What is your background?
I am originally from Honolulu, Hawaii, and lived in Boston after graduating high school. After finishing university I started cooking in restaurants, then hotels, and after moving around various kitchens for five years I moved back to Hawaii. While working as an executive chef at a small sports club, I was recruited to help open the Four Seasons Resort Maui as a restaurant chef. Later I became banquet chef. Maui was an extremely busy destination. Two-and-a-half years later I was promoted to help open the Four Seasons Resort Bali. Six months later I became the executive chef. Through the opening of both resorts in Bali, a three-year stint in Jakarta, another two openings in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, and now Doha, I have now been executive chef for 17 years with the company.

Which dishes do you like to eat yourself?
Simple, nice products cooked well will always do. I love coffee, high end seafood and meats. I am partial to the Asian style of cookery, with American barbecue and Mediterranean close seconds.

How is your kitchen equipped?
Our kitchen at the Four Seasons in Doha is very well equipped in terms of storage areas and work space especially. In terms of the small utensils inventory we did need to purchase quite steadily for the first three years to be able to handle efficiently the level of volume which we as a culinary production unit had developed in that time.

Name one ingredient you couldn’t do without. Fresh thyme How does the food you make at home differ to what you make in the kitchen?
It is totally different, though sometimes I get ideas at home which can be applied to work. It must be understood that in my current role, I am not the cuisinier of any particular restaurant. Each profit centre has its own culinary head, and my job is to keep them all working in sync and maintain instilled principles of service and production that are key to the success of our operation as a whole.

Do you have a large team working with you?
Not so large, yet not so small either. I have 17 culinarians in pastry, but they can barely keep up with the demand. That is quite a large pastry staff for a 232-room hotel, yet it depends on what you do with your resources. If a large team is utilised in a way that is productive, then it makes sense no matter what the number of rooms in the hotel. The number of culinarians on the team is 75, plus another 10 covering two three-meal staff dining restaurants.

When you aren’t working, is there any place in Doha you like to eat?
The Thai restaurant at Grand Hyatt for the food and service, or their Mediterranean restaurant called Rocca for the outdoor ambience. That’s it. Maybe snacks at Admiral’s in the Ritz could be fun.

Which recipe have you chosen for us and why?
I chose this recipe for two reasons: the first is that I like to eat it myself, and it has a long lovely finish that carries in the palate for quite a long time. Also it’s possible to make at home with a little trial and error.
To book at the Four Seasons Doha, call 494 8888