Tucked away in the nooks and crannies of fine-dining kitchens, sous chefs often spend their days brainstorming new menu specials, ordering local produce and meats, managing numerous line cooks, and collaborating with executive chefs on multi-course dinners. Though their creative genius is instrumental to a restaurant's very livelihood, sous chefs are hardly ever recognized or praised for their individual talents.
Truth be told, though it is usually the executive chef of a restaurant that garners all of the media glory and customer praise, these top dogs are only a minor piece of the puzzle.
In an effort to shine a light upon these all-too-often-overlooked cooks, I reached out to a handful of sous chefs in Houston to delve into their culinary backgrounds. After speaking with a few of them, I'm surprised some of these chefs aren't already running their own four-star eateries.
As the city's food scene continues to evolve though, I expect we'll see remarkable work from all of them in the years to come.
Here are four local sous chefs worth keeping on your radar in 2013:
Greg Lowry, sous chef of Triniti Restaurant + Bar
Not many chefs get as picturesque of an entrance into cuisine as Greg Lowry, sous chef of Triniti Restaurant + Bar.
Raised in a close-knit Italian family, Lowry often witnessed his grandmother and aunts prepare authentic Italian feasts. "I'd see them in the kitchen with flour flying everywhere and pasta sauce going on the stove. They'd even have bed sheets on the back of the furniture so they could dry homemade pastas," he says.
"Quite honestly, I was burned out on pastry. It was a lot of stress and I felt like I had something else to offer the kitchen."
During his years of growing up in Houston, Lowry first tested out his culinary talents at the then-Kelly’s Del Frisco's Steak House as a food-runner. Though he didn't know it just yet, he was getting a glimpse into his future career.
"I didn't consider it as a long-term job at the time, but I admired the atmosphere, creativity, and energy the restaurant kitchen had," he says.
Upon graduating high school, Lowry enrolled at St. Edward's University before ultimately deciding college life wasn't suited for his creative disposition. "I really couldn't see where I fit into that world and I knew I needed something more fulfilling," he admits.
Fully committing himself to cuisine, Lowry attended the Culinary Institute LeNôtre to study French pastry and graduated as the valedictorian of his class. "I was probably out of my league when I first started working in pastry, but I committed myself to it," Lowry says.
Though he had a knack for creating delicious pastries, Lowry eventually grew tired of preparing breads and sweets by his mid-twenties. Instead, he set his sights on the savory side of things. "Quite honestly, I was burned out on pastry. It was a lot of stress and I felt like I had something else to offer the kitchen," he says.
Slowly but surely, Lowry honed his skills as a chef at restaurants like Max's Wine Dive and Mulberry in Austin before settling in at Hotel Icon's Voice as the executive chef. When the sous chef position at Triniti opened up, however, Lowry couldn't resist the opportunity to work with culinary powerhouse Ryan Hildebrand.
"He has been a great mentor to me and has helped me grow confident in my identity as a chef," Lowry says. "I love new techniques and reinventing classics, and that's what's been useful for me at Triniti. We aren't tied to one specific genre of food."
When Hildebrand opens his second restaurant Brande later this year, Lowry is expected to be promoted to executive chef of Triniti, and the sous chef couldn't be more excited about the opportunity.
"There are some amazing things over the horizon for Triniti," he says.
Page Pressley, sous chef of Uchi Houston (now chef de cuisine of Uchiko)
Page Pressley learned how to cook the way many respectable chefs do in this day and age: through the use of public broadcasting. “My mom didn’t have a lot of time to cook for me, so I’d sit around watching old Julia Child videos on PBS when I was a kid,” Pressley says.
Similar to Lowry, Pressley tried his hand at college before ultimately realizing his true passion lay with cuisine. After leaving university, Pressley started from the bottom — washing dishes and breaking down proteins at a small Santa Fe restaurant. Though the work was hard and the hours long, the chef felt right at home.
"I think being able to communicate effectively with both your kitchen and your diners is crucial to being successful in this industry.”
“I jumped headfirst into my job,” he says. “I stayed there for a year and a half before going to the Culinary Institute of America.”
Graduating from the prestigious culinary New York school, Pressley returned to Santa Fe and worked as a line cook and later a sous chef at Trattoria Nostrani for a year.
He then made his way to Texas to dive into Austin’s exciting culinary revolution only to find the recession made it nearly impossible to land his ideal job. The young chef ultimately settled on a kitchen position at the Marriott Hotel and later at The Westin Austin at the Domain as a sous chef.
“It was actually a blessing in disguise," he admits. "I got to work in the kitchen but also be up front with the customers. I think being able to communicate effectively with both your kitchen and your diners is crucial to being successful in this industry.”
After working as the executive sous chef at Soleil for more than a year, Pressley eventually received an unexpected call from Philip Speer, culinary director of Uchi, who had stumbled upon Pressley’s resume while sifting through a stack of Uchi applications.
“We talked for 45 minutes, and I didn’t even know what the job was for. That didn't really matter though,” Pressley says. “All I knew was that I wanted to be a part of whatever Uchi was doing. There were 10 to 15 applicants for the job, and they ended up taking a chance on me.”
When he was hired on at Uchi Austin, Pressley knew that there was some discussion of sending him to Uchi Houston, and three months after he started working, the Uchi team offered him the sous chef position at the new restaurant.
Pressley applauds Kaz Edwards, chef de cuisine of Uchi Houston, for propelling the restaurant to such popularity and fame in a short span of time. “I think the best decision they could have made was making Kaz the chef de cuisine. He’s emotionally invested in this company, and it shows," he says.
Presley also credits Tyson Cole, executive chef/owner of Uchi, for inspiring him to push his creativity to lengths he never thought possible. “Tyson is an artist in the purest sense of the word,” Pressley says.
Towards the end of our interview, Pressley hinted that he might be changing positions at Uchi soon, and just a day after our talk, Philip Speer confirmed rumors that Pressley would be taking over Tim Dornon’s former position as chef de cuisine of Uchiko in Austin.
Jean-Philippe Gaston, sous chef of Haven
After his father passed away when he was a child, Jean-Philippe Gaston, sous chef of Haven, began preparing homemade meals for both himself and his mother.
“I’ve been blessed to be around great cooks all my life," Gaston says. "I have a strong European and Latin background, so I’m convinced food is in my blood. When my father passed away, I learned how to take care of myself, and cooking was a big part of that process.”
"I have a strong European and Latin background, so I’m convinced food is in my blood. When my father passed away, I learned how to take care of myself, and cooking was a big part of that process.”
During his college days at the University of Texas at Austin, Gaston began working in restaurants around town to pay his bills and quickly discovered how invigorated he felt in the kitchen.
"I have a strong European and Latin background, so I’m convinced food is in my blood. When my father passed away, I learned how to take care of myself, and cooking was a big part of that process.”
"I realized how easy it was to grow in this industry," he says. "I bought my first set of knives and worked my way up. It's not hard to prove yourself in the kitchen; you just have to be willing to put forth the work."
Gaston enrolled in Austin's Le Cordon Bleu program, finished his degree at UT, and set out to mold his identity as a well-traveled, acclaimed chef. After years of traveling to Europe, Asia, and South America and working in renowned restaurants like Le Crillon, Gaston settled into the evolving, diverse Houston culinary scene.
Through the years, he has worked in numerous Houston restaurants, including Noe in the Omni Hotel, Kata Robata, and Reef before finally joining Randy Evans' award-winning Haven in 2011.
"I've never worked in a farm-to-table restaurant quite like this before. It's amazing to see these whole pigs and whole cows come through the door and have the opportunity to break them down from start to finish," Gaston says. "Working with Randy has been an amazing opportunity. He has helped me become a better, more creative chef.
"I've learned so much about Southern cooking and butchery through him."
In 2011, Gaston won the Up-and-Coming Chef of the Year Award at the Houston Culinary Awards, and in late 2012, Gaston opened the highly anticipated Cove, a raw bar restaurant inside of Haven.
"Not a lot of people get to experience designing a restaurant from start to finish. I'm really proud I got to do that with Cove," Gaston says. "I'm making the food that I want to make, and the support I've felt from diners and fellow chefs in town is something I could have never expected."
Ryan Lachaine, sous chef of Underbelly
Unlike the rest of the chefs on our list, Ryan Lachaine, sous chef of Underbelly, didn't pursue professional cooking until his early thirties. In fact, Lachaine was going to business school at the University of Houston and coaching hockey before realizing what he really wanted to do was cook.
"I always had an interest in food, but I don't have the story that every other chef has. My grandparents didn't have a farm, and I didn't have to teach myself how to cook when I was a kid," he says. "I always appreciated food though and realized I wanted to see how far I could go with it."
"My grandparents didn't have a farm, and I didn't have to teach myself how to cook when I was a kid."
After graduating from the Art Institute of Houston in 2009, Lachaine began working as a line cook at several famed Houston eateries, including Gravitas, Stella Sola and Reef before deciding to spend time staging at various restaurants around the country. Under the guidance of chefs like Sean Brock, Donald Link, and Daniel Patterson, Lachaine worked in some of the most admired restaurants in the nation, including Husk in Charleston, both Cochon and Herbsaint in New Orleans, and Coi in San Francisco.
"I knew it was important to learn about what was going on in the rest of the country in terms of food," Lachaine says. "Houston had a lot to offer me, but I became a much more confident chef because of my experience in those different kitchens."
The birth of his twin boys brought him back home to Houston, and though he didn't know it just yet, Lachaine was about to receive the opportunity to join Chris Shepherd, chef/owner of Underbelly, in one of 2012's most acclaimed new restaurants as a sous chef.
"I met Chris and realized what an incredibly gifted chef he was," Lachaine says. "What people don't know about him though is that he is an even more amazing human being, and that's saying quite a lot. He's really invested in what we're creating here at the restaurant."
Lachaine emphasizes he is still evolving as a chef and that even though he aspires to one day have his own restaurant, he is perfectly content with sticking around at Underbelly for the time being. And can you really blame him?
"It's been a crazy 10 months since we opened here, and I'm still trying to wrap my brain around it all," he says. "It'd be nice to eventually have my own restaurant, but there is still a lot I have to learn before I make a move like that."
Who else belongs in this story? Let us know your favorite sous chefs in town by leaving a comment below!
Ryan Lachaine of Underbelly
