Scars of a Chef by Rick Tramonto with Lisa Jackson

Growing up, I think everyone thinks how they were raised is normal and just like how everyone else was raised, until they find out differently. Growing up, I thought every married couple had a water bed and that every family ate the same things we did, until I started seeing how other people lived. Rick Tramonto thought that everyone’s parents fought like his did. He thought that every family was like his big Italian extended family always eating together, until he saw differently.

Scars of a Chef is the memoirs of Chef Rick Tramonto. Growing up in an Italian family, experiencing the death of his grandfather at a young age, getting into drugs, seeing his father jailed for several offenses, being kicked out of schools and eventually dropping out of school all lead Tramonto down the unlikely path of becoming a chef. Having gained his culinary knowledge from experience, not from the classroom, but from the kitchen. He started working at Wendy’s in Rochester, NY and moved up from there, gaining more experience first in Rochester, then in NYC, Chicago, and England.

THis memoir is an easy read that is real, honest, and refreshing. Any food lover will enjoy reading about Tramonto’s experiences in the various kitchens as well as learn a few things themselves. As a bonus, the end of each chapter contains a mouth-watering recipe. The culinary world is a high stress and high energy environment, but just because you are a Christian, that does not mean your troubles stop. You do, however, have a different resource to handle them.


I received the galley of this book to review from Net Galley. www.netgalley.com