Sunday, September 14, 2008

C.E.C.




I just recently attained my certification through the ACF (American Culinary Federation) as a C.E.C. (Certified Executive Chef). I never thought much about continuing my education through this organization until I recently started working in Colorado. During culinary school, Iwas involved in numerous cooking competitons and felt mesmerized by the following of chefs towards the ACF. As I furthered my career, I lost interest in the organization and felt like there was nothing worth pursuing unless I wanted to become a teacher or trade show chef. About six months ago I got the urge to start my certification and wonder if I could take on the challenge of completing all the qualifications. I started out with a 3 hour cooking exam that required me to prepare a 3 course meal with mandatory ingredients, cooking techniques, and specific knife skills. I passed this part with a 89% and felt good about the grade. The next part was taking a written exam of 100 questions in 1 hour and passing with at least a 70%. I got an 84% and only took 14 minutes to finish the test, maybe I should have slowed down to actually read the ones I missed. Next was attaining 150 hours of industry related involvement and verifying my work history as a Chef De Cuisine/Executive Sous Chef. Finally I had to pass three 30 hour courses in Nutrition, Sanitation, and Management. Now that I have this certification it adds to my reportoire of accomplishments for future endeavors. I'm not sure if I will pursue the next step towards becoming a C.M.C. (Certified Master Chef). Less than 100 hundred chefs have passed this 8 Day Exam since it originated in 1981. As for now, I will continue to further my knowledge in this business and strive to continue challenging myself. If your interested in the ACF, please check out the new website, http://www.acfchefs.org/

3 comments:

MatthewS119 said...

Congratulations Brother. Hows is the menu for the James Beard House coming along?

Jackie said...

I am very proud of you, as usual. Congratulations on your achievement!

Andrew said...

Congratulations on this outstanding acchievement. You will continue to grow in the cooking field as you are creative, focused, and devoted to cooking. Keep up the good work. I always knew you were a great cheif and became even more impressed when you had me eat crab cakes, which I love, with guacomole and I had no idea the crab cakes were prepared with guacomole. As you know I had refused to taste it before. The crab cakes were outstanding.