An internship in the fine dining industry is an experience that can propel a blossoming chef into culinary stardom (well at least help get a foot in the door). Working with Chef David Gilbert in promoting his internship has really got me thinking about personal passions and hobbies.

Chef David has a true passion for cooking and looks for that same burning desire in both his interns, and his staff. Being able to combine passion with work is an amazing opportunity; without passion life can be empty and mundane. He has emphasized throughout his search that potential interns should be well rounded and have hobbies other than cooking.

Not too long ago I came across another chef who combines his passion for cooking with his passion for music. DJ CHEF, a.k.a. Marc Weiss, has been “spinnin’ the beats while cookin’ the treats” for some time now. He is a culinary school graduate and began his career training with top chefs Bobby Flay and Matthew Kenney in fine dining restaurants in New York City. Weiss runs DJ CHEF Events and Entertainment and caters many major events in the New York area.

Not only is DJ CHEF a pioneer in the food/music/entertainment industry, he’s looking for enthusiastic new interns to join his team. If you live in or around the New York area and are looking for an exciting culinary experience this is one worth taking a look at.

Chef David Gilbert is also accepting intern applications at his new restaurant in Dallas.

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So, remember how the Chef David Gilbert Internship was scheduled to start late summer 2008? Okay, scratch that! Chef Gilbert still wants to hire an intern, it’s just that the job’s start date has been delayed a bit. Things change fast in the restaurant world. What can we say? The new Grand Opening date of Chef Gilbert’s restaurant in Dallas has been moved to January 2009 and the new deadline to apply is October 31st, 2008.

The best things in life are worth the wait, believe me, and an internship with Chef Gilbert will be a life-changing experience for whoever he selects. If you would like to apply for the internship, submit your resume here.

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Do you know a budding teen chef? If yes, can you send them to my house to help me prepare spring rolls for 20 this Saturday? I kid! I kid! No, seriously…

In any case, the Art Institutes is holding a nation-wide competition to find the best of the best in teen chefs. On April 12th, local competitions will be held, and the winners will head to Las Vegas for the Best Teen Chef Final Round Competition on May 17th. Yeah, underage people in Vegas. Cooking. Should be a squeaky-clean good time.

Top prize winners win a full tuition scholarship for an associate’s degree, certificate, or diploma from the Culinary Arts program at one of the Art Institutes locations. Not too shabby. Remember kids, free money is the best money.

According to their press release: In addition to a full-tuition scholarship and the title of Best Teen Chef 2008, the first place winner in the national competition, in partnership with Food Network, will be an “Intern for a Day” at the Food Network Kitchens in New York City. The winner will also receive a tour of the Food Network Studios, dinner for two at a Food Network chef’s restaurant and a library of Food Network Kitchens cookbooks.

Lovely!

I especially love how the competitors at the Local Cook-Off Competition will compete in timed heats preparing shrimp cocktail, sauteed breast of chicken, fresh broccoli, and rice pilaf. I know they’re just young ‘uns, but seriously, is it brain surgery to prepare fresh broccoli?

If you are ahead of the game and already have your culinary degree, why not check out the Chef David Gilbert Intern Search for your chance to work under a top chef?

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I am sure most of you have noticed the featured videos on the right sidebar. A few of us here at Chef2Chef.net grabbed a couple of willing friends and decided to create a couple of short mock-cooking videos. Labeled as rejects for the Chef David Gilbert Internship Search, the videos are pretty entertaining (big thanks to our producers!) and have gotten a bit of traction on our YouTube channel.

The first video features the Roadkill Chef who happens to pick up a fresh piece of meat and BBQ’s it using his original Spicy Peach Marinade:

The second video features the Office Chef who creates quite the casserole using whatever she can find in an almost empty office kitchen (please, for the sake of your coworkers, don’t try this in your office):

We were also lucky enough to get a response from YouTube.com user JAllerdyce, who shared “a liquid meal that can satisfy all of the senses.” I’m just not sure if the liquid diet would make the cut:

For a couple of legit cooking sites with video features check out our favorites; StartCooking.com and Ctrl+Alt+Chicken.

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With the deadline for the Chef David Gilbert Internship search getting closer, OnTheLine is taking a closer look at how some of the Food & Wine 2008 Best New Chefs got their start. Most new culinary school grads find mentors and internships to help hone their skills before taking over the reins of an established restaurant or starting their own, like one of the 2008 Best New Chefs, Jim Burke. Burke worked under Mark Vetri of Philadelphia’s Vetri before opening James in 2006.

Gerard Craft, another winner, opened Niche after working under Bryan Moscatello (Bistro Toujours), Mohammad Islam (Chateau Marmont), and Perry Hendrix (Metropolitan).

Image from STLCommerceMagazine.com

And South African-born Koren Grieveson (who came to America by way of Angola, Iran, England and Brazil) worked under Michael Mina (Aqua) and with Paul Kahan Blackbird.

Other top chefs started as interns before hitting it big. Ming Tsai trained in Paris under acclaimed pastry chef Pierre Herme and in Japan with sushi master Kobayashi.

Mark Peel of Campanile certainly benefited from Wolfgang Puck’s internship program at Ma Maison. Peel interned at La Tour d’Argents and Moulinde Mougins through the program, leading to a head chef position at Puck’s Spago before opening Campanile in 1989.

Image from The-Fifth-Taste.com

So culinary students and grads, how about you? Does/did your culinary program have an internship component? Did you seek out internships during your program and after?

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Wow, we have already received an overwhelming number of resumes for Chef Gilbert’s internship search from all over the US! Gilbert will certainly have a tough time choosing his 2008-2009 intern.

Even though the applicants come from many different backgrounds, the one thread that seems common is the desire to learn from one of the best. One of the applicants wrote about how honored she would be to learn under one of Dallas’ rising culinary stars. I think Chef Gilbert is blushing.

An internship with a master in the field is not just about an entry on your resume. It’s about experiences you can’t find in a classroom. Meeting important people in the industry. Learning how things really happen in the kitchen. Apply now. The deadline to apply is October 31st, 2008.

Those guys at Moby Dick’s getting up to some mischief…

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Chef Gilbert recently wrote a column about his search for a new intern for his regular column on Chef2Chef called “In the Fire.” From the column:

Our vision is to provide the intern with hands on experiences that he or she could not receive anywhere else. We are committed to transforming this internship serious learning experience, but also an adventure. My team is dedicated to ensuring that the experience is challenging, motivating, and educational. It is up to us to provide the winner with real life kitchen experience and to develop the fundamental skills that he or she needs to be a leader in this industry; I firmly believe that grooming young cooks to be great chefs is critical to the future of the industry.

The column contains several testimonials from Chef Gilbert’s past interns like this one from pastry chef Ngoc Trinh:

Chef Gilbert provided a versatile and challenging environment to allow my skills to grow and advance in a professional kitchen. He gave me the opportunity to find a home for my creativity and is a leader who guided me in the right direction. I had the freedom to allow my mind to create pieces of art work on plates for the guests. His diligence and sense of perfection are the sole reasons why I am skilled in culinary/pastry arts today. It was a true to life classroom with the heat of a natural kitchen!”

The column also includes a very useful Q & A section, along with a pick into Gilbert’s creative process and leadership style. If you are interested in an internship in a new restaurant with one of the most promising American chefs, you should read “My Quest for A Culinary Intern” and apply for the internship.  The deadline to apply is October 31st, 2008.

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Newcomers to the culinary field looking to advance quickly and attain high-level positions are finding that more and more importance is being placed on new, highly-specialized skills. Today it is no longer enough to have a culinary degree in hand, and a resume with top-notch real-world experience, internships with influential chefs or restaurants are the only way in to many premier culinary positions.

Culinary schools like the French Culinary Institute have career services that help place students in internships and jobs right out of culinary programs. Other internships, usually with major corporations, are posted on online job boards. Some “celebrity” chefs, including the NY-based Chef DJ, have a number of interns rotating in and out of their kitchens at any given time.

Chefs look for very different things in their interns. While Chef DJ is looking for “aggressive, hardworking, and charming” interns, Chef David Gilbert desires interns with “passion, personality, and a relentless drive for perfection”.

What can you expect from a culinary internship? It all depends on the chef. According to Chef Gilbert, “It all depends on the student’s dedication and how quickly they grasp the concepts and tasks put before them. I typically start all students with the basics because without a solid foundation they can not achieve the next level. Once the basics are mastered then I make sure there is always the opportunity to move forward into another role in the kitchen.”

For more information on becoming a chef and internships in general, visit the U.S. Department of Labor’s website on chefs and cooks. Or, if you know you’re interested in an internship, fill out the application for an internship with Chef Gilbert.

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When I saw this photograph of Chef David Gilbert drawing out his restaurant plans on a white board, I thought to myself: “Now that’s a creative person!” Sure creative people have their quirks as supervisors–sometimes they’re demanding or disorganized–but creative people also have a passion for what they do that is infectious. And let’s face it, most of us could use a little more passion in our lives.

The applications for the internship with Chef Gilbert have been rolling in, and we’ve been getting a lot of comments from past interns of Chef Gilbert about what its like to work for him:

From ScubaSteve:

Working with Chef David Gilbert was a great experience. Starting off as an intern I learned quite a lot and was an enjoyable experience at the same time. If I hadn’t needed more time in school to finish my degree I would still be there. It really is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I look forward to working with him in the future.

And according to one past intern (?), Chef Gilbert also excels in that other important personal quality young male chefs need in order to succeed; “pleasing the ladies.”

I’m sure Gilbert runs an equal opportunity kitchen though.

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Are you curious about Chef David Gilbert, the man behind the cuisine the Dallas Morning News describes as “daring, yet accessible”? Modern Luxury Magazine calls his food “magical,” while CEO Antoinette Bruno of StarChefs.com raves, “What sets David apart from so many other chefs playing with their food is that each one of his dishes stands alone as a high-flavor, high-concept, sensual experience with pleasing the diner in mind rather than showing off.”

But who is this Chef Gilbert really? Local Dallas boy done good or savvy world-traveler who brings his culinary experiences in Europe and Central America to play every time he steps into the kitchen? We’ll let you decide.

Here are a few choice morsels about Chef David Gilbert:

1. Chef David Gilbert grew up in Dallas, TX. and discovered his passion for food from his grandfather who owned a neighborhood butcher shop.
2. He thinks quince is a under-appreciated ingredient.
3. Chick-Fil-A was his first-ever paid job.
4. If he wasn’t a chef, David Gilbert could see himself as a starving artist, a math or culinary school teacher, or a SCUBA instructor.
5. Gilbert’s favorite part of the job is developing and mentoring young cooks.
6. After graduating from Johnson and Wales University in 1997, he traveled to Central America and roaming the Yucatan Peninsula while sampling local foods and immersing himself in the culture.
7. One of his long-term goals it to open a culinary school in the Caribbean.

Learn more about Chef David Gilbert by visiting his biography page on Chef2Chef.net here. You can apply for an internship with Chef Gilbert here.

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