Rafi Taherian, executive director of Yale Dining at Yale University in New Haven, Conn., was born in Iran, was educated in Italy and cut his teeth in professional foodservice in California. He spoke to FSD about his first lessons on product quality and fine dining.
“I was born in Iran. My grandmother was the biggest source of inspiration in my love of food. I lost my mother when I was very young and my grandmother helped raised me. She taught me how to be a savvy shopper when picking fruits and vegetables from the market—the fragrance of a ripe melon, the firmness of a cucumber, etc. She taught me the basics of food that I wish was taught in schools.
I attended boarding school in Naples, Italy, and later attended the Universita iuav di Venezia in Venice, where I studied urban planning. While at university I worked at several restaurants. The best of them was this very high-end seafood restaurant called Il Portogetto. We were prix fixe and customers could only come if they had reservations. We brought out 39 different kinds of dishes and you decided if you wanted to eat it or not. We just kept bringing out more food; it was a 2½-hour food orgy. That’s where I learned standards of excellence in terms of what high-end foodservice looks and tastes like.
When I came to the states I soon realized I couldn’t do anything with my urban planning degree, especially since it was from Italy, so I worked as a cashier for Marriott. I was there for two months and management realized I had more potential. They put me in a management-training program and 18 months after I was hired as a cashier, I came back as a general manager. I was there for five years. After Marriott I opened a restaurant called Your Chef Take Home Food. It was catering and take-home food, but we also had some seating. We also did some catering for some school systems—that’s when I realized what working with limited resources means.”