Last week I got a lovely email from Stuart at WannaBeTVChef.com asking to do an interview in anticipation of the premiere of Private Chefs of Beverly Hills on April 9th. It was only my third time as an interviewee and, I have to say, I really dig the way it turned out.Thank you, Stuart!
WannaBeTVChef.com:
http://wannabetvchef.com/blog/?p=995
7 Questions with Beverly Hills Chef Sasha Perl-Raver
Posted by: Stuart
7 Questions is a series of interviews with the culinary movers and shakers you want or ought to know better.
On Friday April 9th Food Network premieres one of it’s most highly anticipated and hyped series in quite some time. Taking a cue from Bravo’s Real House Wives franchise they have developed Private Chefs of Beverly Hills – an inside look at Tinsel Town shindigs from the point of view of the culinary teams that put them together.
At age 16 Sasha Perl-Raver started her own catering business. Since then she has graduated from USC with a minor in cinema, guest starred on the Lifetime drama Strong Medicine, was crowned Miss San Francisco, baked Lindsay Lohan’s 18th birthday cupcakes, been a senior writer for a Hollywood gossip web site and been named “funniest in LA” by a newspaper in New York. Designer Randolph Duke once called Sasha a chubbier Angelina Jolie. A year from now people might be referring to Jolie as an emaciated Sasha Perl-Raver.
Today Sasha combines show business and the culinary arts as a member of the team at Big City Chefs. Big City is a private chef operation that caters to the whims of demanding and eclectic stars. It is also the subject of Food Network’s latest venture into reality programming.
Chef Sasha was nice enough to answer 7 Questions:
1. How old were you when you first started to cook?
Sasha: I took my first foray into cooking when I was 7. I was latchkey kid in Manhattan who took the bus home from school. My bus stop was in front of this amazing pizza parlor and it always smelled insanely good but I only had enough money for the bus, not a snack. So I would go home and make pizza from scratch. I made the dough, the sauce, everything. I got all kinds of Wolfgang Puck! Those early pizzas were usually unbelievably delicious, but one time my dad cracked a tooth on the crust. You live and learn.
2. When did you decide that you could make food your career?
Sasha: I was 16 when I graduated from high school and I didn’t have any marketable skills except my obsession with food. I’d been in charge of Thanksgiving dinner since I was 11, read cookbooks out loud constantly to my parents, fixated on things like how to make roasted garlic flan. A family friend who’d eaten my food for years offered me a job as her personal chef. Word of mouth spread really quickly about this 16 year old wunderkind and soon I had a roster of clients and my obsession became my profession.
3. Which chefs have influenced you the most?
Sasha: Alice Waters is my road dawg! I love her more than words can say and my food philosophy is entirely based on hers. And who doesn’t bow at the feet of Thomas Keller? When I was a kid, I was all about The Frugal Gourmet, Martin Yan and Two Hot Tamales. Nowadays, I would do just about anything to sit down at a table with Rick Bayless, but mainly because I have a big ol’ crush on him.
4. If you hadn’t followed this career path, what other career could you see yourself in?
Sasha: Well, I always really wanted to be a dancer but I fear that will never happen. The truth is my passions have always been food, film and writing and I’ve been lucky enough to work in all those fields whether it’s been cooking for or interviewing celebrities, writing film and food reviews or doing this show. But I still think it would be pretty rad to be a ballerina.
5. What’s the highlight of your career so far?
Sasha: Being on “Private Chefs of Beverly Hills” is pretty major and up at the top but I think it was actually a party I catered a few years ago. With less than 36 hours notice, I catered the US Weekly Young Hot Hollywood Party for 1500 people. I did all the prep alone, had just two line cooks to help me out the night of, slept maybe two hours before the party, there were reporters there from every major entertainment news organization and the whole place was VIP.
About two hours into the party, my boss comes in and kisses me on the face because everyone was so thrilled with the food. I walk out of the kitchen and there’s Jessica Alba eating my tuna tartar and Justin Timberlake stuffing a piece of my cotton candy into his mouth. As my mother would say, I was kvelling.
6. Of all the crazy things you’ve seen at Big City Chefs what’s the craziest?
Sasha: The cast. I kid, I kid!
Every time we do an event, it’s pretty nuts but I have to say, the event Chef Brian Hill and I did, which I believe is in the first episode, was completely insane.
We had to go “Glamping,” which is glamorous camping, and cook a gourmet meal for these millionaires. First of all, I hate camping! My parents are major hippies and took me camping all the time when I was a kid. Don’t get me wrong, I love nature. I just don’t like cooking, sleeping and showering in nature. I haven’t gone camping in years but, there we were, at this beautiful camp site, just off a lake, so picturesque, but all we had was a spigot and a fire pit. No fire, no burners, no oven, no warm water, no prep area; just logs and really high expectations. It was madness.
7. What’s next for Chef Sasha?
Sasha: For about a year and a half I’ve been working on my first book, Hungry for Love. It’s a foodoir (part memoir, part food book), and my agent is sending it out to publishers on Wednesday so I’ve got my fingers majorly crossed for that. Big money, no whammies! And, of course I’m very excited for Private Chefs of Beverly Hills to premiere on April 9th. I’ve dreamed of being on Food Network for as long as I’ve known about it and now I can say that Paula Deen, Tyler Florence and I are one big happy family.
Private Chefs of Beverly Hills airs Fridays at 10p/9c on the Food Network.
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