A little more about me

Born in New York City, I studied Art History along with thousands of other would be curators, art directors, gallerists and art world wanna-bees, way back at the beginning of the seventies. It was a fun time and being an artist was about all I was interested in. For those of you who are wondering, yes I got through university or at least half of it working as a waiter at some better NYC restaurants. It paid well and I was fortunate to run into a couple of older guys who were Europeans, who were professional waiters. They worked hard and had one of the best networks I have ever seen for finding only the best waiting jobs. My interest in food began to grow during this time and I saw and ate many things for the very first time. I also learned a good deal about service from them.

After school not really finding myself working at several office positions, I settled into book manufacturing (met one of my oldest friends) and then publishing, (production work). A few years of that, so much glamor and no money, I thought it was time for a big change. Now 28 and living with a Swedish diplomat I really needed to think about a profession that I would enjoy and would travel. So after much thought and being creative by nature it came to me. The one profession that I was not too old for and always interested me – food! If you cook well in one place you can cook well almost any place. So I took a professional course at the New School of Culinary Arts, which was the only cooking school in NYC at the time and I was off and running.

I worked in NYC at several restaurants and caterers, catered myself for a while (a cut throat business in NYC), and then got one of my best jobs ever – being a private chef for the Marquise and Marquees Raoul De Saint Cyr, and the perfect job it was. Raoul being French and very knowledgeable was an enormous help in getting my cooking right as was several trips abroad. Their light entertaining and falling in with a couple of other private chefs was interesting and exciting.