About

Chef Rachel

Where it all began

Rachel Duboff is a Los Angeles based chef, with a background in both the culinary and nutrition worlds. As a chef, she believes that food should taste great and be healthy. Chef Rachel is currently focused on using her more than 20 years as a professional chef to empower others to be more confident in the kitchen by teaching them the needed skills for success. Whether she is leading a Zoom training for a corporate wellness program, creating a coaching program for someone facing a newly diagnosed food allergy, or working side-by-side with a group of students as they learn to master the art of the perfect sear, she is an adaptive chef who believes that we can all derive more joy in cooking (and eating) with some needed skills.

In her formative years, Chef Rachel had the good fortune to be raised in Seattle by a stay-at-home mom who loved to cook and try out new recipes. Chef Rachel spent many hours watching her mom in the kitchen, and eventually tried her hand at cooking on her own. A move to Malaysia in her early twenties exposed her to the world of SE Asian and Indian cooking where she learned to cook with co-workers and their families. On her return to North America, Chef Rachel headed to Vancouver, Canada where she worked in the former Cookshop Cooking School and began experimenting on her own with private catering. In 1999, she returned to Seattle and in 2001/2002 attended the Culinary Arts program at the Art Institute of Seattle.

Today, she is an accomplished chef with experience as a food educator, personal chef, coach and caterer—having done everything from small dinner parties to weddings for 175. Rachel has been an instructor for PCC Community Markets since 2010 covering such topics as meal planning, pressure cooking and specialty classes that focus on health. Chef Rachel also teaches corporate cooking classes (team building, client events and wellness based classes). Chef Rachel is a continual student and has studied many cuisines through classes, research and travel, including a summer spent cooking in Italy, work on a small farm outside of Seattle, one-on-one’s learning Persian cuisine, Thai cuisine, Indian cuisine and of course the classical French inspired training in her formal culinary studies. In 2021, with a move to Santa Monica, Chef Rachel decided that she would concentrate her work on teaching and inspiring others to get in the kitchen and have fun!

Chef Rachel’s focus on special needs diets started with guiding friends and family through their struggles with new-found vegetarianism/veganism, high cholesterol, diabetes, gluten intolerance/food based allergies, cancer treatment. Realizing that they often lacked the culinary skills to be able to master these challenges on their own, Rachel became an invaluable adviser, providing recipes, guidance and cooking on their behalf. In 2010, Chef Rachel continued her commitment to food and wellness by completing a certification in Nutritional Therapy offered through the Nutritional Therapy Association.

Chef Rachel also believes in giving to her community. She was an active volunteer chef instructor from 2003-2012 with Cooking Matters at Solid Ground, teaching food and nutrition skills to at-risk communities throughout Seattle; Chef Rachel was inducted into the Share our Strength Hall of Fame in 2011 for her contributions to Cooking Matters. Chef Rachel also formerly served on the steering committee for Community Kitchens Northwest and led a monthly Community Kitchen from October 2009 through April 2012. Chef Rachel served many years as the President of the Puget Sound Personal Chefs Association. In 2020, at the start of the Covid-19 Pandemic, Chef Rachel founded a program to help feed neighbors struggling with the sudden challenges of navigating the new world. Over the course of 8 months, working with over 140 volunteer chefs, drivers and packers, Neighbors Feeding Neighbors Seattle delivered almost 11,000 meals. Chef Rachel’s work was recognized by US Senator Patty Murray with a Golden Tennis Shoe award in 2021.

Chef Rachel believes that we all should have basic skills in the kitchen (at a minimum) and with the growth of those skills, life becomes richer and more enjoyable. Chef Rachel believes that cooking is a unifier and that sitting at a table together helps bridge barriers and allows us to truly learn about one and other. Chef Rachel is dedicated to helping people embrace food no matter what challenges or goals they may have and believes that cooking should be a source of pleasure. Chef Rachel’s mission is to empower others to bring health and joy into their lives through food.