first... i should note i actually started cooking mostly as a part time job during school.

by 20 i had international experience and got my first sous chef job.

by 21 i had my first chef job, just a small place, promoted from within when chef quit. already tho at that point i had noticed the servers were going home with more money than i was, and they.

anyway at the end of my first year of being a chef i gave my notice because running the place was a shit show. i gave them 6 months notice, and trained my replacement.

for the last 8 months i was working double shifts basically every day, and hours over 40 were being banked to be paid later. this was sort of a horrible deal and i would know better than to take it now... but anyway, at the end i switched from my double majors to a sommelier cert. top of my class as a sommelier, competed in a national comp and came 4th after coming first regionally and provincially.

had a sommelier job waiting for me as soon as i graduated because while i was still in school i went to the top sommeliers in the city and offered to work for free as apprentice, got some good experience. more importantly tho, when the place across the street from one of the places i worked for free was opening, they asked for advice on who to hire and i was at the top of a resume list.

anyway.

i worked for years as a sommelier first there, then another place where i was head sommelier and the focus was wine education.

now i work part time consulting by contract helping people fix their failing restaurants.