The executive chef is imparting wisdom on the next generation of Daniels hospitality students
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There are lessons to be learned in a kitchen—outside of how to brunoise a carrot or blanch a broccoli. The kitchen is a microcosm of adult life, where people need to lean on each other to achieve a common goal.
Efficiency and communication are paramount, perhaps more than the quality of your cuts or the presentation of your plate. Whether you go on to become a chef or not, a kitchen is an ideal setting to prepare for the rest of your life.
As the executive chef at Knoebel Events, Tim Downs wants to impart those lessons on all his students at the Daniels College of Business. He’s spent a lifetime in the kitchen, learning to follow and to lead while climbing the rungs of the culinary ladder. But Downs had humble beginnings.
Executive Chef Timothy Downs
As a teenager in Michigan, he was working at a steakhouse named the Ponderosa as a dishwasher. When the cook walked out during a shift, Downs was eager to fill in.
“They came back and asked if I knew how to use a grill. I lied and said that I did. So, I was overcooking steaks at about 15 years old,” he said. “Needless to say, they didn’t keep me on the grill.”
By his senior year of high school, Downs was certain that he wanted to be a chef. He went to culinary school in Arizona, completing the associate’s degree in 15 months and landing a job at Café Terra Cotta in Scottsdale. In short time, Downs was named best pastry chef in the Southwest by a local publication. He’d subsequently take roles with Jilly’s American Grill and a Troon Golf club in Arizona, before facing a request from his now wife.
“She said, ‘If you want to marry me, you gotta move to Denver,’” he said. “So here I am.”
With nearly a decade of experience in the kitchen, Downs latched on with Yard House, serving as the company’s Executive Kitchen Manager. In that role, Downs was tasked with opening new restaurants and training future managers. He’d do that for nearly 10 years, learning what worked and what didn’t when it came to teaching in a kitchen. So, when a job opened at the Fritz Knoebel School of Hospitality Management in 2015, Downs was uniquely qualified.
“The job requires a lot of teaching inside the kitchen, and I always did that really well throughout my career,” he said. “So, stepping into the role really wasn’t that big of a stretch for me. It actually intrigued me.”
At Knoebel Events, Downs leads a team of student kitchen staff in the food preparation for a variety of corporate events, cocktail mixers, weddings and more. Whether in the Tuscan Ballroom or off site, the team is responsible for all aspects of a meal. Downs is also an instructor in the more traditional classroom, teaching two courses for the Knoebel School.
In either case, Downs is looking to provide applicable lessons to students, whether they end up in the kitchen for work or not.
“[It’s important], even if 99% of the students that come through here aren’t going to be chefs. Someday, they’ll be making things that they made here. So, its life lessons,” Downs said.
One lesson is particularly relevant to Downs, and that’s around delegation and teamwork. In Downs’ kitchen, each student employee is given a role. One might be the executive chef, another in charge of ordering and a third in charge of staffing. Each play a critical role in the success of the operation.
“With this class project, you have to rely on other people. There’s no way around it,” Downs said. “I have to pull some of the executive chefs aside and say, ‘Now’s the time where you’re delegating. This is where you rely on people.’ That’s how the real world really works.”
He’s also arming the next generation of hospitality professionals with the knowledge they need to succeed, even if their jobs don’t reside in the kitchen. In Downs’ classes, students are learning the difference between a hotel pan and a frying pan, helping them talk intelligently to a chef in the future.
“There’s an association with being in the kitchen and being comfortable in that environment that I think is pretty invaluable and hard to get anywhere else, unless you’re actually in it,” Downs said.
With his background and expertise, Downs doesn’t eat out much. Instead, he prefers to cook at home for his wife and kids. In a twist of fate from his first job in a kitchen, Downs said he’s now best at cooking steak.
He’s come a long way from the 15-year-old that lied about their experience and ruined a few steaks. Now, he’s seasoned.