- PERSONALITIES
- Todd English
- Bobby Flay
- Jasper White
- Govind Armstrong
- Donatella Arpaia
- Neil Bernardi
- Jim Bernau
- Aurélie Botton
- Nicoletta Canella
- Kim Canteenwalla
- Mary Ann Esposito
- Elizabeth Falkner
- Ben Ford
- Bryan Forgione
- Larry Forgione
- Marc Forgione
- Betty Fraser
- Michael Aeyal Ginor
- Ihsan Gurdal
- John Hazak
- Andy Husbands
- Bob Iantosca
- Robert Irvine
- Susur Lee
- Bernie Lubbers
- Emily Luchetti
- Kate MacMurray
- Lynn Mansel
- Daisy Martinez
- Fergal Murray
- Douglas Rodriguez
- Derek Rohlffs
- Jason Santos
- Hugh Sisson
- Jacques Torres
- Marcela Valladolid
- Greg Winter
About Ben Ford
Renowned chef and restaurateur Ben Ford is known for his sense of craft and understanding of food. From the head to tail of an animal to the root to flower of a vegetable, the ingredients in his dishes celebrate the cycle of life and freshness of the earth.
Chef Ford, executive chef and proprietor of Ford’s Filling Station in Culver City, CA, earned his kitchen stripes at distinguished Los Angeles-area institutions The Farm of Beverly Hills, Opus, and Campanile. After opening, and later closing, the acclaimed Chadwick in Beverly Hills, he decided to return to his basics. Ford’s Filling Station, a regional American gastropub, is based on the fundamentals of cooking, teaching, and foraging (Chef Ford, an urban forager, frequently finds his own ingredients in public areas surrounding the restaurant and his home). Here, he utilizes the finest local ingredients to prove that truly good food doesn’t have to be overly complicated. Both Michelin and Zagat recommended, Ford’s Filling Station received two and one-half stars from the Los Angeles Times within one month of opening and, four years later, continues to receive praise from both print and online media.
Ford’s epicurean journey began after he left the University of Southern California to study at the University of Dijon in the heart of Burgundy, France, where he gained enormous inspiration from the Slow Food movement of Europe. When Ford returned to the States, he studied culinary arts at the California Culinary Academy San Francisco. To further sharpen his talents round after his formal training, Ford joined Alice Waters, one of the country’s finest organic chefs, at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California.
He moved back to Los Angeles and honed his traditional French cooking techniques as Sous Chef at Eberhard Mueller’s Opus in Santa Monica. After completing tenures at the venerable Los Angeles restaurants Campanile and Eclipse, Ford was named Executive Chef at The Farm of Beverly Hills. Here, he perfected his flavorful, earthy cuisine and became skilled in the operations of running a restaurant.
Ford’s entrepreneurial spirit moved him to open Chadwick in 1999, where he was finally able to marry his rich professional experience with a lifetime of personal commitment to organics and artisanal sensibilities in the kitchen. Ford drew inspiration from his mother, Mary Ford, a fine cook and illustrator, and from his father, actor Harrison Ford, a skilled craftsman and artist of great integrity. Chadwick’s seasonal California-Mediterranean menu earned Ford rave reviews and national acclaim, including being awarded a coveted Three Stars from the Los Angeles Times, the first restaurant in Los Angeles to receive this high a rating.
A father of two and devoted family man, Ford continually donates his time to charitable food events, such as launching a garden at Farragut Elementary School in Culver City, which is dedicated to teaching students about planting and harvesting an organic garden. Chef Ford also held the respected honor of being a Chef Chair for Share Our Strength’s Taste of the Nation: Los Angeles, an annual culinary festival benefiting Share Our Strength-sponsored food banks in Los Angeles and their goal of ending childhood hunger in America.
