Gerry Williams – with a butchery demo by Paul Gentile and Nick Projkovski

Growing up in Jamaica a picky eater, Chef Gerry quickly developed his eagerness and flair for cooking when his mom started buying his choice of ingredients and helped him prepare his own satisfying supper. Eventually, Gerry’s love affair with natural wood furniture led him to cabinet-making school, but after leaving his furniture-making job, he soon found his way back to the kitchen.

In pursuit of his passion for cooking, Gerry enrolled in culinary school and upon graduating, landed a job in a flight kitchen at Sangster International Airport in Jamaica. Curious about what else the world had to offer, Gerry departed for the United States, where he worked as a cook at Kiawah Island Golf Resort in South Carolina, then at Jupiter Beach Resort in Florida, then at Harborside Hotel in Maine before heading north of the border in 2008 and helping to open JW Marriott’s The Rosseau resort in Muskoka.

Four years after his promotion to Sous Chef at The Rosseau, Chef Gerry joined the team at Oliver & Bonacini Café Grill, Blue Mountain as a Senior Banquet Sous Chef, where he’s delighted in the opportunity to teach and lead a brigade of brilliant young chefs. At Blue Mountain, Gerry values the ability to cook creative yet humble comfort food using local ingredients for a variety of settings — from dinner rush at the restaurant and large-scale events at the Westin to Collingwood Charters boat cruise parties and 200-person weddings in the middle of a hayfield. As Chef de Cuisine, he relishes the chance to introduce brand-new dishes to guests as well as recreate his old favourites.

Outside of the kitchen, Gerry spends his time fishing or restoring old furniture in his workshop. But when he’s in cooking mode, he lives by the philosophy that even the best chefs always have something to learn.