Executive Chef / Co-Owner of H Town Restaurant Group

I came to America for better opportunities and to help my family. I felt I had to do that, and, thankfully, opportunities opened up for me. It was very hard, but I persevered.

One of my cousins was living in Houston, Texas, and I read a letter that he had sent back to his mother. Everything sounded wonderful, it opened my eyes to new opportunities and so I started my journey north. After several failed attempts, in 1984, at age 17, I arrived in Houston with no money, no job and knowing just one person, but with the determination to make a better life for myself.

It was a hard transition for me – I missed the folklore and the way of living in Mexico, the food and people were so different and I didn’t speak English. Houston at that time was going through an “oil bust,” and the city was sort of like a ghost town. I shared an apartment with several friends, and was happy to find my first job, as a dishwasher. While the pay was meager, I grabbed at the opportunity to learn the fundamentals of the restaurant business and find contacts to improve my English.

I then worked as a busboy during the day and cleaned the floors in office buildings at night to supplement my income. I was fortunate to have two steady-paying jobs, but then everything changed. My roommates decided to move to California but I didn’t want to go – my only family member living in the states was in Houston and I wanted to be close. Then, with an unexpected turn of bad luck, I lost my jobs. I was homeless and jobless. It was the worst time of my life.

“Quieres lavar platos?” – “Do you want to wash dishes?” – a friend asked me when we were playing soccer in the park. He took me to Backstreet Cafe and introduced me to the owner, Tracy Vaught. It was here that the greatest opportunity of my life came. I remember Tracy’s voice like it was yesterday. She offered me the job, I accepted and we shook hands, and I started work that afternoon.

I worked very hard, and my love for cooking often took me into the kitchen to watch the chef. She would show me techniques and teach me recipes, and I was soon given a position on the kitchen line. I worked diligently and was soon promoted to the kitchen at Prego, Tracy’s other restaurant, and worked side-by-side there with the Executive Chef. Tracy offered to help me enroll in the Culinary Arts Program at Houston Community College. I was achieving things that exceeded my dreams.

I immersed myself in the time-honored techniques of French cooking, and received a culinary degree in 1982 and became chef then executive chef of Backstreet Cafe, where I had once been a dishwasher. Along the way, Tracy and I fell in love and were married. Together, we have opened four additional restaurants, published two cookbooks and have a daughter who is now part of our company, H Town Restaurant Group.

I motivate my team by getting them excited about seasonal changes and help my chefs create new dishes with honest-but-kind criticism. I also give compliments as often as I can, work alongside them and let them know that I am always available when they need me.

I worked in Rick Bayless’s kitchen for a few days in Chicago, mainly focusing on dish presentation and also how they prepare some meats in an oven as opposed to underground as I did when growing up in Mexico.

I knew this profession was right for me when I graduated culinary school at Houston Community College with very little educational background. It was a big accomplishment for me. It gave me confidence. I had always enjoyed cooking – my first teachers were my mother and grandmother – and achieving a culinary degree was the achievement of a dream which I had really never dared to dream until it happened!

I worked in the kitchen of Carmen “Titita” Ramírez Degollado for several days with Titita in Mexico City. She specializes in the cuisine of Veracruz .