[All photos in this post where taken by Jennifer Johnson]

She stands tall and upright. Maybe she learned that from years of working as a trader on Wall Street.

Her pants are simple and black, but her top is white with an array of flowers as if to show that she’s professional, put together, and full of personality. She probably picked up her fashion sense while walking down the streets in New York. But as I sit with her and discuss her background in finance and how she got invited to Sundance to then serving as a partner for the acclaimed event, it feels like I’m talking to a friend. Not the woman who was previously noted as one of the first female minorities hired on the corporate trading desk at Goldman Sachs. Once she said that, I admit I sat up a little straighter. Not in fear of getting scoliosis, but in fear of looking like a commoner while sitting in the second living room of her beautiful Hollywood estate. Wait, maybe this is the third living room?

I digress.

Mimi is a force with a perfect degree amicability. You can feel her essence as she talks about maneuvering in a male dominated industry and you can hear her humanness as she talks about her daughters who are discovering their personalities and independence. A smile stretches from ear to ear as she mentions the poetry by her eldest daughter. It sounds as if it comes straight from the heart and skips over to mine, making me excited about her daughter’s talent as if I’ve known her for years. I don’t, but at this rate, I might as well.

Family and business aside, Mimi Kim is the founder of ChefDance. A creative dining experience paralleling food and film, ChefDance has aligned with the famed Sundance Film Festival since 2004. Serving invited guests and companies, ChefDance promotes memorable interactions between individuals over food. To find out how she stared ChefDance and where she hopes to see it in the coming years, I sat down with Mimi in her home nestled in the Hollywood  Hills.

Follow My Gut (FMG): Before we get into all things about Sundance, I know you have a background in finance. Tell me what it was like working in in that industry.
Mimi Kim (MK): When I went to work for Goldman Sachs, it was around the Clarence Thomas case. At the time I was the first female minority hired on the corporate trading desk at Goldman Sachs. Then, corporate trading was mainly men and mostly white. At my desk there was a one black male trader and me, the Asian trader, and the rest were all white guys. They thought since they were dealing with the Johnson & Johnson’s and Coca Cola’s of the world they could relate better if they talked the same language and had the same looks. But I think the Clarence Thomas case completely changed that.

FMG: Did getting that position change how people interacted with you in the workplace?
MK: I remember when I first took that job at Goldman someone said to me, “Do you realize they only hired you because you satisfy the checkmark? You’re a token.” They said it as if it made me a sellout. And I said, “If someone’s going to be a token I’d rather be the first one and hopefully I’ll do a good job and there will be more after me.”

FMG: What was your experience like working in finance?
MK: Wall Street life got pretty tiring and I asked myself, “What am I really creating?” I was making a lot of money and had access to a lot of things, but as I got older and mature I started thinking there had to be more to life. I wanted to build something and I decided to start my own business in Los Angeles. I flew to LA and started a venture capital firm. I knew trading and venture capital were very different, but I had to start somewhere. With luck and smarts, investments came through. Even then, managing other people’s money was stressful, but it wasn’t very creative.

FMG: Did you feel like you were a creative person?
MK: I never really thought I was creative because I think school often pigeon-holds you into particular things. It was one way of thinking and I never sat back to figure out what I wanted to do or decide if I was creative. When I started dating Kenny and we went to Sundance, I was pretty stable financially. From that I thought, “I want to do something I really enjoy. I want to do something that will challenge me and get me out of my comfort zone.”

Follow My Gut (FMG): Where does Sundance come in?
Mimi Kim (MK): I’m originally from New York  so I’m very used to the New York food scene. When I was invited to go to Sundance for the first year during the Olympics in 2002, I assumed we would have the same kind of [food] choices, I didn’t. I realized that while the party was great it was more like a cocktail party: tray passes, pu pu platter, and Red Bull vodkas. At the end of the evening I went home starving!

FMG: What was your takeaway about eating at the Sundance parties?
MK: The next day I realized that when I go to the parties I should sit next to the kitchen. I positioned myself so I could see the food trays coming out of the corner of my eye. Since you didn’t know when that tray would come back around, I would take one and then grab a couple more.

FMG: What did you think of Sundance?
MK: At the time I was dating my husband, Kenny Griswold, who asked me, “Did you have a great time will you come back?” I said, “I love the films, I love the town, the party was fun, but I don’t think I’m coming back next year because I can’t afford to lose ten pounds (aka the Sundance Diet). There has to be more food.”

FMG: What would you have changed about the dining scene at Sundance?
MK:  If I had it my way, I would have done something where there would be seats and the food would come to you and you could finish your conversation and have a real exchange. At the end, a little plus would be music like an acoustic set to create the tone.

FMG: Let’s take a step back. What made you think you knew how to enhance dining at Sundance?
MK: Working on Wall Street as a bond trader for seven years, it was a stressful and demanding job, but with everything I did I learned how to entertain and how I would want to be entertained. When I like to be entertained, I would rather it be something different. For instance, going to an event you can’t get into or sitting with the chef.

FMG: What did Sundace teach you?
MK: I realized what I was missing were the things I could enjoy: great food, company, and entertainment. I decided to think about the things that would entertain me and if I could create that, hopefully everyone else will enjoy it too. So I started to create something that didn’t exist ghere. I had an idea and it started with food because it’s a common denominator.

FMG: And that’s where ChefDance came from. Tell me what the very first ChefDance was like.
MK: I never started it as a business; I started in my home in Park City, Utah. I invited friends, brought in chefs to cook in my own kitchen, and had an acoustic set. It was about 70 people and I had chef Tyler Florence from Food Network cook in my open kitchen and my friends could see him cooking. He was a perfect host because my friends could watch him cook in the kitchen and he would hand-feed the ladies. It ended up being everyone sharing food, which was then sharing ideas and dreams, which was a true connection. I realized there was a magic in this because no one felt uncomfortable calling a person the next day.

FMG: Where do you hope to see ChefDance in the upcoming years?
MK: I don’t know exactly where we’ll be in five years, but I can only go step-by-step to get to where I want to go. ChefDance is a huge success; I love it, and it’s a great people connector. However, that event is big. Because of that, I wanted to do something to take the event down a little smaller so last year I started Storytellers. That event is a dinner once a month with fifty people and a storyteller of the evening. Everyone comes together under the same theme for instance, philanthropy. The one thing that was added to it was a call to action taking it beyond eating. You have to learn something and take something with you.

FMG: How do you feel about what you’ve created with ChefDance?
MK: Ultimately,  when people hear about ChefDance I want them to think of a quality event that stands for something. If I could create an event and give a great feeling to someone, then I’ve done a good job.

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ChefDance: Website, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Jennifer Johnson Photography: Website and Instagram