Hi All,

Have been eating lots of raw these past few years and have decided to study
to become a raw food chef/educator etc. I have researched quite a few companies
who offer these courses. Does anybody know if there are courses which are recognised above others in the raw chef world? I am Irish but am willing to travel anywhere to get the proper, certified, recognised training. There seem to be a few good ones in the US doing seemingly good courses. Has anyone any experience.
Hope to hear from you.

P

Look into these if you haven't already:

Cherie Soria's Living Light culinary institute:

[rawfoodchef.com]

Matthew Kenney Academy (he is a noted raw food chef):

[matthewkenneycuisine.com]

While not a raw chef culinary school, the Natural Gourmet Institute is excellent:

[www.naturalgourmetschool.com]

A friend of mine attended Natural Gourmet. It was a very good program, she said, and she interned at Greens (famous San Francisco vegetarian restaurant).

Make sure the program you select has some rigor--not some weekend "raw chef certification" thing. You should learn food handling, knife skills, plating, budgeting, and a slew of other things.

Something to think about--some raw food restaurant owners have said that they would rather hire someone with restaurant experience of any kind and train them to make raw food than hire someone with a raw chef certification with no restaurant experience. Restaurant work is really tough--very long hours, on your feet the whole time, very high stress, and paper-thin profit margins. Experience is really important. In Sarma Melngailis' book Living Raw Foods, she says this, and I have seen at least one other raw restaurant owner say the same thing.

Hope this helps. Best of luck in finding a program that fits your needs.