Meet your Personal Chef, James Avery

Chef James Avery is a Jersey Shore native. He began his culinary career at a pizzeria as a teenager. James moved to Florida in 2000 to attend Rollins College to pursue a degree in Communication, and spent 4 years working in restaurants, nightclubs and resorts in the Orlando area. After college he moved to South Florida to attend The Arts Institute of Fort Lauderdale to obtain his culinary degree. There he worked at the Convention Center of Fort Lauderdale and prepared up to 3000 meals a day for hungry eaters. He also found work at the South Florida hotspot Cafe Maxx, owned by Chef Oliver Saucy. During this time, he found the love of his life in a girl also from New Jersey. When the news came that their new family was getting bigger, they decided return to New Jersey.

Since his return to the New Jersey area he has cooked at David Burke's Fromagerie and worked at Michael Mina's Sea Blue located at the Borgata in Atlantic City. He started the program Le Petit Chef at Marlboro Montessori Academy teaching children how to identify food, nutritional value, and how to prepare simple meals from the pantry. He also ran his own seasonal eating establishment J Cafe where he earned a reputation as a "from scratch" chef using seasonal, organic, and local ingredients in his dishes.

Even though Chef James has worked in the restaurant industry for over 10 years, he advocates the importance of enjoying meals in the comfort of your own home gathered with loved ones.

Chef James has experience preparing healthy, organic, all types of vegetarian, gluten-free, and many of the popular diet types like Weight Watchers. "Its my mission and passion to enhance my client's quality of life through food!"

James lives in Monmouth County, New Jersey with his wife Diana, their daughter Kaylin and the family dog, Saber