This week we asked a few questions of Jeff Dunham, chef/owner of The Grove Grill at Laurelwood.

First cooking job: Chucks Cellar, a steak house in Los Altos, Calif. I started as a prep cook responsible for setting up one of those 75-item salad bars.

Photo by Nikki Boertman

Jeff Dunham

Best original dish: Coriander Cured Venison with Tomatillo Fritters and Tamarind Whisky glaze at Routh Street Cafe in Dallas. Not so much for the dish as a whole, but the coriander cure is really good stuff.

Worst original dish: You are not going to get a chef to talk about his or hers worst anything. But if I must, New York style cheese cake with fermented pineapple salsa. It never did sell well.

First food you remember eating: Green beans and cherry tomatoes as I picked them from Grandpa’s garden.

Your favorite meal: New Orleans barbecue shrimp, with French bread and an iceberg lettuce salad.

Favorite junk food: Potato chips.

Favorite ethnic food: Chili rellenos, but is that even ethnic anymore?

What do you cook at home? My wife Tracey would say ‘nothing.’ But anything on my Weber Kettle grill. And even now my son Chip has taken that away from me.

The most ambitious or challenging meal you've cooked: I was the chef in a restaurant in Westport, Conn., The Meeting Street Grill, and I prepared a six-course meal at the James Beard House in New York. Surprising how much pressure you can put on yourself.

Best place in town to eat, besides your restaurant: To grab a quick bite, La Guadalupana on Summer Ave. and my mother in law, Elena Lunt’s house for just about any holiday.

If you weren’t a chef, what would you want to be? An avocado rancher in Santa Barbara, Calif.

— Jennifer Biggs: biggs@commercialappeal.com or 529-5223