From Cocaine to Cooking
Famed chef to give cooking tips, tell his story at Duke Jan. 4
Chef Jeff Henderson once had a specialty: cooking cocaine. He peddled crack in the ‘80s, earning up to $35,000 a week.
But federal prison introduced him to the culinary world, and now Henderson is an executive chef and best-selling memoirist.
He will talk about his life at 1 p.m. Friday, Jan. 4, in Reynolds Theater, and offer highlights from his recent New York Times best-selling memoir, Cooked: From the Streets to the Stove, from Cocaine to Foie Gras.
"As the steam burned and pruned my skin, as I looked around at my fellow inmates and compared this to my life as a high roller, I finally knew this was what America thought of me," Henderson writes in the memoir about working in the prison kitchen. "I was just a petty criminal. And worse. All the wrong s--- I did my whole life started to become painful.
"The kitchen made me face it head-on. It stopped me from pretending that I did nothing. I could no longer hide from it or ignore it. I had to move on, and eventually these thoughts drove me to want to be in the kitchen all the time."
The event is part of Duke Dining's campus culinary training and is open to the public.
"I've seen him, and he's unbelievable," said Jim Wulforst, director of Duke Dining, which is sponsoring the event with Bon Appetit, Duke's primary food service vendor. "He's a dynamic speaker who has been through it all, and he's doing something really good today."
When Henderson was released from prison, he started his culinary career as a dishwasher at a Los Angeles restaurant. He faced the stigma of an ex-con but persevered. In 2005, he became executive chef at Café Bellagio in Las Vegas. He's an award-winning chef, recognized for "posh urban cuisine" with Southern and California flair. Columbia Pictures has purchased the film rights to his story.
"This is an opportunity to bring in a celebrity chef as a mentor for folks to meet and greet and to set the stage for anyone in the audience to strive to be all they can be," Wulforst said.
For more about Henderson, visit www.chefjeffhenderson.com