By the time he was twenty-seven years old, Kwame Onwuachi (winner of the 2019 James Beard Foundation Award for Rising Star Chef of the Year) had opened--and closed--one of the most talked about restaurants in America. He had launched his own catering company with twenty thousand dollars that he made from selling candy on the subway, yet he'd been told he would never make it on television because his cooking wasn't "Southern" enough. In this inspiring memoir about the intersection of race, fame, and food, he shares the remarkable story of his culinary coming-of-age.

Growing up in the Bronx, as a boy Onwuachi was sent to rural Nigeria by his mother to "learn respect." However, the hard-won knowledge gained in Africa was not enough to keep him from the temptation and easy money of the streets when he returned home. But through food, he broke out of a dangerous downward spiral, embarking on a new beginning at the bottom of the culinary food chain as a chef on board a Deepwater Horizon cleanup ship, before going on to train in the kitchens of some of the most acclaimed restaurants in the country and appearing as a contestant on Top Chef.

Onwuachi's love of food and cooking remained a constant throughout, even when he found the road to success riddled with potholes. As a young chef, he was forced to grapple with just how unwelcoming the world of fine dining can be for people of color, and his first restaurant, the culmination of years of planning, shuttered just months after opening. A powerful, heartfelt, and shockingly honest story of chasing your dreams--even when they don't turn out as you expected--Notes from a Young Black Chef is one man's pursuit of his passions, despite the odds.

"This is an astonishing and open-hearted story from one of the next generation's stars of the culinary world. I am so excited to see what the future holds for Chef Kwame--he is a phoenix, rising into better and better things and showing us all what it means to be humble, hungry, and daring." --José Andrés

Other cookbooks by this author

• All Hours: Crazy Good Food for Whatever, Whenever
• All Hours: Crazy Good Food for Whatever, Whenever
• Il Buco: Stories and Recipes
• Can I Eat That?
• Cooking for Your Kids: At Home with the World's Greatest Chefs
• Dad, What's for Dinner?: Lifesaving Recipes to Avoid Meltdowns, Have Fun in the Kitchen, and Keep Your Kids Well Fed: A Cookbook
• Dad, What's For Dinner?: Lifesaving Recipes to Avoid Meltdowns, Have Fun in the Kitchen, and Keep Your Kids Well Fed
• Food & Beer
• Global Epicurean
• My America: Recipes from a Young Black Chef
• My America: Recipes from a Young Black Chef
• The Nom Wah Cookbook: Recipes and Stories from 100 Years at New York City's Iconic Dim Sum Restaurant
• Notes from a Young Black Chef: A Memoir
• Notes from a Young Black Chef: A Memoir
• The Official Stranger Things Cookbook: Recipes from Hawkins and Beyond
• Russ & Daughters: 100 Years of Appetizing
• Vino: The Essential Guide to Real Italian Wine
• What's Cooking?