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A Chef's Journey, Scene 1:
Updated: Mar 19, 2019
The first steps of my journey on the culinary highway.
Thinking back over my journey in the hospitality industry I have accomplished and gone through many things. In this blog series, I will go through these experiences by city. Hopefully my notes will help someone move past whatever may be holding them back. Not just for people in the same industry but life in general. I will also be tying in my passion for food so that you may correlate your passion into what makes you happiest in life to fulfill your own journey.
Pasadena, California (The Early Years)
This is the starting point for it all. As a young man, many days were spent watching my mother and grandmother cooking. Watching “Yan Can cook” and “the Frugal Gourmet”, just to name a few. My grandma Jesse lived in Pasadena Ca, just up the street from the Rose Bowl. It was a small house with a huge wall-to-wall garden. The brick walls had grape vines all around. Apple trees, pomegranate trees, guava trees, fig trees, apricots and so much more. Little did I know this would be my first experience of what real food was designed to be. I would work in the garden helping grandma. I know between my family and the influence of my mother it created my love and appreciation for food. Little did I know the path it would send me on.
The photo above is a vegan dish I created some time ago. I made gnocchi using the pulp from a carrot. What made it tricky was not using egg or dairy as a binder. The texture is the tricky aspect. I also used beet purée and roasted brussels sprouts, mushrooms, heirloom baby carrots, fresh herbs and cherry tomatoes. I fried some sage to create a browned butter sage sauce. The dish takes me back to playing in the garden while my mother and grandmother would sit and talk for hours. I wish they both were here to see and experience my current success at #Bistro49.
Have a culinary question? Shoot me an email at ChefKC@bistro49jackson.com anytime.