While his childhood friends pretended to cook toy food in their play kitchens, James London’s fantasies took a deeper dive into culinary make-believe.
“As a young kid, I didn’t pretend to run a restaurant—I pretended to work lobster boats and fishing vessels,” said the Charleston native. “I didn’t know that path would end in the kitchen, but I knew I wanted to be connected to food at its most honest, elemental level.”
There are plenty of discerning diners expressing gratitude for his epiphany. Not only has his restaurant, Chubby Fish, sailed to the top-spot on countless “must try” lists, but it has garnered high praise on a national stage: 2025 Best New Restaurant by Bon Appetit, No. 7 U.S. ranking from Food & Wine, New York Times’s "Best Restaurants in America" list in 2024-2025 and a much-coveted presence in the Michelin Guide. London also was a finalist for the Best Chef Southeast 2024 James Beard Award.
He now can add another accolade to the list: an appointment to the roster of 2026 South Carolina Chef Ambassadors. Since the program’s inception in 2015, it has built an impressive honor roll of distinguished chefs whose commitment to local ingredients and community position them to represent the state’s food scene.
In pursuit of culinary mastery, Chef London put years of sweat equity into formal training at the French Culinary Institute in New York and gained priceless hands-on experience in fine dining establishments from Charleston to New York City to San Francisco.
In this Q&A, he explains why “local” is at the heart of the Chubby Fish concept and the philosophies he hopes to bring to the table as a South Carolina Chef Ambassador.
What approach have you taken to distinguish Chubby Fish from other seafood establishments?
“Chubby Fish is an ingredient-driven restaurant. Being a dock-to-table seafood restaurant means that we let what our fishermen and farmers bring us dictate the menu for the day. I cook in many styles, so it’s a very eclectic menu and cuisine. But the common thread is that we source the best seafood possible and allow it to shine on the plate.”
Which South Carolina ingredients are absolutely “musts” in your kitchen?
“I think we have the best shrimp in the country, bar none. The shrimp from our nutrient-rich waters is so much better tasting than shrimp caught elsewhere. We do a Chili Garlic Shrimp with our local white shrimp and for the big brown shrimp we simply steam them on a bed of rock salt and let the customers peel them so they can see just how perfect they are.
South Carolina has also made a lot of strides in farming oysters. We always have a nice mix of native wild oysters (in season) and locally farmed oysters so our patrons can see the difference and learn a little bit about the process.
And I am constantly sneaking turnips and radishes into our food. They bring so much flavor to the party and allow us to ground the menu in restraint and balance. We grill them and braise them in dashi spiked with white soy, and they are little explosions of flavor throughout a dish.”
What do you want patrons to experience when they dine at Chubby Fish?
“We want them to have the best products coming from our neck of the woods that day. We have an open kitchen, so our customers sitting along the bar can interact with our culinary team and hopefully pick up some tips throughout their meal. Our front-of-house team acts as sherpas, guiding the customer to the best possible dining experience. We want people to leave and say, “That was special.”
As a South Carolina Chef Ambassador, what do you wish the dining public to know about the state’s culinary scene?
“South Carolina has such a bounty of amazing food. There’s been impressive growth of the culinary scene in the past 10 years that allowed us to diversify our portfolio of offerings using South Carolina ingredients. There’s been a surge of culinary professionals who started cooking in South Carolina, left to explore other regions and cuisines and then returned with a whole new lens through which to view our native ingredients. I’m very excited to see where we go with it.”
