Tajeh Porter
Nura | Brooklyn, NY
February 2025
Tajeh Porter grew up around the best cooks she had ever met: her family. After years spent eating soul food whipped up by her Louisiana-born grandmothers, Porter's own interest in the kitchen caught on, and she started to experiment with new ingredients and recipes. After plans to play basketball didn't pan out, Porter enrolled in college to become a stenographer, but ditched school to read cookbooks instead. When she came clean to her parents, they decided to help send her to culinary school. At 24, Porter graduated from Riverside Community College Culinary Academy and moved to Las Vegas. She joined the team at Yardbird Southern Table and Bar, working the line, learning the basics, and sinking her teeth into the restaurant’s pickling and preservation program. Porter moved next door to help open Chica, a Latin concept by the same group. There, she was exposed to Mexican, Venezuelan, Argentinian, Peruvian, and Japanese cuisines while working as sous chef. Feeling burnt out, Porter stepped away and started working the line at a local Italian restaurant.
In 2018, Porter joined the opening team of Rising Stars alum Daniel Humm’s Nomad Las Vegas as a line cook. Working her way up to sous chef over the next two years, she developed an understanding of the fine dining restaurant’s systems and techniques. After moving to New York to help open a New American restaurant, Porter went to dine at Nura. She was captivated by the food, the atmosphere, and the woman-led kitchen. Porter started as a line cook under Rising Stars alum Jackie Carnesi before she was promoted to sous chef a few months later. Since taking over as executive chef in November 2023, she has created a menu that leans on ingredients, techniques, and flavors that are both global and personal, with dishes like her roasted half chicken with blistered sungold tomatoes, charred okra, chile de árbol, urad dal, and a preserved lemon jus. At Nura, Porter has also worked to create a collaborative environment for her staff, emphasizing their training and development while breaking down the barriers between the front and back of house.
