We recently connected with Carlie Cornett and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Carlie, thank you for being such a positive, uplifting person. We’ve noticed that so many of the successful folks we’ve had the good fortune of connecting with have high levels of optimism and so we’d love to hear about your optimism and where you think it comes from.
It comes from the opportunity to make a person smile or create a fond memory with the food I have served them. Curating menus for people, cooking and showing people what local food can taste like, and then impacting their lives in a meaningful way. Thats what keeps me optimistic and encouraged to keep going. Meeting with local farmers and other creators in the food industry and getting to share their products or highlight them in a menu brings me a lot of joy.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I started my culinary career by traveling and doing seasonal work for 7 years. I worked everywhere from Colorado, Northern Michigan, and all the way to Denali Alaska. I learned a lot along the way, but mainly that it takes a village to run a truly magnificent kitchen and I was lucky to meet some of the best people along my travels. It helped hone my love for local ingredients everywhere I traveled, learning how people in that region would cook or use them in recipes. I took that knowledge when I moved back to my home state in Kentucky. Learning everything I could and meeting as many local farmers as possible, I used my passion for cooking local and put it on my menus. Getting people to know where their food comes from and what farmers provide the ingredients really feeds my soul. To know that I can create menus, using locally sourced stuff and teach people that you can truly eat amazing things from your own backyard is incredibly rewarding to me. It brings sense of community back to us.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Three things I would pass on to anyone early in their culinary journey is one, always be hungry to learn more. The food scene is immense and always changing. There is always a new technique or flavor profile you haven’t tasted before, and who knows what that can open up in your mind to create the next great combo. Secondly, patience is a blessing. It is tough growing up through kitchens. It’s hot, long crazy hours and you’re working when most people are out having fun. You will get to the point to where you want to be. You will nail down that sourdough recipe, or learn how to grill a perfect steak with 30 other orders coming in behind it. It just takes patience and time to get that knowledge perfected. Thirdly, take that step before you feel like you’re ready. This might sound confusing. But a lot times we hold ourselves back from truly growing because we are scared. Jump in, try it out and if you fail, pick yourself up and do it again, but learn from what you did wrong to be better the next time. There will always be someone that has more experience than you in some field but the greatest gift you can give yourself is to learn from that person and master it yourself.
Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?
They believed in me and tried my food, over and over and over again, and I have been told by my mom way too many times in my early years that I was using too much salt. Their willingness to show me growing up what a hard work ethic was, and then to encourage my own when I was starting out. They encouraged me when I suggested I wanted to go to culinary school and that made a world of a difference for me.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.truenorthcateringco.com
- Instagram: Truenorthcatering
- Facebook: True North catering
- Yelp: True North catering
Image Credits
Johanna Hribal Frames and letters photography Louisville ky
