In the high volume kitchens of the Excalibur Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas where nights would be so busy that tickets would race off the printer at nerve racking speeds that would push a person almost to the breaking point and then subsiding as the last satisfied diner received their meal. From there he moved to the JW Marriot Summerlin Resort on the other side of town where he spent time in the Ceres Restaurant.

There he was given the reigns to utilize a palette trained at an early age dining in restaurants around the country playing the “Identify the ingredients and reproduce it at home” game with his mother. Crafting nightly specials utilizing some of the finest ingredients in the world came shortly after allowing his creativity in the kitchen to come to the forefront, shine, and enthrall guests with the complex layering of flavors and seasonings that have become his signature style.

After meeting his future wife in Las Vegas, he moved to Maui to start a family, and to learn in the kitchens of Chef Roy Yamaguchi, one of the fathers of Pacific Rim cuisine. “It was a great experience using ingredients from all over Asia that I’d never seen or heard of before” says Tony. The executive chef, quickly realizing his talents, soon had him engineering nightly specials that soon found their way onto menus.

From there he went to the Ritz Carlton in Maui. It was here that he had the opportunity to work on events such as the Mercedes Open and the Kapalua Wine and Food Festival and find himself paired with a virtual cavalcade of star chefs that included Ming Tsai, Alan Wong, Charlie Trotter, Joel Antunes, and David Paul Johnson as he quickly made monumental leaps from to lead cook, jr sous chef and within a year and a half Chef de Cuisine of the Terrace Restaurant. Again his refinement shown through in menus that featured dishes from delicately tea smoked kurobota pork loin with braised apples and cabbage to foamy green asparagus soup drizzled with truffle oil and accompanied by a farmhouse white cheddar “melt”.

After his stint at the Ritz Carlton he moved to Palm Beach Florida and into the kitchens of world renowned chef Daniel Boulud. There he learned absolute perfection from one of the world’s true masters of culinary arts. Again, however he was drawn back into the Marriott family at the Harbor Beach Marriott where he manned the helm at Riva and in turn began his culinary relationship with Chef Dean James Max.