Celebrity chefs such as Gordon Ramsay, Eric Ripert and Nigella Lawson are rock stars in today’s culture. And as much as the Food Network, Iron Chef and other lifestyle staples of cable television have encouraged home cooks to be more adventurous in their own kitchens, it is men and women preparing gourmet meals in front of the camera who are the headliners. Alexis Tarrazi spoke with local chefs about their job, their avocation and their menus for this eight-part series, Rock Star Chefs. These chefs will tell you that the journey to stardom is tougher than it seems behind all the cameras and lights.
1 Wild Turkey Way, Hamburg, NJ 07419
(973) 827-5996
Hours
Monday Closed
Tuesday Closed
Wednesday Closed
Thursday 5:00–10:00 pm
Friday 5:00–10:00 pm
Saturday 5:00–10:00 pm
Sunday 5:00–10:00 pm
Family Influence
“I started cooking when I was about two,” Fischer, a native Minnesotan, said. “My mother and grandmother were big canners, so they preserved everything – jam jelly, pickles peaches, cherries. So at a young age I picked it up and was stuffing tomatoes in the jar and things of that nature…. I think the essence of cooking was bred into me at a super young age.”
Fischer first entered the professional kitchen when he was 13 and began flipping burgers at Wendy’s. As soon as he was old enough to legally work, Fischer took a job at a local resort, the Grand View Lodge in Nisswa, Minn., where the chef sent Fischer and two other boys off to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y.
“It was kind of written on the wall after that,” Fischer said.
 |
| Timothy Fischer Executive Chef of the restaurant Latour in Hamburg, NJ |
Journey To A James Beard Award
After graduating from the CIA in 1997, he worked at numerous award-winning locations, including Little Nell in Aspen, The Inn at Little Washington in Virginia and La Mansion Del Rio in San Antonio. “If look at my resume on the map it’s kind of a big circle,” Fischer said. “One of the things after getting out of the CIA, I wanted to learn the American regional stuff and touch all those different regions. Whether it be for a couple of years or even longer, just going there to immerse myself in their flavors and concepts and culinary ideas. It’s paramount of how I got there.”
Fischer also made all several culinary vacations across the globe when he was young and single. “They were always food destinations - Europe, Belgium, France… everything I did when I was younger was based on food,” Fischer said. “You almost sell your soul to work in the kitchen.”
Before coming to the Garden State, Fischer served as executive chef at the Hotel Donaldson in North Dakota, where he was nominated for the James Beard Award for Best Chef of the Midwest in 2011. “It’s kind of surreal,” Fischer said. “I think it’s every young chefs dream to win that.… I think if you cook honest food and you are honest to yourself and your earth – you give back and you take. You support the local farmers and do the right thing. I think they notice you for doing the right thing. When I was in North Dakota and I was nominated, I never thought in a million years that they would come out to the frozen tundra of North Dakota and put out a nomination…. It’s a dedication not just to the kitchen but to the farmers and environment, of the food around you.”
Local Influence
Fischer took his current gig at Crystal Springs Resort in Hamburg and Vernon in January and since revamped the menu for Restaurant Latour to offer a concept of “upscale American cuisine with extremely local flair.” “Every single thing put on the plate is either from a garden that’s one of ours or it’s from a garden minutes away or from a person we met personally,” Fischer said. Crystal Springs Resort recently created a partnership with Green Valley Farms to start a farm that would produce food exclusively for the resort.
Fischer and his Sous chefs are at the farm constantly picking their own ingredients to create new dishes for the day. “You know most people go to the store to get their eggs but when they have to feed the chickens to get their eggs, it brings out a sense of ownership – a sense of pride,” Fischer said. “Knowing where the food comes from and being able to put your best foot forward is always good.”
Prepping The Next Generation
Cooking was apart of Fischer's life as a child and he has passed on his culinary love onto his nine year old son, Vince. "My son grew up eating foie gras as a baby. We didn’t buy any baby food we made it," Fischer said.
His wife Hadash is from the Philippines, which influences her cooking with her native flavors. With both parents loving food, Vince is immersed in cooking all the time. "He is my supermarket pal, he goes out to the gardens with us, we have a cooking class for kids at the resort where he is my Sous chef for that," Fischer said. "He has been immersed in it so long. Unfortunately life of chef is working 80 hours a week, but he gets to come in. When I make pizza, I wont make it since he will be the one throwing the dough around the kitchen and flour and putting all the stuff on it. He's even started baking. At nine years old, he is definitely advanced."
Television
Television media has played a role in making chefs a more respected icon. "It has been cool to become a chef in the last 10 years with some of the Gordon Ramsay things out there and Top Chef and on every network there is a culinary show," Fischer said. Fischer particularly likes Ramsay's show "Hell's Kitchen" on FOX.
"It can propel people who may not be at that sophistication level, these people get restaurants and restaurant gigs," Fischer said. "I think a lot of the people coming on the show are great, but they are not the Daniel Boulud or the Thomas Keller — the people I idolized growing up as chefs. It will be interesting to see who the next group of big guys will be after the Patrick O'Connells move on."
The biggest difference Fischer noticed was that more people were recognizing that the person in the chef whites was to be respected. "It's starting to bring middle America around," Fischer said. "It's not just the guy that cooks your food back there." A perfect example is Fischer's father.
"My father never thought it was a good idea (to become a chef)," Fischer said. "Even up to a few years ago he didn’t think it was a good idea. He wanted me to stick in Minnesota… I always thought it was a good idea. He always said to join the navy and see the world is how he always put it. And I went to culinary school to see the world."