FORMER Chef Jerry Traunfeld
Jerry traunfeld, former Herbfarm chef, plans to open a restaurant in Seattle in 2008.
Jerry grew up in Maryland. By the age of 12 he was tending vegetables as well as turning puff pastry.After college in the Northwest, Jerry moved to San Francisco and attended the California Culinary Academy, graduating in 1983.
Following several kitchen stints in San Francisco, including the venerable Ernie’s and the opening year of Stars, Jerry moved back to Seattle where he became Executive Chef of the Alexis Hotel. In 1990, Ron and Carrie tapped him to take over (from Ron) as the chef of a tiny restaurant serving luncheons in a converted garage on the grounds of a working herb nursery, The Herbfarm.
In the ensuing years, the restaurant continued to garner national acclaim as a premier dining destination. The Herbfarm was voted one of the top-ten restaurants in the United States in the 2007 Zagat Survey and is a Gayot’s Top 40 U.S. Restaurants. It is the only AAA 5-Diamond restaurant in the Northwest.
When Jerry was chef, The Herbfarm was featured in The New York Times Magazine, Food & Wine, Bon Appetit, Gourmet, Fortune, and many other publications. He appeared on Martha Stewart Living, Better Homes and Gardens Television and The Food Network, and was regular guest on Public Radio’s The Splendid Table. In 2000 Jerry won the James Beard Award for Best American Chef of the Northwest. His first book The Herbfarm Cookbook won an IACP award in 2000, and his second book, The Herbal Kitchen, was named one of the best cookbooks of the year by Food & Wine.
Executive Chef Keith Luce
Keith Luce took the helm as The Herbfarm's executive chef on October 1, 2007. During the entire month of October, Chef Luce worked with former chef Jerry Traunfeld.
Executive Chef Luce grew up on a farm on eastern Long Island, New York. As a youngster he worked in his grandfather's Italian restaurant in the Hamptons. Luce trained in New York at the Rainbow Room, Le Cirque, and La Côte Basque, getting A-list tutorials from the incomparable pastry chef, Jacques Torres, and the dynamic Jean-Jacques Rachou. He then spent two years in Europe, training at the top Michelin-stared restaurants in France and Italy.
Back in the states, Keith spent a year working closely with chef Walter Schieb at the Greenbrier Resort in White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia. Based on that experience, chef Luce was tapped by the White House as sous chef to the President of the United States during the first Clinton administration.
In 1997, Food & Wine chose Luce as one of America’s “Top 10 Chefs.” A year later, as the opening chef of the fabled Chicago restaurant, Spruce, the James Beard Foundation named him “Rising Star Chef of the Year.”
Keith then moved to the Rockies to serve as executive chef at the 5-Diamond Relais & Châteaux Little Nell in Aspen. In 1999, he furthered his experience as executive chef at PlumpJack, overseeing their restaurants across California.
After two years in the Bay Area, Luce—still just 33 despite his long résumé—opened Merenda in San Francisco. At Merenda, the pasta dishes were “beyond compare,” according to Michael Bauer, food critic of San Francisco magazine, who also enjoyed “one of the most satisfying soups” he’d ever eaten. As John Mariani stated in Esquire, “What sets Luce apart is the exceptional finesse with which he brings off his creations.”
