A Chef in the making

For as long as I can remember, I have had this fascination with the kitchen. I was always the one in the kitchen helping my mother and grandmother prepare meals and learn their great recipes. Although I am now a chef, it did not start out that way. I have taken a very different path than most. I started my professional career as an accountant. After a long year and a half, I found that that was not my calling. However, I knew that food was my passion and with the encouragement from my family I decided to enroll in culinary school.
Once I graduated from culinary school, I began my career as a pastry and pantry chef at a The Dal Rae Restaurant in Pico Rivera. This was a fantastic place to learn and build a foundation for what was to come. I worked there for about a year and found that I was not going to be able to grow in the way that I wanted. Although I built a great learning knowledge of the industry, I was not going to blossom into the Chef that I wanted to be. I began to look for opportunities within the industry to reach a certain goal that most of us have, which is to become and executive chef.
I found that opportunity at Edison International Field of Anaheim. This was the most exciting time of my life. I was so excited about this position I could hardly contain myself. There was a bit of a problem, however, that I may have been a little worried about, and that was experience. I was hired as a sous chef with only one year of experience under my belt. This, if you did not know, is pretty much unheard of in the industry. But, I did have my business background to help me out on the management side of the kitchen. I did get the position, and now it was time for me to perform. I was pretty nervous about my culinary skills, because I started as a blank slate in culinary school. Sure I loved to cook, but my only experience was in my mother and grandmothers kitchens. So there I was, just one year out of culinary school, and taking on the responsibility of opening a high profile baseball venue with not much experience. But what I did know was that I was confident and sure that I was able to take on whatever challenge they threw at me.
Five years after graduating from culinary school, I was able to achieve the goal of becoming and executive chef at The Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim. Being responsible for all food production at The Pond was a great experience. After a couple of years, it was time for me to bring my sports and entertainment experience to the private sector. Since leaving the Pond of Anaheim in 2003, I have focused my attention on continuing to build The Salsa Grill’s success with my partner and Dad, Jess. I also opened Black Tie & Blue Jeans Catering which is a sister company to the existing restaurant and am currently a corporate chef with Melissa’s World Variety Produce Inc. This position keeps me in Sports and Entertainment in that I work as a liaison between executive Chefs in stadiums/arenas and Melissa’s procurement and marketing staff. This is only a small part of what you will see from me in the future, because I will not stop until I have achieved all of my goals and dreams. Stay tuned.