Perry Hoffman is just into his 30s, but he's been executive chef of Napa Valley's only winery fine-dining establishment for six years and a rising star in what makes California cuisine and Napa Valley unique.
He was hired at Domaine Chandon's Étoile restaurant as a sous chef seven years ago and was promoted to executive chef a year later. He helped oversee a change in direction for the Yountville restaurant. As executive chef and restaurant general manager, he oversees a staff of 70, including 20 in the kitchen and 37 in the front, who serve more than 40,000 patrons annually.
Napa Valley wine and fine cuisine are virtually in his blood. A grandfather on his father's side was a winemaker at Christian Brothers, and grandparents Don and Sally Schmitt started French Laundry, where he started learning kitchen chops at a very young age.
Mr. Hoffman is set to be on a panel of young wine industry innovators at the Impact Napa Conference on Thursday. The Journal asked him how his long history in the wine's sister industry is shaping the culture of the valley.How deep are your roots in Napa Valley?
MR. HOFFMAN: I was born and raised in Napa. I was really lucky and blessed to be born into family with culinary senses. My grandmother Sally Schmitt sold the French Laundry to Thomas Keller. His house is my grandmother's old house. My mother was a waitress in the restaurant. It wasn’t the place with worldwide attention Keller had made it now.
Instead of preschool I was brought to work. At ages 4--6, I was working. My first paying job was vacuuming the floor at 3 in the morning at age 5. My grandmother came into the kitchen at 9, and she started me out at age 5 doing simple prep tasks like roasting bell peppers. The restaurant was sold in 1992, and Keller reopened it in 1994.
At age 13--14 I had thought about my past in cooking with my grandmother and decided what I wanted to do in life. At 15 with a work permit, I got a job at a neighborhood restaurant in Napa on the first day they opened, and for the next three years I got yelled at. That was my culinary school. Everyone there was in theirs 20s to 40s, but they showed me how to hold a ladle at the table at service.
Then I moved to Boonville. My parents bought 45 acres with 42 types of apples grown there. I my uncle Johnny's sous chef for a year at the Anderson Inn, and he taught me how to cook from a garden. It forced me to instead of working from a produce list to work with what's in season. I learned to cook there, to be creative by arguing with myself.
I took the next big step by working in a large, big-volume operation, with a pool bar, lobby bar, room service and banquet service. At the Santi restaurant at the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn I was a sous chef for three years.
One day in 2005 Auberge du Soleil chef Robert Curry called, and I knew I wanted to do something else. I tried out by cooking Robert a five-course meal. I was so nervous because I hold it at the high end of restaurants. I realized that everything I thought I knew in the previous seven years was wrong. The standards were very classic French. I learned the right way to do things and leadership from him and his 60 cooks. In summer that place is so busy with service after service. That was my real culinary school. I was hired when I was 19 as a sous chef and was the youngest person in the kitchen.
Something I was told when I first started cooking is that every place you move to should be better than the last. After two years I figured I had learned all I could from Robert.What have you brought to Domaine Chandon?
MR. HOFFMAN: Domain Chandon was among the original fine-dining restaurants in Napa Valley. My grandfather was mayor of Yountville for 20 years, and part of that time involved allowing Domaine Chandon to build such a large production winery in the middle of Yountville. I wanted to come here because of history of the company and winery.
For about the first two decades, it was Philippe Jeanty's restaurant at Domaine Chandon and served very classic French food. Everyone knew what he was doing and that it was open seven days a week. After he left, there were eight different executive chefs and five CEOs.
The restaurant was originally built to promote sparkling wines through a food-and-wine experience. I saw that Chandon had lost its way and the general public didn't know what was the style of service and when it woul
