Chef Martin Heuser was up well before the sun on Monday. The chaos of serving as the food and beverage director and executive chef of the Westin Crown Center was fading with each of the 45 minutes that ticked off the clock as he drove north from Kansas City.
The stress was completely gone by the time he settled his back against the bark of a rough tree on the first day of turkey season. A turkey would have to get up pretty early to beat Heuser to the spot, and a quick look at the German immigrant's face should be enough to let any turkey, or fellow hunter, know that wouldn't happen.
Heuser has always been comfortable among hunters. When he was 16, his family bought Im Steinhaus, in Bonn, Germany. Deer hunters would bring in their spoils in the morning, and it was up to Heuser to help break the animal down and prepare it for the menu that night.
"It was my father's place, but I started working in the kitchen because it was a family restaurant," Heuser says.
He would grab his best friend and drive to Paris on Tuesday nights. They'd spend his day off, Wednesday, shopping for fresh fish and produce, making sure they were back by Thursday morning. And come Thursday at 5 p.m., he'd have designed a new menu based on what they had bought at the market.
"It was the same then as it is now. I only heard complaints if the food costs were too high," Heuser says.
In order to build on what he had learned in his family's restaurant, he enrolled in the Steigenberger Hotel Management School in Berlin and accepted an apprenticeship with the Hotel Bristol in Bonn. It was there that his eyes were opened to the world of big galas and the world of pastry.
"After three or four months, I couldn't stand chocolate at 5 a.m. in the morning any more," Heuser says.
Following a three-year apprenticeship, he accepted a position as the commis de cuisine at Operakaellaren in Stockholm, Sweden. While in the kitchen, he was literally cooking for the King and Queen of Sweden. But it was on his days off that he learned about the farm end of the farm-to-table movement by helping his landlord slaughter and butcher cows and hogs.
"The farm and my cooking experience together, it was amazing," Heuser says.
He returned to Germany and dedicated himself to the art of fine dining, working at Chateau Hugenpoet and Gala, both Michelin Star-winning restaurants. But when he was offered a position as an executive chef at the age of 22, he knew he wasn't yet ready to lead a kitchen.
"You have to feel it. You need to be able to stand in front of your guys and be able to teach them. I felt I had so much more to learn," Heuser says.
So he went back to his parents' restaurant, going to school at night to earn his Master Chef's Diploma. It was the lunch crowd that would lead his career in a whole new direction. Members of the Canadian Embassy dined at Im Steinhaus every Monday and Friday. And they were only too happy to sell him on the idea of moving to Canada.
In 1994, he and his wife went to Vancouver, British Columbia, where he had accepted a position as the executive chef at the Sheraton Wall Centre Hotel. It was the beginning of a 17-year (and counting) career with Starwood Hotels. He managed kitchens in Whistler and Calgary before moving to Kansas City in 2007.
He started as the executive chef before being named the food and beverage director in 2010. And after four years, he finally feels like he's starting to make headway on the dreams he had when he asked the Westin to install a full complement of ovens (imported from Germany, as well) in order to bring about a new kind of banquet.
"Buffet food doesn't have to be dry or lukewarm. We have the opportunity to do something different here," Heuser says.
Because to a turkey hunter, there's no greater sin than a piece of poorly cooked, dried out, buffet turkey.
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