E-mail a friendJeff Henderson
airdate November 11, 2008
Jeff Henderson found his passion for cooking while serving nearly a decade in prison for drugs. He's been executive chef at several top restaurants and made Las Vegas history by becoming the first African American named "Chef de Cuisine" at Caesars Palace. An inspiration to troubled young adults, he has his own company, The Henderson Group, and a reality show on The Food Network, The Chef Jeff Project. He's also a best-selling author, whose life story is being turned into a major motion picture.
Former convicted felon shares his transformation from a prisoner to renown chef. (3:52)
Full interview. (11:52)
Jeff Henderson
Tavis Smiley: Jeff Henderson's path to becoming one of the culinary world's rising stars could not be more unlikely. A former drug dealer, he spent nearly a decade behind bars, beginning at the age of 19, and while incarcerated he developed a passion for cooking. That led him to become the first African-American named as the top chef at Caesar's Palace, of course in Las Vegas.
He now runs his own company and stars in the Food Network series "The Chef Jeff Project." The show airs Sunday nights at 10:00. Here now, a clip from "The Chef Jeff Project."
[clip]
Tavis: So Jeff also has a new book out. It's called "Chef Jeff Cooks." Jeff Henderson, nice to have you on the program.
Chef Jeff Henderson: Thanks for having me, Tavis.
Tavis: I'm glad to have you here.
Henderson: Yeah, thank you, man.
Tavis: When you walked in the studio, I gave you a big hug, as I always do. Everybody's proud of you, but I am especially proud of you, having known you before all this happened, so it's a wonderful thing and I appreciate the shout-out in the book, by the way -- I saw that.
Henderson: A pleasure.
Tavis: So thank you. For those who just saw the clip and don't know what they were seeing, who were those people you were talking to?
Henderson: These were six at-risk young people that we cast here in Los Angeles who come from diverse backgrounds -- dysfunctional families, from gang backgrounds with drugs to convicted felons. And I hired them to open my catering company, Posh Urban Cuisine, in an attempt to impact the lives in a positive way, but using food as a vehicle to change.
Tavis: And so the TV show follows you and them doing what?
Henderson: Catering high-end events here in Los Angeles, but it's also a life skill; culinary boot camp. So we deal with all the social issues that these young people face in their daily lives. They come from the inner city, they haven't been exposed to anything out there, and my focus is to make sure they get the exposure.
Tavis: And what does one learn, particularly one who's had a hard life or who thinks he or she is hard? One learns what from hanging around with you and food?
Henderson: Well, they understand what I teach them is that they all have potential, and I try to bring that potential out of them by giving them ownership, giving them responsibility, and I give them a lot of recognition and praise for the attempt that they make to try to do something positive in their life.
Tavis: Tell me -- I'm not a cook and I shouldn't admit that to you (laughter). That's why I have you come to my house every night.
Henderson: (Unintelligible.)
Tavis: Jeff has been to my house a couple times, hooking a brother up. That's why I have you come over, because I don't cook, but I have great respect for those who do. Help me understand what one learns when one spends time in the kitchen. I would assume, for one thing, patience, but what do you learn when you're spending time in a kitchen doing what you do?
Henderson: Well, besides patience you have to have passion to cook. A lot of passion comes -- my passion came from growing up in generational poverty, being in prison, and being hungry. And when I had an opportunity to work in a kitchen, when you take flour, eggs, sugar, a little bit of yeast, and four hours later you have a finished product which is bread, it's a beautiful feeling. (Laughter.) And that's what did it for me, so that's what I get out of it.
Tavis: It's a tasty feeling.
Henderson: Absolutely.
Tavis: I guess the thing that tickled me so much when I got to know you is the absolute -- and I mean no disrespect here -- but the absolute dichotomy I guess is a good word between being in prison for 10 years and cooking. I could think of a lot of things that ex-felons do. Cooking, as a chef -- it just didn't equate for me.
Henderson: Well, I've been trying to figure it out myself, Tavis. There's some connection between prison and food. If you go into the finest restaurants here in Beverly Hills, the majority of the people who work in the kitchen who's doing the daily grinding has a shady background, who come from the streets and stuff. And I don't know what that connection is, but food has been a vehicle for a lot of formerly incarcerated individuals because you don't deal with the public, you don't deal with money, and these guys who come out, they need a job and they get to eat. So, it's a connection.
Tavis: I've not been to prison lately, thank goodness -- trying not to go. Haven't been there lately, (laughter) so I don't know what prison food tastes like, but how does one develop a passion, a love for food while in prison?
Henderson: Well, prison -- the kitchen in prison is the most important place. Food is the most important thing to a person serving time. I fell into the kitchen. I never had a dream to be a chef. Got fired on my job, put on a pot and pan detail, and a couple guys in there took me up under their wing and a chef was born.
And for the first time in my life, I was being praised for something positive. And I said, "Maybe this is a trade for me when I get out of the joint."
Tavis: When did you know that you had the capacity -- beyond the passion, when did you know you had the capacity to be a high-quality chef?
Henderson: Well, it really didn't come to me until years after I was out of the joint, and when I wrote in my book about all the people who I thanked, and when you hired me to come and do the event for the (unintelligible) youth leadership, it was the first time that I cooked for so many prominent African-American people.
And when I'd done that event, and the praise that I got, that evening, that gave me the confidence that I could go out there and cook for the world. That's when I knew that I was ready for Las Vegas, and eventually became the executive chef of the Café Bellagio.
Tavis: I had no idea. I was just trying to get a meal, man. (Laughter.)
Henderson: Was it good?
Tavis: Yeah, it was delicious. I still get some (unintelligible) on that. (Laughter.) I was just trying to help a brother out.
Henderson: Yeah, cornbread, crusted crab cakes, and --
Tavis: Oh, man -- don't start, man.
Henderson: -- sweet corn soup with the lobster.
Tavis: Stop, stop.
Henderson: Uh-oh. Uh-oh.
Tavis: Unless you're going to roll a cart out here with some food on it. (Laughter.) Don't start talking about food unless you're going to bring it out here.
Henderson: All right.
Tavis: I was cracking up looking at the book, because I knew some of this, but not in detail, at where you got some of these recipes from. So I'm thinking of the juxtaposition of you cooking at my high-end event, a bunch of other high-end events, you're at the Bellagio, you're at Caesar's Palace. You're cooking for all these high-end events and very well-to-do people. If they knew where some of these recipes came from -- from cats in the joint -- Friendly Fried Chicken. Tell me about some of the recipes.
Henderson: Yeah, well, my Friendly Fried Chicken is one of the first things I learned how to cook. I was in prison with Bobby Womack's eldest brother, Friendly Womack, and I named my famous jailhouse fried chicken after him. And I had a little chicken business when I was in the joint, as well.
Tavis: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. How do you have a chicken business in the joint?
Henderson: Well, I used to sell a breast and a wing for $4.50 -- a leg and a thigh for $3.50, and the most you could have was $15 worth of quarters on the yard. And that was my little hustle, and I bartered -- I'd trade chicken for haircuts, new t-shirts, phone tickets. (Laughter.) I've always been an entrepreneur, Tavis.
Tavis: (Unintelligible) the hustle.
Henderson: And I had my cinnamon rolls in there, my world-famous -- I call them Penitentiary Cinnamon Rolls. And they'll make any cinnamon roll shop go out of business (unintelligible). And you know what? That jailhouse fried chicken's on the menu at Café Bellagio -- a $30 million a year operation -- (laughter) and they eat it up every day.
Tavis: And they're eating it up.
Henderson: They don't know where it came from, though. (Laughter.)
Tavis: I just thought that was funny, man. They're eating stuff, don't know where the recipes came from. Tell me about the concept for -- we talked about the concept for the food show. How did that happen, though? And I'm trying in my own mind -- just trying to wrap my brain around me meeting you, inviting you to do this thing for my foundation, all this other stuff happening. How did you get from there to here? The Food Network -- the show is kicking.
Henderson: Yes. Well, after I did that event for you I eventually moved to Las Vegas and became a chef at the Bellagio, and I started writing my memoir when I was in prison, but the time wasn't just right.
Tavis: Your memoir is called "Cooked."
Henderson: "Cooked: From the Street to the Stove." And I've been giving back to young people for 18 years. When I was in the joint, I convinced the warden to bring in young people from the outside into prison to talk to them about choices. And I wrote this memoir and a guy from New York called and said, "One day I want to help you tell your story to the world." So I wrote the book and sold it to William Morrow, went on "Oprah." You know what happens when you go on "Oprah?"
Tavis: Bam.
Henderson: Will Smith called two days later, he bought the life rights to "Cooked," and we have deal that we're working on; a movie script, and I never looked back. Food Network came, they said, "Jeff, we've been hearing about you over the years, we want to do something with you, but what'll we do?" And I said, "I don't want to do a regular cooking show like a lot of other chefs have," because I'm not that type of guy.
And I said when I did your event, half of those guys in the kitchen have been to prison that worked for me.
Tavis: And I didn't even know.
Henderson: You didn't even know that.
Tavis: That might have scared me, if I'd known. (Laughter.)
Henderson: Yeah, and we put it down.
Tavis: Ya'll put it down though, man.
Henderson: I talked to Larkin about it. Larkin knows about it, because he was watching, he was (unintelligible) the kitchen.
Tavis: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Henderson: So the Food Network came and I said, "I want to do a show that impacts lives using food as a vehicle," so I put together a 28-day life skill culinary boot camp, where I took these kids off the street, tough love chef, the preacher, the father, the big brother, and teach them the life skills necessary.
Because when I took these guys off the streets in L.A. to do catering events with me, I was supposed to have been teaching them how to cook, but I had issues with them not being to work on time, sagging their pants. And I had to tell them, you have to be a brand. I built a brand when I came out of prison. I clean-shaved my face, I covered -- took makeup to cover my earring hole, I straightened the way I walked, got rid of the swagger, because I knew that I wanted to work for the high echelon of society, and that's how I was able to pull it off.
Tavis: Well, you got the penultimate swagger now. You got a whole new kind of swagger, and I ain't mad at you. You enjoying it?
Henderson: I'm enjoying it. I'm traveling all over the country, I've been extremely blessed with opportunities to work with corporate 500 companies, HR departments, I'm in prisons, I've got other TV projects I'm working on. But I'm really excited about the movie project with Will. I had an opportunity to spend a whole day with him to talk about how this movie will be different from all the other movies that come from out of the hood.
Tavis: I assume you feel comfortable, though, with the project in his hands.
Henderson: Absolutely, because we talked about it. I wasn't just trying to sell my story just to get some money. We have to deal with the high incarceration of African-American men. One out of four Black males going to prison, teenage pregnancy, HIV and broken families -- breaking the whole generational cycle is an important part of this movie.
Because I was a nonviolent guy when I was on the street -- never been involved with gangs. I had a bit of integrity out there, and giving back today I truly believe is my calling.
Tavis: What do you make of the fact -- and some may regard this as a lay-up question; I don't because I'm curious as to your take on this. What do you have to say to Americans who really aren't serious about -- we talk about recidivism all the time. You want to get a conversation going, talk about recidivism -- everybody's got their own point of view on that.
The notion that other "R" word, though -- rehabilitation -- is something we don't take seriously. As I sit listening to and looking at a guy like you and all the success that's come your way, you think that what's possible for you -- and I don't mean being a chef on TV per se -- but do you think what's possible for you in terms of your living a life of making a contribution, some comfort, some convenience, is that possible for other folk when they come out of prison?
Henderson: Absolutely. A lot of times, the media doesn't put a lot of emphasis on men who go into the system who turn their lives around and come out and be successful -- they just don't talk about it. I do. And I never looked at the system to rehabilitate me -- I rehabilitated myself. I read my first book in prison, I went to school, got my GED, and I was very fortunate to have been in the federal system, where I was in there with the more sophisticated, intellectual convicts.
Wall Street business moguls -- Ivan Boesky, the co-defendant of Michael Milliken, was there, they taught business class, we had Toastmasters International. And I remember one thing a White guy told me who was a Wall Street business mogul. He said, "Henderson, you're smart, you have potential. When you get out you could build a brand. All you have to do is change the product and get some integrity," and that never left my mind.
Tavis: Maybe the moral of the story is that we should all go to prison.
Henderson: No, no, no, no, no. (Laughter.) No, no. That's for the ones who are in there. But all the potential --
Tavis: Go to federal prison and get the hook-up with Boesky and Milliken.
Henderson: No, they're out now; they're doing well.
Tavis: Yeah, I know they're out. I'm glad to have you on the program, and I am prouder of you than I could ever express. I don't have the words to tell you how delighted I am at your success. His name is Chef Jeff. The new book is called "Chef Jeff Cooks: In the Kitchen with America's Inspirational New Culinary Star." Over 150 recipes in the text that I didn't to talk about because I didn't want to get hungry. As seen, of course, on the Food Network. Great show. I'm proud of you, man.
Henderson: Thank you.
Tavis: I'm glad to have you here.
Henderson: It's good to be here.
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