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chefs' salad days

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Famous chefs remember what they were cooking when they were 25 years old:

"I was chef to French heads of state by age 21. Four years later I was doing fried clams and french fries in New York City as director of research and new development at Howard Johnson's."

Jacques Pépin, 62
Television chef and cookbook author

"I was a starving art student--a metalsmith and a painter. My part-time job was baking at night as a pastry chef at a country club. I'd work from midnight to 8 A.M., then go to art class during the day."

Gale Gand, 43
Brasserie T, Northfield, Illinois

"I had begun my first year at The Culinary Institute of America. I was learning all the basics--how to peel a carrot, how to start a roux. We had six weeks of classes before we even got into a kitchen. I loved every minute of it, not knowing what my future would be, and at that point, not caring."

Dean Fearing, 43
The Mansion on Turtle Creek, Dallas