Home-Cooked Cuisine

After Tafoya scrubs the kitchen and tosses a bulging trash bag, no marks of his fragrant culinary journey exist beyond a fridge full of dinners and the upcoming week's menu left on the table.

Convenience Food

Beth Dominguez, who had employed chefs while vacationing before signing up for the service at home, resisted at first when her banker husband suggested it as a way to free up her time amid raising three children.

"At first I took it as kind of a cut, like, 'Oh, he doesn't like my cooking,'" she says. "But I saw I was in a culinary rut. I was doing the same things over and over again, and I didn't have time to find new recipes and do the shopping and all those steps."

While Dominguez had trepidations about letting a stranger into her kitchen, the lengthy initial consultation set her at ease.

Going through four pages of meats, herbs, spices and every other imaginable ingredient, the entire family created a playbook for what would -- and wouldn't -- touch down on the dinner table.

Still, the sight of her kitchen converted into a professional line posed a shock.

"It was covered," she says. "He was just so busy in there, completing a week's worth of food in a few hours. I'm used to that now, but at first, I [thought], 'Oh, my God. I think I'm just going to find something else to do right now.'"

Now five months into the service, Dominguez has found she's not only eating healthier food tailored to her tastes, but she's saving as much as $100 a week that had been devoured by takeout orders -- not to mention her kids can eat their favorite dish whenever they want: steamed artichokes, of all things.

Hard-Boiled Advice

Because anyone with a set of chef's knives can purport to be a professional, a good match requires some careful consideration.

Wallace says certification of safe food handling is imperative, whether it's through the National Restaurant Association's ServSafe program or another course mandated by your local government. Every personal chef should be able to provide documentation for this.

	Five-Star Food at Home

Any professional coming into your home should also carry insurance, whether it's purchased by the chef or falls under the umbrella of a professional organization. APPCA members, for example, carry $2 million in general liability coverage.

"That's peace of mind for the client and the chef," Wallace says. "You don't want to walk into the client's house carrying a food case and knock over that family-favorite Ming vase."

Beyond physical and financial security, much of choosing a chef falls to personal needs and chemistry.

Bryan Davis, a personal chef and high-end caterer working in and around Washington, D.C., says communication is the key ingredient to the whole process, from choosing a chef to tweaking the service over the years.

"When I first started out," Davis says, "I was very adamant that after each cook date my clients send me an email about the meals. Now ... they don't pick menus anymore; they just get what I decide to make them. It took a lot of communication in the beginning, but now I know how each different client likes to eat. That's what they pay me for."

---

Enjoy the Good Life? Email us with what you'd like to see in future articles.