David Schuttenberg - Chef David Schuttenberg has always cooked; however, he hasn’t always done so professionally. A Southern Arizona latchkey kid, his early work featured playful takes on ubiquitous after-school dishes like the bologna and cheese curl up and the pizzadilla. After college, he toiled in obscure cubicles for Fortune 500 companies, earning a salary far in excess of his desire to perform his job functions. Much soul searching ultimately led to giving up the salary and benefits for a career and adventure in the culinary industry.
In 2003, he bid farewell to Corporate America and attended The French Culinary Institute. Upon graduating, he landed an internship at Chef Zakary Pelaccio’s highly regarded Chickenbone Café and later went on to work with world-renowned chef Tom Colicchio at Craft.
After a brief move back West, Schuttenberg returned to New York and landed once again with Chef Pelaccio, serving as opening Sous Chef at the highly acclaimed Fatty Crab. There, Schuttenberg discovered the satisfaction of cooking soulful, street inspired cuisine while using the best available ingredients and employing refined, high-end techniques. In May 2008, Schuttenberg’s cooking came full circle with the opening of Cabrito, a casual, rock n’ roll Mexican joint located in New York City’s West Village. While the opening of Cabrito has not meant a return of the pizzadilla, Schuttenberg has realized his dream of giving a personal twist to the street foods and home style cooking of Mexico he so enjoys.
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Rick Camac - Rick Camac is the Managing Partner of Fatty Crab, which opened in 2005 and is currently one of the hottest destinations in Manhattan along with second Fatty Crab located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan .
Last year Camac opened a restaurant in Greenwich Village of Manhattan, a small Mexican eatery that utilizes seasonal, local products and features an extensive Tequila and Mezcal tasting list. It opened in the spring of 2008, called Cabrito.
Camac is also working on a Southeast Asian barbeque restaurant located in Williamsburg Brooklyn with famed chef Zakary Pelaccio, name Fatty ‘cue. Fatty ‘cue is scheduled to open in the spring of 2009.
Camac’s entrée into the food and beverage business started with his investment into Maker’s, a neighborhood bar in Murray Hill, NY 8 Years ago. Maker’s is still a favored local spot. Camac has sold his interest in the venue.
Prior to entering the restaurant business, Camac spent 15+ years owning, managing and operating technology firms.
Camac holds a degree in Business Administration from the State University of NY at Oswego and has a Diploma in Computer Technology from New York University.
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Zakary Pelaccio - Zakary Pelaccio is the award-winning executive chef/partner at the critically acclaimed Fatty Crab, a small Southeast Asian ‘joint’ focusing on Malay Cuisine. Previously, Zakary was the chef at the highly lauded Chickenbone Café, a modern gastropub located in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Zakary was instrumental in the concept development and build out of Chickenbone. In 2007, Zakary Pelaccio developed a Malaysian influenced restaurant called Suka, in London’s ultra-hip Sanderson Hotel that won England’s Food & Travel Magazine “Best Asian Restaurant of 2007” award. Zakary’s most recent endeavors include Cabrito, a small Mexican eatery in Greenwich Village that utilizes local products. Zakary is currently in the process of opening a second Fatty Crab on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and also a Southeast Asian influence barbecue restaurant called Fatty ‘Cue located in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
Zakary’s approach to food is not only a product of time spent with chef luminaries like Daniel Boulud and Thomas Keller, but is also heavily influenced by his travels across Western Europe and his time spent traveling throughout Asia and living in Malaysia. Fatty Crab is based on Zakary’s experiences in Kuala Lumpur and his favorite Malaysian restaurant just outside of Kuala Lumpur that specialized in Chili Crab and Malaysian Rotisserie Chicken Wings.
It is not only his global travels that inform his sense of culinary style; his palate is just as affected by his local surroundings. Pelaccio is a passionate member of Slow Food, for which he edited a Slow Food USA eating and drinking guide to New York City, and is an ardent supporter of using fresh seasonal products from small, local farms and regional artisans and merchants. Zakary is also on the advisory board of Heritage Foods USA, a new company focused on resurrecting rare and near extinct breeds of animals indigenous to the United States.
Zakary worked at some of the finest restaurants in New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area. He began by training as a manager and purchasing agent with the Myriad Group, NY, owners of Tribeca Grill, Montrachet and Nobu. Zakary then moved to the Television Food Network where he wrote scripts and worked as a field producer for the program “Dining Around,” which focused on reviewing restaurants throughout the country.
Soon afterward, Zakary began to follow his passion for the industry into the kitchen and spent time traveling and working in Asia. He worked as a cook for a year at the renowned Seri Melayu restaurant in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and spent time in the Thai kitchen of the Westin Hotel in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Upon his return from the East, he attended the French Culinary Institute from which he graduated first in his class. During that time, he worked at the critically acclaimed Union Pacific Restaurant. After graduation he worked as a cook in some of the country's most elite restaurants—The French Laundry in Napa Valley, CA and Daniel in New York City. In addition to his culinary studies, Zakary received a BA from the University of Vermont with coursework completed in Florence, Italy, the University of California at Berkeley and Columbia University.
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