I've been a huge fan since I saw you as a judge when Chopped first premiered! You, along with Alton Brown and Gordon Ramsay, are by far my favorite chefs I've encountered. I just have a couple questions about cooking and the road to becoming a great chef:
How long do you think it took you to get a "kitchen sense"? In other words, how long did it take for you to gain a 6th sense, an instinct, for cooking for things such as: how long something has to cook; how ingredients work together; how to create recipes from random ingredients, etc.
Any essential tips you'd give to someone just starting out? I feel like I have the standard tips down, like keeping your knife sharp and having a good frying pan but I still feel like something's been missing over the couple years since I've started cooking.
Favorite type of meat/vegetable/spice/fruit to work with?
Do you have any tips for cooking for a large amount of people? The largest I've done was for 40 people. The menu was a standard mixed salad with almonds, fettucine chicken alfredo with a zuchinni substitute for dietary needs, and mini cheesecakes (cheesecakes made in a muffin tin), and that took an entire day to make, with cheesecakes taking an entire night to make/cool. All of the food was served buffet style so I had to make everything in advance then transfer it and everything was just chaotic because I only had my small kitchen to work with.
Jokuki40 karma
Hello Alex!
I've been a huge fan since I saw you as a judge when Chopped first premiered! You, along with Alton Brown and Gordon Ramsay, are by far my favorite chefs I've encountered. I just have a couple questions about cooking and the road to becoming a great chef:
How long do you think it took you to get a "kitchen sense"? In other words, how long did it take for you to gain a 6th sense, an instinct, for cooking for things such as: how long something has to cook; how ingredients work together; how to create recipes from random ingredients, etc.
Any essential tips you'd give to someone just starting out? I feel like I have the standard tips down, like keeping your knife sharp and having a good frying pan but I still feel like something's been missing over the couple years since I've started cooking.
Favorite type of meat/vegetable/spice/fruit to work with?
Do you have any tips for cooking for a large amount of people? The largest I've done was for 40 people. The menu was a standard mixed salad with almonds, fettucine chicken alfredo with a zuchinni substitute for dietary needs, and mini cheesecakes (cheesecakes made in a muffin tin), and that took an entire day to make, with cheesecakes taking an entire night to make/cool. All of the food was served buffet style so I had to make everything in advance then transfer it and everything was just chaotic because I only had my small kitchen to work with.
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