Perfect thank you! Here’s a first-person chef story from Bina Stazya, an American professional chef, written in a warm, engaging voice suitable for her “About Me” page:

My name is Bina Stazya, and if you’ve ever had a meal that made you stop mid-bite just to close your eyes and feel every ounce of flavor well, that’s exactly the kind of moment I live to create. I’m 38 years old, born and raised in Asheville, North Carolina, but I’ve cooked my way across kitchens in Portland, Charleston, Chicago, and a few beautiful chaos-filled months in Naples, Italy that I still dream about. Food has always been my language, my art, and sometimes, my therapy.

I come from a family that wasn’t particularly culinary think a lot of microwave dinners and grocery-store rotisserie chickens—but somehow I was the weird kid begging to make her own béchamel sauce at twelve. I remember watching Julia Child reruns while my friends were into cartoons. I’d mimic her voice as I stirred boxed mac and cheese, pretending I had a studio audience in my mom’s tiny kitchen. By the time I was sixteen, I had turned my first job at a local diner into a kind of informal apprenticeship, pestering the line cooks with questions, watching how they moved, copied how they tasted.

I graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, class of ’09, with a fire in my chest and the kind of confidence you only get from long hours on your feet and honest feedback from chefs who don’t sugarcoat. I’ve since worked in a range of kitchens from high-end farm-to-table establishments to no-frills, get-it-done joints where flavor mattered more than flair. And honestly? I needed both. The polish and the grit.

My style leans toward elevated rustic: I like food that feels rooted and soulful but with a twist that makes you smile when you taste it. I’m big on seasonal ingredients, nose-to-tail cooking, and fermentation anything that honors time and transformation. I’ve burned more sourdoughs than I’d like to admit, overreduced enough sauces to make a demi-glace cry, but every mistake sharpened my instincts. My hands remember what my mind forgets.

These days, I’m based in Minneapolis, where I co-own a restaurant that lives somewhere between a neighborhood favorite and a secret chef’s hangout. I train young cooks with the same patience (and occasional tough love) I once received. Mentorship matters to me. So does curiosity. I’m the type to sit down after service with a book about koji or Levantine spice history, then test it out on the specials board the next day. Some nights it’s a hit; other nights, it’s a lesson. Either way, we grow.

To my fellow chefs out there: keep experimenting. Cook ugly sometimes. Taste until it surprises you. And above all remember that behind every plate is a story. I’m still writing mine, one shift at a time.