ok I'll post first,
Gerard, born and raised in manchester uk, came to USA in 1969, apprenticed to a pastry chef ,Maurice Leduc, from Paris in his patisserie in Harvard Sq Boston. After 5 yrs I was gifted a set of sabatiers and started working around, I was surprised to discover the baking skills I took for granted as standard were unknown to almost everyone I worked with. So I went back and worked with Maurice again, he opened a very popular french restaurant ( Autre Chose) and stayed there for many years learning to cook.
10 years later I was the pastry chef at the meridien hotel in Boston, met a nice woman who said we should open out own pastry shop, we did and it was popular for 25 yrs, but she died, I sold it and bought a cafe and started catering corp lunches and weddings. After several yrs I sold it and worked around, ended up helping a chinese girl open a bakery cafe in Acton Ma, she had come to America as part of the CCP olympic team but stayed here. I retired after 4 yrs , it is doing well today (Legend Cafe).
I live up in northern Maine just south of Houlton, 700 people in this town, they don't know squat about food and that suits me.
Although I was trained in all aspects of French food, I'm definitely a fish and chips type of person.
Heres a pic of me as a skinny teen apprentice with Maurice.
and a short video of some of the stuff I did at various times.