, offering a sensory experience that celebrates nature, culture, and craftsmanship in every bite.

Hi Kike, so nice to chat with you. From looking at what you do, it’s clear that your creativity and innovation shines through , but it sounds like it all started with a fascination with biology. What first sparked this and when did your interest in biology grow into a passion for cooking?

Since I was a kid, I’ve loved cooking. I saw chefs as people living a magical life, always in touch with the seasons, the ingredients, the traditions of every place. But back then, being a chef wasn’t really considered a great career. At the same time, I was obsessed with biology. I’ve always been curious about life itself, and that curiosity has never left me.
When I finished my Biology degree and a Master’s in Food Studies, I realized something: a chef is the one who brings all of nature’s work to the table. It’s not just about producing food—it’s about celebrating it, sharing it, and closing the cycle around a table.
Plants became my focus because they’re often overlooked, even though they’ve been with us since the beginning: they gave us oxygen, fed us, healed us, guided our cultures. Herbs especially fascinate me, they communicate through flavor, aroma, color, and texture. Their diversity is mind-blowing. That’s why I design tasting menus that tell the story of humans and plants—because every bite can reveal something extraordinary about our connection to nature.

Your events thrive on creativity and performance. How do you think this enhances people’s experience, appreciation and understanding of the food they’re eating?

For me, food is never just food, it’s an experience. I’ve always been surrounded by artists, and I see art as a powerful way to transform how people see the world. Science alone doesn’t always move hearts. But when you bring in creativity (through performance, music, or art) you’re not just informing people, you’re surprising them, making them feel something, giving them a memory they’ll carry home.
At my events, I want people to laugh, to have fun, to feel joy, and in that joy, they also learn something important about nature and food. When an idea tastes delicious, when it’s playful, when it’s unexpected, that’s when it sticks.

Soil is everything. Years ago, I lived in Almería, in southern Spain, on a permaculture project called Sunseed Desert Technology. I was both growing and cooking food there, living with a community of 20 people. That experience showed me how all life is connected—that a garden is really an ecosystem. Flowers, fungi, insects, soil, humans—we’re all part of the same web.
In the kitchen, this translates into cooking with what the Earth gives us, when it gives it. Eating with the seasons. Regenerating soil so that every year it becomes more fertile. People call it “farm-to-table,” but to me, it’s just common sense.

Do you think people have a true understanding of the connection between the food they eat and where it comes from?

Not really. Globalization has given us incredible diversity on our plates, but it has also distanced us from the ritual, cultural side of food. Now, people are used to seeing the same foods in supermarkets all year round. That makes us forget the beauty of seasonality.
That’s why in my events, we don’t just sit down to eat. We go out together to forage and harvest, to reconnect with the plants. And then we cook. By the time people sit at the table, they’ve already lived the story of those ingredients—and that changes everything.

Yes, agreed, it connects us so much more to the food we’re about to eat! We saw you'd mentioned on your website that “I’ve always seen cooking as a tool to improve the world…” How can the kitchen and dining table become a place to deepen people’s fascination with soil, and spread the word about the soil crisis?

Cooking is the perfect excuse for conversation. Sharing a meal is one of the most universal acts of care and joy. Around a table, people open up. They listen.
In my performances, whether they’re about botany, sustainability, or art, what I create is a shared space where strangers connect. That’s where big ideas can actually land. Without soil, there’s no food. Without food, no cuisine. Soil is our pantry. Chefs and artists have the responsibility—and the privilege—to remind people of that, and to celebrate it every time we cook.

Have you ever designed a dish or dinner around the theme of soil or ecosystem degradation?

Yes! In fact, El Herbario Comestible started as a single dish: a rice paper pressed with edible herbs and flowers, like a botanical painting you could eat. People loved it so much that it grew into a whole project.
Later, working at El Celler de Can Roca—when it was the best restaurant in the world—I helped create a menu called The Earth is Running Out, translating environmental crises into dishes. I learned that a plate can tell a story as powerful as a book or a film. Sometimes it’s beautiful and full of hope. Sometimes it’s bitter and hard to swallow. But either way, the message is clear: what future do we want to taste?

Bitter and not-so-tasty dishes would definitely make it a lot more clear to people!  If you were to design an educational experience focused on soil through cooking, what would it include?

Right now I’m working with the Community of Madrid to design training programs for teachers—bringing together science, art, and gastronomy. We go on botanical walks, make art, and then cook with the plants. That multisensory approach is so powerful—it turns learning into something unforgettable.
With soil, I’d do the same: explore it with microscopes and magnifying glasses, touch it, smell it, draw it, taste its fruits, understand its ecosystems. Because fertile soil takes centuries to build, and only a few careless years to destroy. Showing that contrast is a way to inspire respect and care.

Yes, we need to educate people as much as we can!  What would be a message of hope you want people who come to your events and eat your food to leave with?

My message is simple: you can only protect what you love. So the first step is to fall in love with nature again. That’s why I design experiences that seduce, that surprise, that make people smile while learning.
At our events, people reconnect with curiosity. They rediscover wonder. And when you’re in love with the world around you, protecting it stops being a duty and becomes pure joy. That’s the real hope I want to spread.

Discover more about Kike’s work here