Chef's Table at The Ecology Center

Featuring Executive Chef Chris Gentile

Friday, Sept 9th, 2022


Event Cost: SOLD OUT

An edible conversation between a farm, a chef, and the community.
We are delighted to welcome Community Table back for 2022. This beloved event brings a renowned chef to our farm to design an ecological meal around our four seasonal rotations (market garden, milpa, berries, cover crops). By bringing these culinary artists back to the source, we give them an opportunity to connect with new ingredients, find fresh inspiration in our bioregion’s historic foodways, and discover the rewards of relationship with the land.

CHEF CHRIS GENTILE

Gentile has been a boy wonder for much of his cooking career, which began in early childhood when he made raviolis with his Italian father every Christmas Eve. He joined the kitchen team at the Inn on Biltmore Estate in Asheville, N.C., at 17, and two years later was promoted to sous chef, making him the youngest chef ever hired at the famed restaurant. Chris staged around the country at four Michelin-starred restaurants, including Thomas Keller’s French-American cafe Per Se in New York and Grant Achatz’s molecular gastronomy mecca, Alinea, in Chicago. Finally he landed in his dream city of San Diego, where he landed a job at Searsucker and was promoted from line cook to sous chef in just one month. At age 20, he was named executive chef at Gabardine. Then he worked at L’Auberge Del Mar’s Kitchen 1540 and La Jolla’s Nine-Ten before being appointed opening executive chef at Double Standard Kitchenetta in the Gaslamp Quarter at age 24.

Chef Chris is now leading the new restaurant at world-acclaimed Rancho Valencia Resort.