April 24, 2017

GABY SALKI, CHEF, FOOD PHOTOGRAPHER AND WRITER

GABY SALKI, CHEF, FOOD PHOTOGRAPHER AND WRITER

Gaby stormed through the hall, frustrated and angry.  She was in her third year of college pre-med and on her way to becoming a doctor, just like everyone else in her family, so that made sense until now. This was the last straw!  She had just finished her organic chemistry class for the day and decided that she hated chemistry so much that that would be her last class. 
***
  “What is it that you want to do?” Her mother sat on the couch across from her. Gaby loved her mother and she would talk to her about everything.

  “Well, I really like the idea of being a part of the fashion world, you know, styling and that end of things.” 

  “Whatever makes you happy, Gaby, makes me happy.” Her mother could see that she was stressed and gave her a hug. 

   Gaby decided to switch to a business and marketing major and loved it. When she finally graduated college, she moved to LA and quickly got a job in the fashion world.
The job was short-lived because she really was not happy with the company, she loved fashion but the company itself was not a healthy environment.

*** 
  “So what are you going to do now, Gaby?” a brunette girl asked while shoveling another mountain of home made avocado dip on her chip.

   “I don’t know-”

  “This dip is delicious, by the way,” a girl wearing a pair of jean shorts and a loose t-shirt said, her mouth half full. “Sorry to cut you off- continue,” she said, wiping her face with a green napkin.

   Gaby stopped for a second, her eyes sparkling as a flash of an idea came to her.

   “I am going to go to culinary school.”

  “Oh my goodness, Gaby, yes, that is perfect!” another girl with short black hair gushed.

  “I’ve always loved cooking for you girls and this would be my opportunity to do something fun,” Gaby said while mixing a beet, corn and quinoa salad. “I’ll do it for the next year and then I can figure out what kind of job I want to have after culinary school.” 

  A girl with a blonde ponytail held up her glass. “This deserves a toast. To Gaby!”

“To Gaby,” everyone agreed.


  Gaby fell in love with cooking and got a job as a chef her second year of culinary and pastry school and never looked back. 
***

  As Gaby made herself a quick breakfast, she looked up at her vision board, a place where she put all her goals that she wanted to achieve that year and in five years. It was filled with photos, magazine cutouts and hand-scribbled ideas. She took it all in and heaved a deep breath. Today was the day that she would secure one of her most important potential clients.
As she drove, Gaby went over why she should get the job, a bit of a pep talk to get her into the right headspace.

 “I am an extremely hard worker and I don’t take no for an answer. When I put my mind to something, I am gonna do it and I might not get there immediately.  I might hit a few road blocks but I am going to figure out a way to make it work and to get to where I want to be.”
***
Gaby’s Biz:
What’s Gaby Cooking  has three faces: there’s the website,  which is the blog recipe development;  photography food styling, you know, that section of the business, and then there’s the personal chef side of the business.  And then, there are all my clients, you know, I work with clients, for recipe development.  I do photography for them, as well as for the What’s Gaby Cooking website, and I really enjoy that.  I do a lot of travel writing for other people. I like being able to wake up every morning and do something different.

 I just got back from a press trip to Louisiana on Wednesday night and on Thursday morning I was back cooking for a client. On Friday, I was in the studio shooting my cookbook, so I really like being able to do a multitude of things on a daily basis.  It makes me have to stay very organized, which is integral in creating a business.

A day in the life: (All images courtesy of Gaby Dalkin, What’s Gaby Cooking) 

Typically, I wake up around five in the morning and go to the gym. I’m home by 7:30 or 8 and I spend, usually, the next two hours going through all my emails, responding to any readers’ questions on my website.  I am an obsessive list-maker.  My calendar is my favorite material possession, I just love it.  I have a list of things I need to get done every day. I cross things off, I move things around and I add things and I delete things.  It’s all over the board! I try to stay focused on this list because that’s how I get the most work done. 
I’ll spend some time in that two hours developing new recipes, testing my kitchen.  Then, I will typically go to the market and do grocery shopping for my client.  I’ll go over to their homes and I’ll cook lunch and prepare dinner and put it in the fridge. 
Right now, I am cooking forJessica Simpson, I absolutely love her! I have actually been extremely lucky in that it is mostly word of mouth and people hear about me and call me.  I’ll go in for a test day, where I just go in and cook for people and if they like me and they like my food, then, you know, we usually work together. 
   
And then I am usually home by four and I’ll spend some more time recipe-developing, using photos for my website, and then when it gets dark out I do more business side stuff because I can only shoot my photography in natural light.  As the light goes down I am back in front of the computer, answering emails, working on business deals.  It’s really interesting. 

  Since I work for myself, I don’t have a normal day- I’m never not working, you know,  a random email from someone comes in a nine o’clock at night and I am, you know, just finishing up dinner, I’ll respond to it. I am a rapid responder. I like to get back to people immediately, because I feel like people’s time is valuable and I appreciate when people get back to me in a timely manner. So, you know there is no end of the work day for me. I’ll work until I need to be done.

 

Success Advice:
I would find a mentor, I am really fortunate that I’ve had some amazing mentors, and I still do and I think I always will.  It’s really about building your relationship with people and when you’re comfortable enough with this relationship, asking someone, can you help me, I have these great ideas.  Will you take a few hours every month and kind of guide me? I just want to learn from you. I had a lot of mentors and it was a two-way relationship.  I would do stuff for them also, so it wasn’t just them giving me knowledge and that was really helpful. I’ve made some amazing friends, doing that and people that have helped me, you know, far beyond my wildest expectations just because we have this mutual relationship and they knew that I really valued their opinion. 

I found all my mentors are basically in the food world and I would meet them at different conferences and really develop a relationship with them.  We’d have dinner every once in a while or we’d go get cocktails or I would help them on a photo shoot or I would work with them on a catering job- whatever it was that they were doing.  If they needed my help, I would offer my help.  When I was comfortable enough with them, I would say, hey, and I would just ask people point blank, I would love if you would be my mentor and people have intern started asking me these things and it is so flattering I don’t think people want to say no to that it’s really kind of a great pat on the back. You just feel great when someone asks you to be their mentor. It’s just so nice.

You are going to have to start at the bottom and work your way up, but, you just kind of have to get your feet wet, and grow from there and work hard.  You have to put in your time.  You work super hard and just be pleasant at all times, everyone has to love you and you’ll grow and move up from there.

Right now, I am working on cookbook all about avocados, I am an avocado fanatic, I just wrapped all the recipe development and the photography for it and it will be out April 2013. My best friend his name is Matt he’s an amazing food photographer, he was a huge mentor of mine and we have just become best friends over the years, he and his partner, Adam, who is a food stylist, and the person who gave me my break into food styling, they did the cookbook and I assisted on it. It was a wonderful experience.

In the future:
 I really want to do T.V.  I would love to have my own show. I don’t think it would be a regular cooking show, I want there to be more to it. I would love to write another cook book to expand my platform and get into some online webisodes featured on my website. I would like to start working with more clients on recipe development and really supporting products that I love and produce farmers here in California, who I think need the help and the exposure. 
Nobody believes that I’m 25, but I think I have a really good work ethic. I also really like proving people wrong, so if someone says, oh, you can’t do that, I’m like, ok, watch me!

 

Follow Gaby!
Instagram:@whatsgabycookin
Facebook: @whatsgabycooking
Twitter: @whatsgabycookin
Snapchat: @whatsgabycookin
Pinterest: @whatsgabycookin

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