For Andaluca chef, it's all about giving

Long before Wayne Johnson ever thought of being a chef, he liked hanging out in the kitchen.

"When the family would get together, that's where they knew to find me, in the kitchen with my mom and her sisters, doing the dishes or whatever," says Johnson, who has spent the past four years in the kitchen at Andaluca, a little corner of the Mediterranean, conveniently located (for Seattleites) in the Mayflower Park Hotel downtown.

That's a long time for Johnson to have cooked in the same kitchen. He grew up in a peripatetic family, thanks to his dad's job as an Army tank commander. A military career never appealed to Johnson, however: "I figured I did my 20 years with him."

Cooking was something he did to put himself through college at the University of Northern Colorado, where he majored in accounting. At age 21, he moved to Vail to work for the Marriott Corporation.

"Before then I never thought of cooking as a career. But in Vail, I met Tom Walker, a chef who came out from L.A., and he was always having fun. All the other chefs that I'd known up until then were really tough and not very polished around the edges. I loved cooking, but I wanted that fun. When I saw I could have both, that's when I decided I really wanted to be a chef."

He took advantage of Marriott's intensive chef/management training program to move up through the ranks, and eventually found himself in the San Francisco Bay area.

"It's a very thorough program, I still think it's one of the best in the industry. I felt obligated to pay them back," says Johnson, who stayed with the company for nearly 16 years.

He became known as an "opener." After launching three new restaurants back-to-back for Marriott, he landed at the Parc 55 in San Francisco.

"A year after I joined, they decided to redo the whole concept," he recalls. "It would have been just like opening a new restaurant, and I decided I didn't want to do that again."

So when Paul Ishii, general manager of the Mayflower Park Hotel, called about the job as executive chef at Andaluca, the timing was right. Johnson's interest in Mediterranean cuisine had already been honed through a course of study at Greystone, the Culinary Institute of America's Napa branch. He had found a cuisine he felt comfortable interpreting, and the idea of being executive chef at an established restaurant like Andaluca "felt good." He also liked the supportive, close-knit community of chefs he found in Seattle. Four years later, it has turned out to be the longest job of his career.

"I love it here. I've settled in," says the soft-spoken 45-year-old, with a slight air of amazement. "I realized it takes me about a year to get comfortable, to get all the bugs out of the system, and another year to get everything to where you want to drive it. That 2-½ -year point is when I would always start to get bored.

"But what happens in the third year, I've discovered, is that it starts to feel like family. I've got cooks that have been with me two or three years now, my sous-chef's been with me four. I'd never gotten to that point before."

His tenure has created a sort of comfort zone that allows him to devote more time to giving back to the community, something that he's always done.

"I think we grew up with the idea of helping," he says. "I remember when we were Boy Scouts, me and my brother would visit people at an assisted-living home. Some of those people were just put there, no one came to visit them. I remember the joy on their faces to have someone just sit there and play cards with them."

Community involvement was so important to him that, he says, "One of the questions I asked Marie and Birney Dempcy, owners of the Mayflower Park Hotel, at our interview was if they supported the community. I was impressed with their track record."

The first two years at Andaluca, Johnson didn't do much outside the hotel. "I didn't feel confident enough to be away. Now I can say to my staff, 'if anything goes wrong, give me a call.' I have a good team backing me here and the support of the owners. You'll probably see us doing a lot more."

Giving back to the community

According to the Washington Restaurant Association, roughly nine out of 10 restaurants actively participate in community activities. Like Johnson, many Seattle-area chefs offer their time and talents to benefit institutions like the James Beard Foundation, March of Dimes, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center and Share Our Strength, or FareStart, the local program that trains the homeless for jobs in the food industry. But Johnson "gives back" in other, less glitzy ways, as well.

Shoppers at the West Seattle Farmers Market last month watched him whip up "North African risotto," a saffron, cinnamon and cumin-enhanced rice dish that calls for artichoke hearts, garbanzo beans, currants and squash. He does many cooking demonstrations around town, not just to promote Andaluca, but because he wants to teach people how to use fresh ingredients.

He cooks a holiday feast for seniors at the Admiral Assisted Living facility near his West Seattle home, and in the aftermath of Sept. 11, instituted a holiday tradition of feeding firefighters at several fire stations in the downtown area.

The hotel typically underwrites the food costs for these events, and Johnson and other staffers donate their time and energy. "When we do something off-site, the hotel employees and even the executive committee pitch in and help dish out food," says the chef. "I used to have to promise days off to get helpers, now I don't even have to ask."

Their efforts have earned Andaluca and the Mayflower Park numerous public-service awards, most recently, a national community service achievement award given by the 11,000-member American Hotel and Lodging Association.

Johnson is particularly apt to get involved in programs for young people. Four times a year he cooks for the "Come Clean Dinner" at the University Family YMCA, a weekly event that provides homeless teens and young adults with a free meal, a shower, toiletries, medical aid and counseling. In the winter, he'll cook them a homestyle meal, such as turkey with gravy or baked ham. In the summer, it might be chili dogs and potato salad. He makes apple pie or cookies for dessert.

"The joy on their faces is good to see, and they are so polite," says Johnson of the 30 to 40 young people who typically show up to shower and eat. "For whatever reason — they dropped out of school, or ran out of money, or are too ashamed, or just don't want to go back home — these kids tried to make it on their own and ended up on the street somehow. My thought is if they get a taste of home cooking, maybe ... " He shrugs. "As a father, you just hope there will be somebody out there, reaching out to your kids if they need help."

His own two boys, Anders, 8, and Tony, 12, live in Michigan with their mother, but spend all summer in Seattle with dad.

"It's tough having them so far away, but I don't focus on the time they're not here, I focus on the time I'm with them," he says. Johnson shortens his work schedule in the summer to make the most of their time together. This year, both boys enrolled in a cooking camp at the Blue Ribbon Cooking School, where dad is also an instructor.

Johnson says he doesn't try to steer his sons in any career direction, but last year when someone asked Tony what he wanted to do when he grows up he answered, "be a chef."

"That was the first I'd heard of it," says his dad.

"And he's good," boasts this proud papa. "He handles a knife real well, makes stocks and sauces. He always wants to come to the restaurant and hang out with the cooks. I told him if this is what you want to do, I'll teach you all the basics. As you grow up you can make your decision, but you can always use these skills."

Cooking skills, life lessons

Cooking skills are important life skills, believes Johnson, which is why he participates in the fledgling Emerald Chef Youth Academy. Developed by Seattle-based Hope Heart Institute, a nonprofit cardiovascular research and education organization, the four-week after-school nutrition and health program takes aim at combating obesity in children.

Pilot programs ran last year in the Rainier Valley, sponsored by Powerful Schools, and at Pathfinders School in West Seattle, sponsored by Seattle Parks and Rec. If funding comes through, both programs will be offered again this school year.

Emerald Chef targets low-income youth and youth of color because health disparities in the United States are greatest among these populations, making them among the most likely to develop poor health conditions.

"We offer education and intervention at a young age for children most at risk for illnesses like heart disease and diabetes," explains program director Kristine Wong.

For one hour each week, through field trips, hands-on activities and at-home projects, kids exercise, meet farmers, celebrate culture and prepare traditional ethnic cuisine, learning first-hand about whole foods and how a healthy environment supports a healthy body.

"Our hope is that by educating a group as young as 8- to 12-year-olds, they will develop good, lifelong habits," says Naomi Kakiuchi, a registered dietician who got Johnson involved with Emerald Chef. "Wayne has such a sense of fun that he makes it easy for people to engage with him and with the food."

"They're learning about nutrition from Naomi, and I teach about food, how to cook and handle knives," says Johnson. "But from my point of view, I'm also teaching them life skills. 'Clean as you go' and 'everything in its place' goes a lot further than just when you're cooking. Little things like that can be important."

Johnson doesn't volunteer so that he can see his name, or Andaluca's, in the media, but if his participation brings attention to worthwhile programs like Emerald Chef, that's a bonus.

"I just think helping people is the thing to do. I don't think twice. It's only an hour. Even if you're busy, busy, busy, everyone has an hour," he says.

Providence Cicero: providencecicero@aol.com