In a trade where experience, skill, and luck seem to play equal parts in your success, San Francisco’s youngest executive chef is an outlier. But when 22-year-old Thomas Martinez landed the top spot in the kitchen at Mission Beach Cafe, he didn’t let a silly thing like age stop him from taking the job.
While a series of lucky breaks and fortunate connections have paid off for Martinez during his burgeoning career, he credits his early success to hard work, natural curiosity, and more hard work. The young chef, who has put in time in some of the city’s top kitchens including Greens Restaurant, Aziza, and Roots, as well as the Ferry Building Farmers Market, regularly works 12-hour days, and has put in months of free labor.
Martinez started at Mission Beach in 2007. Before long he was helping develop menus, and when then-chef Nick Dickinson took time off to tend to a new baby, Martinez ran the show temporarily. Last spring, Dickinson left for good, and Martinez took the helm for a few months before burning out and going to work as a private chef. He found that boring, though, so when his replacement, Top Chef’s Ryan Scott, left in November, Martinez came back.
We caught up with Martinez on the phone to ask about his early training, his current job, and what it’s like to be the boss of people older than you.
What was your first restaurant job?
I Started working at Jersey’s Pizza in my hometown [of Redlands]. I worked there for about six months. Started as a dishwasher, and busted my balls to get making pizzas and salads… I was 18.
What was your early training like?
Shortly after starting school (California Culinary Academy right after high school) I got a job at Soluna Cafe. My roommate was working there. It was three blocks away from school and the chef told me the only way I’d get hired is if I worked for him for three months for free. It was a rough time. The guy wasn’t that nice but he wanted to teach me. But it was worth it because when I was in school there was no push. It was like, “you’re here to learn this so take your time.” At work it was like, “you don’t know how to do this?!?” It’s like I got extra schooling while I was in school.
Rabbit Pot Pie, one of Martinez’s original dishes at Mission Beach
What happened after school?
I couldn’t take it there anymore so I went to work for Annie Somerville at Greens. She asked if I could work for free for three months as well. So I did that again, which was actually really nice because I didn’t feel like I had to be there at a certain time or if I wanted to stay longer I could..
I wasn’t making any money so I was like, I don’t know how much longer I can last working for you guys for free. Annie knows a lot of people at the Ferry Building farmer’s market, [where] I got a job at Heirloom Organics.
I learned a lot about produce. How it’s grown in certain ways, what the product looks like before you break it down, what certain things taste like raw. I got to trade with people. It got me acclimated to what northern ca food is all about when it comes to fresh and local.
What was your role at Aziza?
[Aziza Chef] Mourad [Lahlou] was buying produce all the time. This girl I had worked with at Greens had gotten a job at the restaurant he owns. He offered me a job… He really pushed me to learn how to order for my station, make sure my station was prepped all by myself. I had to start every day at 11 or 12 and stay until 12 at night. He really did push me to make menu items, just because I had all this knowledge of food… It really drove my creativity.
So how did you wind up at Mission Beach?
I found the job because my roommate and Nick had worked at cortez together.. I got the offer, so I went in there and I realized how close it was to my house. I thought, this sounds awesome, even if it was just to cook on the line. There was another chef there who just walked out, so nick asked me to be the sous chef within a week of being there.
Are you the boss of anybody older than you?
Oh yeah
Is that awkward?
I’ve known a lot of them for a long time. A lot of it has to do with being respectful, especially of people older than you. But I’ve been in situations early on in being a chef where I learned how to act around people who are your peers and who you’re responsible for.
Whenever something comes up I reserve some time to discuss it in a civil manner so it’s not like oh, you’re being a young punk… which I’ve noticed works better than screaming down someone’s throat.
[All photos by Chris Andre]
