Steve Collins is passionate about cooking, smoking
and grilling. When he took an early retirement in 1996, he and
his wife, Billie Frank, moved to Colorado. At a seminar in 2001 he heard
the words, "If you are not doing what you love, leave and follow your
passion." Collins went to work the next day and gave a month's
notice. He knew he wanted to do something that involved cooking, but he was
not sure what. An article about a personal chef in the Sunday paper gave
him the answer. Within a month he was in Arizona at the United States
Personal Chef's Institute learning the basics of his new profession. After
a few years of working in client's homes, he decided he wanted more
contact with people. He moved to New Mexico in 2004 to become the executive chef at The
Hacienda Doņa Andrea de Santa Fe, a mountaintop inn and retreat
south of Santa Fe on the historic Turquoise Trail. He left a year
later to open his own cafe in Santa Fe. Currently, he is working in
the hospitality industry in Santa Fe and working on another
cookbook.
His cookbook,
Grilling and
Smoking with The Home Chef, was awarded the 2004 Award of Excellence by the National Barbecue Association for the best book
in its category. It offers more than 90
original recipes for the smoker and the grill. The book also contains a
section of helpful tips on such things as starting a charcoal fire and
choosing a grill or a smoker. This book is an excellent resource for the
backyard cook. He also has authored, Not Your Usual Tailgating
Cookbook, which is available as a downloadable e-book. Click
here to order.
Collins was honored in early 2005 when one of his
recipes, Smoked Trout with Smoked Poblano Salsa and Chipotle Crema, was
chosen as a favorite of the year (2004) by chef2chef.net
co-founder, David Nelson. The web-sites e-mails go out to over 500,00
subscribers daily. It was chosen, according to Nelson, because, "As soon
as I read Steve's trout recipe, I knew it was something I would order if I
sat down in his restaurant and it was on the menu." Nelson says that
he is a big fan of Southwestern cooking.
Collins
was a guest chef at the 2005 and 2006 Fiery Foods and Barbecue Shows both in March in Albuquerque,
NM. See you next year.
He is a self-taught cook with a natural flair
for food. He started catering in the 1980's. One of his first jobs was
grilling a whole baby lamb. From then on he was hooked. Cooking was relaxation after his day-job, counseling troubled youth.
Collins who has been married
for has been married for 33 years is a
regular columnist for The National
Barbecue News.
Photo by Brian Colon
