Barnes Bay and Meads Bay frame Four Seasons Resort and Residences Anguilla, a 35-acre retreat where dining takes in blufftop views, beachside lunches and an open-air lounge. Four Seasons has announced its inaugural Chef Fest Anguilla for 13–15 November 2026, bringing visiting chefs into these settings for a weekend focused on Caribbean ingredients and cooking traditions.
The festival marks ten years as a Four Seasons property, with chefs arriving from New York, Atlanta, Nevis and the Dominican Republic to cook alongside the Anguilla team. Tasting stations, demonstrations and restaurant takeovers give travellers several ways to experience their work, across five venues with distinctly different styles.
Three days of tastings and takeovers
Friday 13 November opens with a ticketed welcome celebration featuring chef tasting stations, passed canapés, cocktails and live entertainment. Guests will be able to sample cooking from the participating chefs in one evening, an introduction to the talent assembled for the weekend. A portion of the evening’s proceeds will go to local charitable organisations, connecting the anniversary celebration with the wider island community.
Saturday’s programme includes chef demonstrations, tastings and ingredient showcases throughout the resort. Restaurant takeovers will culminate in special menus and appearances by the visiting chefs at its dining outlets. Cooking demonstrations and mixology activities add opportunities to explore the techniques behind the food and drinks, alongside the meals themselves.
Sunday’s Chef Fest Brunch brings all the participating talent together for an interactive finale. The three-day format moves from Friday’s tasting stations to Saturday’s more varied programme, then finishes with a shared event involving the full chef line-up.
The chefs coming to Anguilla
India Doris brings the perspective of Markette, her intimate restaurant in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighbourhood. Her cooking combines European influences with her Caribbean heritage, shaped by years in European kitchens and expressed through seasonal ingredients and changing menus of sharing plates. That background makes her an interesting participant in a festival centred on regional traditions and the exchange of ideas between chefs.
Doris’s previous kitchens include La Trompette, Bibendum, The NoMad and Crown Shy. At SAGA, she rose to executive sous chef, adding another chapter to a career that now informs Markette’s balance of technique, seasonality and Caribbean flavours.
Manu Calderon returns with a direct connection to the host property. Formerly executive chef at Four Seasons Resort and Residences Anguilla, he now holds that role at Four Seasons Resort Dominican Republic at Tropicalia. Claudio Gumbs, from Four Seasons Hotel Atlanta, and Telharsha Smithen, from Four Seasons Resort Nevis, also join the festival.
The resident culinary team supporting the weekend includes Aaron Gumbs, Tre Niles, Jomar Timpug, Jorge Lopez De Lira and Lashanda Davis. Lopez De Lira is restaurant chef at Lima-Limon, where his Mexican heritage informs the cooking; he joined the Anguilla operation in 2025, having joined Four Seasons Punta Mita in 2022.
Five venues with different flavours
The resort’s existing restaurants offer a useful sense of the weekend’s range, from Caribbean seafood to Mexican and Pan-Asian cooking. Their regular dishes described below establish each venue’s character; Chef Fest will bring its own special menus, collaborations and guest-chef appearances.
Salt occupies a blufftop position overlooking both Barnes Bay and Meads Bay, with seafood at the centre of its dinner menu. Its signature ceviche combines local fish with lime and Scotch bonnet peppers. Spiny lobster comes grilled or Creole-style, accompanied by rice and peas, plantains, slaw and drawn butter. A tableside Salt Sommelier service pairs locally harvested salt with spices, giving a familiar ingredient particular attention. The setting and menu make this a natural place to explore the island’s seafood traditions.
Lima-Limon brings Mexican cooking to Barnes Bay. Its regular menu includes shrimp red aguachile with fermented red pepper and a mix of avocado, radish, shallot and cucumber, alongside Michoacán-style pork carnitas. Short rib is braised in red adobo and served with refried beans and a quelites salad. These dishes offer another expression of the resort’s interest in regional ingredients and techniques, with Lopez De Lira’s own background informing the restaurant.
Bamboo Bar & Grill sits beachside on Meads Bay and normally serves breakfast and lunch. Lobster tails and spiny lobster salad feature alongside a grain-and-vegetable bowl with tuna and salmon. The drinks menu includes rum-based tiki cocktails and an Anguilla Fresh, made with gin, rosemary and ginger beer. Its beach setting provides a more relaxed contrast to Salt’s elevated position above the bays.
Sunset Lounge is open-air, with views across Barnes Bay at sunset, cocktails, live music and Pan-Asian food. Sushi, sashimi, poke bowls and izakaya plates form its regular offering; signature dishes include a crayfish-and-barbecued-eel roll and kimchi fried rice with short rib bulgogi. Café Nai completes the five-venue line-up, serving hot and cold coffees, teas, pastries and gelato.
A stay between Barnes Bay and Meads Bay
The anniversary recognises a decade under the Four Seasons name. The property opened as Four Seasons Resort and Residences Anguilla on 20 October 2016, having first opened under the Viceroy brand in 2010. Its position on Anguilla’s northwest shore puts the two bays at the centre of the stay, as well as the dining experience.
Kelly Wearstler’s interiors combine geometric architecture and large glass walls with natural materials and sculptural furnishings. Lamps made of driftwood, tables of petrified wood and floors of travertine marble provide distinctive details throughout the design. Accommodation ranges from rooms and suites to villas, townhomes and residences; the resort says 80 per cent has ocean views.
Three pools include an adults’ blufftop pool, while an ocean-facing spa, fitness programming, water sports and island excursions offer options beyond the festival programme. For a food-focused trip, these facilities give the stay variety: meals and demonstrations can be combined with time by the water or a spa appointment.
Planning a November visit
Arrival options include direct American Airlines flights from Miami to Anguilla, or connections through Princess Juliana International Airport in St Maarten. From St Maarten, guests can continue by shared or private sea shuttle, or take a short flight to Clayton J. Lloyd International Airport in Anguilla.
The sea transfer takes approximately 25–30 minutes to Blowing Point Ferry Port, followed by a drive of around 15–20 minutes to the resort. From Anguilla’s airport, the drive takes approximately 20 minutes. The resort’s concierge can help arrange transfers and car rentals; town cars, luxury SUVs and vans for ferry-terminal collection require at least 24 hours’ advance reservation.
For the festival programme, participating-chef updates and ticket information, consult the resort’s Chef Fest and dining information or call +1 264 497 7000.
