Dave Perry
Credit: Yvette Uhlmann
Touring / Personal Chef
Daryl Hall / Kelly Clarkson
CHANGEOVER: Talk a bit about who you are and what you do.
DAVE PERRY: I’m generally a private touring chef. I bounce back and forth between being a personal chef for artists and then doing gigs cooking for band and crew. I like doing both just because they're the same but different. They're both on tour. The personal gig is just as the name implies and it's a little more personal. You get to know one single person, their likes and dislikes, and cater to them. In a lot of ways, it's a little less manual labor, but more mentally tough and taxing. If you're cooking for a crew, you’re feeding 100 to 150 people or more. It's a lot more work to do that versus making one plate. It's a lot more stress to make one plate, and to have one chance to impress your client, versus 150 people. If 140 out of 150 people are happy, I'm cool. Maybe with ten people, I just didn't hit their tastes.
When did you first realize that you wanted to be a chef?
Credit: Yvette Uhlmann
I've been in kitchens since around 2001. I first went to college to be a high school history teacher at College of Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina. I think I partly pursued that because my mother was a teacher. I always enjoyed teaching other people. When you're 17 do you ever really know what you want to do? I did three years at college and then realized I was not that into it so I switched it up. I dropped out because it wasn't for me, and I'd already been cooking to pay the bills. When I dropped out, surprisingly, my parents were pretty cool with it. My mom later told me it was one of the smartest things I'd done, which was surprising, but also said that I’d better get myself some kind of schooling. Since I was cooking, and enjoyed it, I decided to go to culinary school just to get my parents off my back and maybe learn something. I then went to the Culinary Institute of Charleston and haven’t left the kitchen since. What started as a means to an end became a passion pretty quickly.
How did you transition into the music industry?
In Charleston, I bounced around in a couple of different places. I was in my young 20s, doing different jobs and progressing. I moved up pretty quickly in the kitchen because I’m a quick learner. Once I decide I want to learn something, I act like a sponge and try to take in everything. A lot of the kitchens in the Charleston area are very French influenced so a lot of my background, initially, was French low country cuisine, which is a lot of bouillabaisse, shrimp and grits, and classic Southern/French influenced dishes. At one point, I moved to Salt Lake City, Utah, where I worked with a lot of wild game then eventually went to Virginia and learned a lot of the Chesapeake culture that they have there.
I was getting fairly well versed pretty quickly. Around 2013, I was running a restaurant in Virginia, which, oddly enough, pretty much everybody in that place was in a band except for me. A lot of them were in some fairly big bands at one time or another. I hired a guy named Neil Smith that I needed for one or two days a week and had never seen his resume. I just talked to him and he knew what he was talking about so I brought him on. As we got to know each other I asked what he had been doing for work. He's a New Zealander and had been on the road for ten years as a touring chef. My reaction was “that's a job?” I've been cooking for 13 years and had never even heard of a position, or even considered that there was a position of catering, on tours. At the time I told him, if you ever need somebody, tell your company to give me a call. It's either who you know, or the right timing or the combination of both. That's how it was for me. Two years later, we became good friends. He's since opened up a Kiwi style pie shop in Richmond, Virginia, called Proper Pie and is doing amazing work there.
After I'd met him, and we had that conversation, he called me up and said, “I know you're at the restaurant and you're doing well, but my old company is looking for another chef to join the Paul McCartney tour. If you're into it, I can set you up on who you need to talk to and see if they'll take you.” It's a big life change from running a restaurant, and coming home to your very own bed, but I knew I was not going to get another opportunity in my life to cook for a Beatle so I said yes. I quit my job and two weeks later I was in L.A. doing rehearsals with Paul McCartney’s crew and never looked back.
At rehearsals, it was one load in and one load out for the duration so that was nice. It was still a culture shock to me because the company that I had been hired for is based out of London. I was one of only two Americans on the catering crew on the tour. It was just a whole different language of cooking. Even the pans are called different things so it took a minute to adjust. In my first ever show, we went right from the rehearsals to Fortaleza, Brazil in South America. As any touring artist or crew can tell you, South America is just a different animal. It's very tough. I love going down there, but it's very tough, and at one of my first gigs down there, almost immediately was stung by some variety of South American bee. I got a bacterial infection that absolutely ruined me for two or three days. I did my longest shift that I’ve still ever done to date, something like a thirty-two hour shift, down there. We just grinded it out because that's what needed to be done. We all took an hour break to take a nap and, at that time, thought, “what have I done?” The crew chief told me that South America is about as hard as it gets. If I could make it through this, the rest of the gig was going to be cake. He was right. There are many tough places, but South America is one of the toughest places to get it done. When you start with your worst gig, everything else seems like gravy. Even those long days that we still do, I love them because I know it could always be worse.
What's a typical day like as a chef on tour?
I get to do two different deals, so it depends. If you're with crew catering, essentially us and production are the first ones in. A lot of times before the bus even stops, we're ready to go to work. You're getting your radio sorted on the bus as it’s backing into the venue. You’ve got your backpack on before the bus even stops. When the doors open, you're running into the venue to get eyes on what your area is going to be. Our truck is one of the first ones to be dumped and they want breakfast up ASAP. It's very much a fire drill in the beginning of getting in. After you do it a while, you get to know the areas in different venues. Some are nice and easy, and others are the opposite. One may have a great area with easy access to water and things like that, or it might be rough because the dining room is exactly on the other side of the venue and we're cooking a mile away from everything. Either way, you dump out and do step one of building your kitchen. Step two is, as you're hooking up ovens, pots and pans, you’re baking or cracking eggs. You’re moving as quick as you can to get breakfast up. Once breakfast is up, then you start addressing lunch.
Credit: Rick Rosabella
The main thing on a crew tour or gig, for me, is essentially menu planning, coordinating everything and shopping. You're a little less in the kitchen. I don't enjoy doing those gigs as much myself. I like being in the actual kitchen more than in the grocery store, frankly. As soon as we get breakfast going, you go with a runner up to the shop to get all the items that will be needed for lunch and dinner. You do a pre-shop prior to arriving and that has all your standard items, like onions, carrots and items you trust anybody to pick up. Then your crew chief runs out and gets all the specialty items, which is the stuff that you don't trust just anyone to pick out. Once breakfast is up, you get going on lunch. Once lunch is up, you're going on dinner. Once dinner's up, you're going on load out. Once load out is done, you start working on cocktails and menus for the next day. It's basically rinse and repeat. If I get five hours of sleep on tour I'm good and I'm feeling alright. If it's less than that, then I start feeling it through the days.
On the opposite end of that, if I'm doing the personal chef gig, it depends on the artist. Some of them like their breakfast at 10 AM and that's great because with the crew gig, breakfast is up ASAP. You're rolling off the bus at 4:30 or 5 AM, whenever you’re arriving, to get breakfast up at 6 when the rest of the crew is coming in. A lot of times, when the rest of the crew comes in, I've already been there for an hour and a half. We're the ones that are in first and, a lot of times, out last, depending on the crew. However, with the personal gig, your artist might want to eat breakfast at 10 AM and that's a beautiful thing. You're going to work at 9, almost like a normal 9 to 5, but 5 is a dream. That's never going to happen but you get to start later and it’s very artist specific, depending on what their meals are, what you can carry and what you might need to shop. A lot of times you might have an assistant. A lot of times I'm out and It's just me so I'll have a runner that just runs me out to the shop. If it's easy, and there's a shop close that has the things I need, then I can be in and out and back in an hour and back on the gig.
Mentally, it’s more taxing, but physically it’s easier. It also depends on what they want because you're at their beck and call. Even if you’ve discussed something with them about what’s for dinner, two hours prior they may change their mind and want a pork chop. Then you scramble and run out and do what you can to get a pork chop and make that happen. Even when you come back with a pork chop, they may change their mind again so you're a bit at their beck and call, which can be both rewarding and frustrating, but I like those challenges. It’s what I thrive on. In crew catering, and on the personal side, you've been given not an impossible job but just a very hard one. You don't always have normal kitchen equipment at your disposal. Many, many times I've turned my hotel room into a kitchen with induction burners. You'd be surprised what you can put into a rolling suitcase and then turn that desk that most people are writing notes on into a full-on kitchen station. The whole touring mentality coming into it is that you take nothing and make something tremendous in that space. It’s all encompassing from the whole tour. Everybody comes in, sees an empty venue, and then 12 hours later, there's a ridiculous amount of lights, video screens and stages rolled in. I love the same simplicity of it in the kitchen that we could put in random spots in a venue. A lot of times it’s not necessarily an area where you want a kitchen. You might see the area and think that it doesn't look sanitary at all, but you take that space and completely transform it into a full on kitchen. It’s just like the guys out in the arena who take that empty space and turn it into a full show with automation and lights. We all do the same thing, just in different areas.
How did COVID-19 affect your job and what have you been doing since the industry has been shut down?
COVID just absolutely decimated my job. I had actually just started a tour and we had done three shows. We had done one weekend worth of shows and it was a weekend warrior type schedule. We flew out for the second weekend. I flew to Philly, got there, went to sleep and when we woke up, there had been an email at three in the morning saying the tour was canceled and you get a bus ride home. Everybody was going back to Nashville. Hopefully, it would last a couple of weeks and we would reschedule. Obviously, it did not last a couple of weeks. We just kept getting emails pushing the dates. I think, like everybody, depending on the month, day, time of the day, we all go through a range of emotions with this. I had taken the last bit of 2019 off, and the first bits of 2020, so I hadn't worked in four to five months because I worked all the months prior. I was ready to get back to work but I also have not had a summer off in eight years since I started touring. I hadn't had a ton of time off so I was just going to lean into it a little bit and try and stay safe. I tried to not be concerned with the work and I didn't do much for the first couple of months, workwise. I leaned on the savings and it was nice in one aspect because all of a sudden all my friends were home, all of my road friends. We were all going through this together so that did help. We basically established what we referred to as the “quaranteam.” It was a group of roadie friends that you somewhat see when you're home, or cross paths on the road, and ask how tour is going. You would see them for five minutes and then might not see them again for a year. I had just moved to Nashville, so I kind of leaned into it.
We had great summer weather and it was easy to social distance at a lake outside. I did a lot of trips to the lake where I could float around and hang with the quaranteam and just enjoy a summer. I did try to do some of the side hustle with Postmates and driving but I have a 16 year old truck that's not exactly made for zipping all over town doing deliveries, so that didn't last too long. I started trying to do other things and I started writing. I used to write when I was in high school, so I started writing some stories and who knows if anybody will ever read them. I picked up random little gigs that have nothing to do with cooking.
I did one gig where a bunch of roadies in the Nashville area put together a company called Eamotion. A lot of bands are doing drive-in gigs, which I think is great, but this was a drive thru experience at the Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway. They coned it out and made a two mile track, and then lights, sound and video came in and, essentially, it was like a Christmas lights on steroids experience. I drove a pace car for that. They did it twice because it was decently successful. We all enjoyed it and everybody got a chance to work. I think a lot of it was just to support the industry and put some people to work. Then they did another one that was an actual Christmas lights experience, and I drove the pace car for that one as well. It had nothing to do with food but I got to have some roadie reunions behind a face mask and I got to wear a radio. I never really have a radio on tour but I was so excited when I got one, even if I just hopped in a car, put it in my cup holder, clipped the biscuit to the sun visor, and then drove literally two miles an hour around the track. If you're not aware of how fast two miles an hour is, it’s terribly slow. It is the speed of walking.
Credit: Yvette Uhlmann
Just recently, we started getting some of the roadie relief programs. One of them was The LEE Initiative here. Chef Edward Lee put it together and they partnered with the Touring Professionals Alliance. They're partnering with restaurants all over the country in different cities to provide meals for roadies and anybody in the music industry. Sean Brock at Audrey and Maneet Chauhan at Chaatable did it in Nashville. I was able to get involved there and actually cook again, which I was really grateful for. I really miss the kitchen and what they're doing is amazing. It was for my people. As soon as I found out about it, I wanted to be involved. Luckily enough, I was able to go and help them through at least four or five out of the six or seven weeks. I was able to get involved with preparing food. If you're a roadie, you would just come and pick up a meal. Each of the restaurants was doing it once a week for six weeks as well. Audrey put out meals on Tuesday and Chaatable put out meals on Thursday. It was really nice to do both and to scratch that itch and get back to work in a kitchen. Sean Brock and his crew are incredible chefs so having a chance to work with some of those guys was amazing for me. To do it for a good cause was just the cherry on top.
[Editor’s Note: If you are in the live music touring industry and live in the Nashville area, please click here for the latest information and how to register for upcoming donations in March]
As a chef, what would you say is your favorite dish to cook? In addition to that, what is a memorable food experience you've had that someone else cooked?
It's a bit of a loaded question for chefs. I think we all have something we lean into or something that you know is going to impress. For me, that's some variation of a shrimp and grits dish. There's two reasons for that. One, I've done things where you're cooking for somebody and you want to impress them so you go all out and do so many different components. What ends up happening is if you're doing it by yourself, in a home kitchen for example, sometimes you might bite off a little more than you can chew and something isn't quite up to par because you've got too many things going on. I love the simplicity of shrimp and grits. Your three items need to be quality. You need to have quality grits, you need to make a nice sauce and get a nice shrimp. Then it's just about taking those three details and getting perfection, or as close as you can out of these three simple things. It makes it easy to do in a lot of different settings. You've got the time to really hone in and tweak the recipe since it’s so few components.
Most of the time, mine is a shrimp and grits with an andouille sausage and tomato jus with stone ground grits that’s cooked up nice and creamy in the South Carolina way. So that's one that I'll go to when I'm having friends over or if somebody wants to impress. I did that one for Daryl Hall a lot but would do it with cauliflower grits since he doesn’t do carbs. I would take cauliflower and cook them in a consistency of grits. It's also versatile because you can take in a lot of different flavors. You can add some barbecue flair to it. You can make it spicy, you can make it mild. You can start chucking pestos in there if you want to get a little wild. Nobody's ever been upset with my shrimp and grits.
As far as something that somebody else has done, on my first tour with Paul McCartney we took off to Japan. That's the only time I've been to Japan and felt incredibly lucky to go. We were there for a little over two weeks and I feel like I just didn't sleep when I was there because the amount of stuff to see and do is overwhelming. Everything is so different and, obviously, we were working long hours and schedules. I would work a good 18, 19 hour day and be exhausted. A lot of times if you're in a random city in America you’re just exhausted and go back to the hotel but in Japan, you want to see and do everything. I would do those long 18, 19 hour days and then go find a ramen joint, get some yakitori or whatever I could find. I would just walk around and follow my nose in Japan. As far as food that I didn't necessarily understand, or even know how to recreate, I encountered a ton of it over there. The menus are in Japanese and sometimes you're ordering just by pictures. Frankly, if they didn't have pictures of their food, I don't know what I would have been eating. Sometimes even with the pictures, I didn't know what I was eating. I would just point to a picture since I was trying to go off the beaten path. When you do that, you sometimes get away from the spots that have an English menu, or anybody who speaks English, so I was just pointing at items. Sometimes I would think something was beef, maybe.
We found one little spot that went down several dark alleys and ended up following our noses to a little place. We all sat down at these little seats that were around a little bar inside. It was almost like a stage with an old Japanese woman and she was just back there carving ice cubes into perfect circles for a cocktail. We all had some shochu which was delicious. That was the drink that everybody was drinking over there and then ordered I don't know what but what showed up was this perfect little caramelized cube of pork belly with a little wasabi on it and this amazing sauce with I don't know what in it. It just melted and I have no idea what components were going on in there, but everything was just so fresh and simple. In another place, we'd asked for an English menu, since that place had one. It was a Korean barbecue kind of place and there were coals and a little grill at your table. We were ordering little slivers of wagyu beef and we would just put it on this grill and it was amazing. We had little scallops in the shell with a little knob of butter and a splash of soy sauce and we would put them on the coals and let it bake until they were simmering. It was delicious. There was also another dish that was just called delicious chicken. I have no idea, necessarily, what part of the chicken it was, and chickens only have so many parts. The delicious beef that I ordered was also aptly named. It was delicious, but with the beef I kept thinking it might be kidney fat. It's almost like a rib eye fat that you put on a grill and char. It was marinated in some sauce and it was delicious, just like a nice fatty rib eye. Japan hit me with a lot of those. I had no idea necessarily what I was eating or how to even recreate the dishes. The attention to detail that they put into everything over there was amazing. I definitely want to go back and eat through the cities again.
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What do you miss most about touring?
Honestly, I think the people and the chaos of life. It's a weird job because on Tuesday, everybody's at home in different areas of the country or world, and then on Wednesday we all converge in Cincinnati to start a six or eight month deal. A lot of the time, it’s complete strangers that you're going to be working very closely with in some form or fashion. Your whole crew could be a lot of first timers or people that know each other. A lot of people come together as strangers and leave three weeks, six weeks, two years, or however long later as family. You stay that way with a lot of people on tour. With so many of those people, you may do one gig with them and cross paths with them maybe two or three times a year, or maybe once every two or three years. When you see them again, it's always a joyful reunion of your family. I miss seeing those people regularly. There's so many surprise reunions and surprise friendships that are made. Sometimes people you don't get along with in the beginning turn out to be your best friends at the end. The whole deal of touring is organized chaos and that's been my life for most of my life. I'm a bit chaotic in general and kitchens are the same thing. If one is to just walk into a normal kitchen, and have no idea how it's run, you're not going to be able to figure it out by observing quickly. If you just look into any busy kitchen, it just looks like everybody is running around like mad. It's an organized dance that produces amazing results and it's the same thing with the gig. I always love the beauty of seeing that come together from all standpoints. It starts with clinking and clanking on the stage when they're getting all the points together to hang lights and set up the stage, all things I don't understand nor comprehend. Then I go make breakfast and swing by an hour later and find that they've got points up in the air, they're starting to get a stage built and it all starts to come together. I miss the whole process of seeing that and seeing your family do it.