Five months into his tenure as executive chef at Goldener Hirsch, Auberge Collection, Jeff O’Neill is still adjusting — physically and creatively — to a place that represents a complete departure from the environments that shaped most of his career.
One of the biggest challenges, he joked, was the altitude.
“(I had) altitude sickness that was beyond — oh my god, it took me like two months to adjust to here. I would scuba dive five days a week, so I came from below sea level,” he said.
But the appeal of Goldener Hirsch was that it pushed him out of his comfort zone. Alpine cuisine — the hotel’s speciality — was something O’Neill had rarely encountered firsthand, let alone led.
“I’ve never thought about doing Alpine cuisine. I mean, I knew it existed, but not really. Outside of here or Colorado, there are no Alpine restaurants in Miami or New York or L.A. It doesn’t exist,” he said.
So he taught himself, or rather, ChatGPT taught him “a degree in Alpine cuisine.” While the role was a divergence from his background, it fulfilled a long-standing goal to work within Auberge Collection, a company O’Neill had pursued for years while waiting for the right fit.
“Auberge stands out as the leading food and beverage-focused hotel group in the world, if you ask me. They’re so dialed in on food and beverage, that’s so important to them, the roster of chefs is crazy,” he said.
But O’Neill’s no stranger to talented chefs.
Born and raised in New Jersey, his family moved to Manhattan in New York City. He entered professional kitchens almost immediately, absorbing the discipline of fine dining long before most aspiring chefs get the chance.
“I started at a two-star Michelin restaurant washing dishes when I was 12, and then I started peeling apples, cleaning ducks, icing cakes, that kind of thing,” he said. “I worked the whole time I was in high school.”
That immersion carried him to the Culinary Institute of America along the Hudson River, where he split his time between two of New York City’s most influential kitchens.
“While I was there, I alternated weekends at Le Cirque with Daniel (Boulud) and at Aureole with Charlie Palmer,” he said. “When I graduated, I went to Aureole because Daniel was going to open some restaurant. He told me, ‘No, go to Charlie, I’ll call you when I’m ready.’ I thought he was blowing me off, for sure. I thought I didn’t make the cut, but sure as heck, when he opened, he gave me a call.”
That restaurant was Restaurant Daniel, placing O’Neill in one of the most demanding kitchens in the world at a formative age.
“When I was there, Daniel was No. 2 in the world, so it was an amazing experience. I mean, he was crazy and a real jerk — I love him to death, we’re good friends now — but have scars on my back from that man. The French accent used to give me chills,” he said. “I was in way over my head. I had a high level position because he wanted an American to be the top cook.”
Even when he attempted to leave, the mentorship became clear, even if O’Neill didn’t recognize it at the time.
“When I went to give my notice three years later, I couldn’t leave. He wouldn’t let me leave,” O’Neill said. “I was like, ‘I thought I was horrible, you tell me I’m awful every day.’”
His next move to Le Bernardin introduced a radically different leadership model.
“It was like going from a Metallica concert to Pavarotti, it was just a completely different planet, like zen, calm, everybody respects each other. No one yells. If you get upset with someone, you have to apologize after service in front of everybody,” he recalled. “I was like, ‘What is going on here?’”
After the Big Apple, O’Neill relocated to Palm Beach to helm a five-diamond restaurant at The Breakers. He still describes it as a dream job.
“It was a lost lead that goes, ‘anything it takes, spare no expense,’ one of those kinds of jobs: no food cost, no labor cost, just make it great. That’s a good job. There’s no nonsense,” O’Neill said.
Now-President Donald Trump was a regular guest during that period, and O’Neill was eventually offered an opportunity at the Mar-a-Lago Club.
“Mr. Trump and Melania used to come every other Friday for dinner, and he loved the restaurant, just loved it. So for two years, he was trying to poach me to do the same thing,” O’Neill said.
When O’Neill finally accepted — after a summer off to be with his newborn son — he found himself in over his head, again.
“He hired me to be the fine dining chef at the restaurant, and a month later, he fired the consulting team and made me the executive chef. And I told him, I said, ‘You can’t do this, I’ve never done this before. I’ve never run a property this big,’” O’Neill recalled. “So he told me to steal anybody I needed, to pay them whatever I needed to, and we’ll figure it out after the season.”
Like with Restaurant Daniel, O’Neill adapted, and the experience led to the openings of Trump’s hotels in Chicago and Las Vegas. Each earned Michelin stars within months.
“I try to be a sponge everywhere. If you want to talk about something I’ve done before, I’ll pretend I know nothing about it so I can hear how you do it,” O’Neill explained. The skill allowed him to be successful in such demanding roles. “I’m not smart enough to know that. I had to be taught that: be this way, act this way. But I was so young when I started that I was able to get those habits at a young age.”
After five years, O’Neill was on his way out and got connected with Amazon founder Jeff Bezos at Ivanka Trump’s wedding, which landed him another unexpected opportunity.
“He’s like, ‘Alright, when I move to Florida, I’ll hire you.’ He moved to Miami and he called me … I couldn’t believe it,” O’Neill said.
But while it was another dream job, O’Neill eventually realized he wanted something else.
“I should have stayed there for the rest of my life, because it was easy. He paid me really well. They were great people. You didn’t have to give menus in advance. He’d eat whatever you made. It was awesome, but I was just bored. I wanted to do another restaurant,” he said. (TB: This makes it sound like O’Neill was a private chef for Bezos, which, if true, you should explicitly state before this because until this point in the story, he was working for restaurants)
That restlessness ultimately brought him to Utah, where he tackled the revamp of the Goldener Hirsch restaurant, now The Hirsch. Not only was O’Neill tasked with redoing the menus in that signature Alpine style, but he’s also taking the skills of the kitchen to a higher level. As a leader, that means discipline, systems and humility.
“I’m a nice guy. I treat people well, and I work really hard, and I’m neat and clean. I’m a decent person, and I work really hard. I’m humble. And I think with this business, humility is everything, because once you have that ego, the learning stops,” he said.
He cares about his team, loves to laugh and takes the job seriously, he said. With his own wealth of mentors contributing to his success, O’Neill said he knows the value of being a mentor and plans to lead his kitchen that way.
“One of the things I was taught when I was younger, and I try to implement this also, is think as the brand, take yourself out of the equation,” he said. “So I hope to have everybody on the same level where we have a conversation one time, and we don’t have to talk about it again. And it will get there.”
Getting the restaurant open and operating, on such a tight four-month schedule, was a challenge — but that’s exactly what O’Neill was looking for. As for getting out of the restaurant business sometime soon? Not going to happen.
“I can’t do anything else. I can’t even change a tire. I can’t do anything,” he said with a laugh. “Everybody thinks about getting out of it. It’s an evil place to be. It’s an evil business. But I love it. I’ve never looked at the clock once, ever, 35 years, never, unless I was hungover like once or twice.”
O’Neill admitted it’s a miracle he’s still married after a lifetime of 100-hour work weeks, a testament to his wife. As for his career, a lot of it was just luck, he said.
“I was very blessed to meet the right people at a young age, and then it just kind of snowballed. I didn’t really realize what I was doing and where I was working until I left New York,” he said. “Years later, now my mentors are icons, so I’m just lucky. I was very young, and I didn’t realize at the time that I was in the best place I could possibly be.”