When I want to kick it up, I like to add hardwood chips or chunks to the grill; it adds bold smoky flavors. The most common woods are hickory and mesquite, but you can find alder, apple, cherry and, my personal favorite, pecan.

My favorite Aspen memory is saving an upside-down cake that had exploded from the high altitude.

It's okay to play with your food.

Food that's beautiful to look at seems to taste better than food that isn't.

I've been very fortunate, because I've cooked for a lot of actors and actresses and musicians. I've cooked for presidents and I've been to the White House.

The world has changed, and it's almost been 11 years. I have 975 employees. I have six restaurants. We haven't opened any new ones in almost three years.

My inspiration was my mom. She's a great cook, and she still cooks, and we still banter back and forth about cooking. Growing up in a mostly Portuguese community, food was important and the family table was extremely important. At a very young age I understood that.