 mike e. newbee
howdy all. I cook for a living, and have for the past 18yrs or so. I love my job which happens to be cooking exclusively for a family. I'm their "private chef" which is a term that sometimes make me wince. I feel the term chef should be reserved for the chief of a kitchen restaurant. I definately feel that the term chef is tossed around way to loosely, ultimately diminishing its meaning. A recent culinary school grad is not a chef. it takes years ,I feel, in order truely assume that titlle. I like the term "cooker" as opposed to cook. A cooker is a budding craftsman while a cook is someone slinging hash.
Semantics aside, cooking for a living is the best. I live in Napa,Ca. and work for that family in the Oakland hills. I went to the CIA 14 yrs. ago then spent stints working for Brad Ogden and Michael Chiarello before landing a spot in the kitchens of Chez Panisse. I cooked there for over 4 splendid yrs. prior to my current job. I've done a lot of culinary trips through Europe and currently am planning one to Vietnam.
My love of hearth/live fire cooking led to me build a beautiful "earth oven" in my back yard. It cost next to nothing (except time) to build and was profounly gratifying. It also cooks like a dream. We are now building another oven at a friends and have plans to lead the building of 3 or 4 around Napa, effectively creating a local earth oven network. I plan to lead some local oven cooking workshops once the othe ovens are completed. I am happy to talk with anybody about the joys of such an enterprise.
That gives you guys a glimps of my seen.
Mike  |