Click to go to our Application Page

Dear Chefs, colleagues, and friends,

Allow me to briefly introduce myself, my name is William A. Bauer CEC, CCA,  I am the new President of the CCACLA.

For years I was a member of CCAC in name only, then my membership lapsed and I moved around a bit. But then in 2006 I came back to southern California and worked with a great Chef that inspired me to get certified, and rejoin the ACF.  But again I was a member in name only. Then years later I decided to go to a meeting. It just happened that I arrived early and had an opportunity to chat with Robert Phillips before the CCAC board meeting. We were old acquaintances and crossed paths many times for various reasons. As we chatted he suddenly asked, why aren’t you on the board here? I was speechless, I never thought about it. I hesitated but ultimately said Okay, that was over three years ago and here I am.

I am honored, humbled and grateful.

As many of you know our former President Robert Phillips has been elected to a national chair and is now the current Western Regional Vice President of the ACF and thus had to resign his position as President of the CCAC.

All due congratulations to Chef Robert Phillips.

Chef Phillips will now become Chairman of the Board for the CCACLA and since this his is his home chapter I’m sure we can expect to continue see him at monthly meetings.

I look forward to working with Robert in his new capacity and to learn from him to strengthen and grow the CCACLA.

Many good things have been accomplished under Chef Phillips direction and now I embark on the challenge of maintaining and growing CCACLA in the shadow of his legacy and in the spirit of our collective vision.

Some serious work needs to be done in the next three months to set the course for the coming year.

• We have board seats that need to be filled with willing and active participants.
• We have a presidential gala that needs to planned, awards to be presented and elected officers sworn in.
• We have several ideas for big events in 2020 to include a fund raising golf tournament which we look to possibly turn into yearly event.
• As you many of you know Chef Robert Phillips wife Raquel passed away suddenly in August. We will be establishing The Raquel Romero Phillips scholarship Fund for local deserving culinary students. Raquel was so tied to the LA food community, through her husband Robert, her own work in the industry most recently with Hilton in Anaheim, as well as her nephew’s that are aspiring young Chefs. It is right that we do this in her honor.
• We will continue to participate in local food shows and trade events like food EXPO LA, knowledge bowls, advisory committee’s, as well as charitable events and disaster relief as warranted and needed.
• There has been much discussion about how to make the CCACLA more relevant and/or accessible to our younger members. We are looking at Podcasts, possibly even webcasting the educational portion of each meeting.
• A great idea was floated to create a special page on the CCAC website and possibly link to Instagram and/or Facebook to have an ongoing monthly “completion” of food styling. Thank you Chef Chris Emerling!

Continuing on; from time to time there is much conversation about the ACF and CCACLA and what value is there in membership.

The answer is short, its worth what you put into it. If you don’t participate, its a yearly sticker from ACF saying you’re a member. If you participate, you meet colleagues you’ve only heard about, make new connections, get motivated to keep moving forward, glean new ideas during meetings and conversations, get involved in community, and with charity.

We learn much about ourselves when we become selfless and suddenly you may find yourself helping others, and that is a nice place to be.

Those of you who recently dropped of the roster that are included in this message, I encourage you to rejoin. Those of you who are members in name only, I encourage you to become active and get involved.

We all understand LA is big and there is a lot of driving that may need to done at very inopportune times to participate, get a colleague and car pool to the meetings makes the traffic less bothersome and you wont walk into the meeting alone if you’re late!. Work has its demands and that takes priority, but reasonable boss’s make reasonable allowances for reasonable requests.

In closing I will lift some lines from an email I got recently from Robert Phillips.

• Share your ideas and don’t be shy, be bold as Chefs are. Reach out to your colleagues, pull them into your circle and then in to the CCACLA circle. This should be our focus as we move forward to build a better organization for the young up an coming chefs. Lets build a strong relevant organization that we can be proud of in the best traditions of being a chef;  Passion, Professionalism and Pride.

Next meeting will be at Chaffey College Monday October 14th for an Oktoberfest dinner!!

It will be posted on the CCAC website and look for the email blast soon!!

Thank you

Sincerely

William A Bauer