Jean-Michel Boulot
Executive Chef, Housing and Food Services, University of Washington
Chef Jean-Michel Boulot started his professional culinary education as
an apprentice in a small restaurant close to his hometown in Normandy,
France. After graduation, he moved to Paris and began to learn from some
of the best chefs in that food capital. He spent about ten years progressing
from one establishment to another, from hotels to restaurants, large and
small, unknown to well-recognized, to gain a great depth and breadth of
experience. In 1986, he had the opportunity to move to Vancouver, Canada,
to help open a French restaurant for the Universal Exposition. This was
his first experience abroad, and he also was at the time waiting for a
U.S. visa. With the granting of his visa six months later, he moved
to San Francisco for the opening of a French hotel. Three years later,
he had the opportunity to move to Thailand for Hilton International, where
he assumed the position of Executive Sous Chef. He was in charge of all
special events, catering for the royal family and all state dinners organized
at the hotel, including dinner for the Emperor of Japan. Representing
Hilton International, he participated for two consecutive years in the
culinary Olympics in Singapore. He returned to America via Hawaii, where
he worked for a large convention hotel on the island of Oahu. A year later,
he was hired by Ritz-Carlton and moved to Palm Beach, Florida, as Executive
Sous Chef; a year later he transferred to the Phoenix Ritz-Carlton as
the Executive Chef. After three years, he was offered the opportunity
to revamp the dining facility of a private golf club, “Desert Island.”
Next, the Myriad Group, a high-end restaurant group from New York, asked
him to join their venture with Starwood Hotels. He was sent to New York
to assist in the opening of the first “W” hotel, then opened
the second in San Francisco and finally the third in Seattle. He is presently
at the University of Washington and has been instrumental in reworking
the process of feeding the University community by “de-institutionalizing
institutional food service.”