Executive Chef at All Pro Smoke Show

Top lessons I’ve learned throughout my career are: (1) Failure makes you stronger. (2) Ask the right questions at the right time. (3) ALWAYS ASK FOR HELP!

Advice that has stuck with me was from my first day at Restaurant Marc Forgione as the new Chef de Cuisine, I got a message from Chef that said DFIU. Y’all can figure that one out!

Two jobs impacted my career significantly. My internship at Restaurant Daniel and my time at Restaurant Marc Forgione. At Daniel, I had no idea what tired was in my life until I worked for Chef Daniel. The mental push and drive to be as close to perfect was next level. I was relieved when my internship was over! However back to school for a couple weeks I was ready to go back for that passion that was instilled in me. At Restaurant Marc Forgione, I thought that I could do anything I could dream up. This was under the parameters that it all sold, and we hit food cost. This really taught me to take all the skills that I learned in all my positions leading up to Forge and applying them in new ways. Between these two positions, they gave me the passion, work ethic and drive to be the best chef I can.

When I was given the opportunity to go to Paris for a stage, I knew this profession was right for me. It meant leaving my friends and family to pursue a career across the ocean. It was unforgettable.

I am personally still working on having a work/life balance. I love what I do and that makes it hard to balance! I am always thinking about food and beverage. I am so lucky to have a wife who shares the same passion as I do. But she is the first to say “STOP IT with work”. I try to play golf, but that has been frustrating lately. So now I just tinker with things and want to get into more welding and woodworking.

This industry is so consuming it will eat you up and spit you out. I was just talking to my team today as they were having lunch on a beautiful Texas December day, and they thanked me for making sure that we stop for 30 minutes to enjoy a family meal, sitting down. It’s the little things.

I am looking for a cook who shows up with a good attitude and wants to be a part of a team. You can teach someone to do a job in the kitchen, but you cannot teach motivation to want to push hard and make themselves a better chef.

The fact that I can comfortably break down anything that walks, swims, flies or has grown out of the ground from “nose to tail” is one of the most important skills I possess as a chef. Most of the team has never butchered anything -- ever -- so I want to pass that knowledge on to them, as well as understanding how to make money on everything that animal or vegetable has given to us.

My team thinks that I am crazy! I am constantly trying to improve the flow of service by moving things around. This keeps them on their toes and always questioning what is coming next. We have daily meetings and work with them one-on-one to improve their growing skill sets. This is how I was brought up in the kitchen by my chefs. I want to pass along that tradition to the next generation of cooks who want to come up.

Everyday I wake up and ask myself what inspires me to continue in this industry. The past year plus, without a professional kitchen to work with a team to cultivate ideas about food that supports the farmers, ranchers and fisherman was hard. I came back to Texas after leaving NYC with the hope of what we were doing there day in and day out. Meeting my team at Tillie's at Camp along with all the local farmers is 100% the reason that I want to work and excel in this industry.

Inspiration comes to me in the strangest ways; it could be cooking at the hot dog roller at the local gas station or even talking to an Uber driver about what their favorite food was when they were growing up in their home country (that was mainly in NYC coming home after work). Most of the inspiration comes from reading and studding the classics to adapt them to the local ingredients that I can get.

I continue to educate myself with LOTS AND LOTS OF BOOKS. Also having meals with people and talking about food!

I can’t live without My Staff in order to do my job. I cannot do what I do without them. They are the backbone of the dream that we are putting out to our guests.

Books I feel that are essential for chefs are “Letters to a Young Chef” by Daniel Boulud and “Marc Forgione: Recipes and Stories” by Marc Forgione.