Chef Cindy leads the way: Cindy Pawlcyn puts her stamp on Monterey Bay Aquarium culinary program

Growing up the youngest sibling in a large family in rural Minneapolis, young Cindy was steered toward music by her mom. But she couldn't carry a tune ... so she picked up a spatula instead.

By age 13 she was taking classes at a local cooking school and catering parties in her neighborhood.

"I think it was something I could excel in and it was making people happy, so it was very encouraging," said Pawlcyn, who eventually ended up defining Wine Country cuisine, opening Mustards Grill in Napa Valley in 1983, followed two years later by the equally iconic Fog City Diner in San Francisco. Today she owns three Napa-area restaurants, just finished her fifth cookbook (in 2001 her "Mustards Grill Napa Valley Cookbook" won the James Beard Foundation Award), and is now running the culinary program at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, where her advocacy for ocean health and farm-to-table cuisine marry with the beliefs of the MBA and its Seafood Watch program.

This weekend Pawlcyn will steer her new team through her first Cooking for Solutions, the annual event that helps consumers discover how their choices protect the health of soil, water and ocean wildlife.

Pawlcyn spoke with The Herald at length about her upbringing (she was raised by a Russian/Austrian father and a German/Norwegian mother and she never had frozen dinners), her passion for pleasing people through food ("it triggered something in me early on") and her successful career as a chef, restaurateur and trendsetter.

Q: What brought you to the kitchen so young?

A: I had older siblings that could paint and draw and play piano so much better than me, because they were all much older than me. So I started cooking to make my dad happy, making him things he wanted and needed. My little trick.

Q: What were your thoughts when the aquarium hired you, and how do you think your style and beliefs fit with the MBA culture?

A: I had been going to the aquarium since it opened, because I was down here for Rio Grill (Pawlcyn once owned the Carmel restaurant). And I absolutely love animals and I always have. It's quite a process to be selected, cooking for the board and cooking for (aquarium executive director) Julie (Packard), both sides making sure we were all on the same page. It's a great opportunity to get to cook in such a beautiful place. I love to garden (she tends a half-acre garden at her St. Helena home), and all the things that are important to me are important to them, and I'm really excited.

Q: What's coming down the pike at the aquarium regarding the food program?

A: We're going to to redesign and remodel, and make sure the food service is much more user friendly and speaks to the whole need of taking care of the oceans and taking care of the earth and paying attention to what's really important. We need to keep the land clean and the oceans clean because they are so intertwined. Can you imagine eating the last bluefin tuna in the ocean, how horrible that would be? One of my missions is to make sure sardines and anchovies are more appealing. I'm committed to making more people feel that way.

Q: Any truth to the rumor that a fine-dining concept will happen at the aquarium?

A: We've been talking a lot about it. There is much to consider, whether there will be a separate entrance, a member's entrance or some way of allowing people without the time for the whole aquarium experience to come for the dining. So that's part of what we're working on for the new project. It's an area that everyone's excited about as we move forward.

Q: What are your feelings going into your first Cooking for Solutions event?

A: Very excited and a little bit nervous. It's a big thing. I want to do well and make sure everyone's happy and that the message comes across loud and clear. I love being around chefs. We feed off each other. The collaborative environment is really inspirational. A lot of us are into sustainability and sometimes that's a hard sell. People want what they want sometimes, so its nice to be with like-minded people.

Q: How much time do you spend on the Peninsula and at the aquarium, and what did you do to build a team at MBA to carry out your vision?

A: I've been visiting in fits and spurts because I was working on my fifth cookbook, but I'm glad I'm done with that and it's behind me so now I can spend more time. Usually it's about every 10 days I'll be down working the kitchen and dining room crews. And it's cooking food and getting on the same page and re-familiarizing myself with the purveyors in that area, getting them into the aquarium, trying to work with the sustainable fishery people to help, for example, get Monterey Bay calamari in a better, healthier way (much of our local squid is shipped to and processed in China). A lot of it isn't harvested in the right way, destroying the bottom of the sea.

Q: The farm-to-table concept has really caught, but a lot of restaurants have more food waste now. Do you think composting is a must for these types of restaurants, so it's farm to table back to farm?

A: We're doing a lot of here in the valley, and it's one of the areas I'm looking forward getting involved in (in Monterey). Composting all wet waste, it's wonderful. What's so great about this is that you can have post-consumer waste as well as kitchen scraps. So all our bones after stock, the butter off the tables, everything, all the salt goes into compost. We've worked out systems to compost at certain temperatures to make sure everything's safe, so that's been fun. Mustard's waste has reduced by 70 percent from what used to go into the landfill. It's pretty impressive when you actually do it.

Q: Your life is already pressure-packed, what was your experience like on the fast-paced, competitive Top Chef Masters? (24 contestants competed, with Chicago chef Rick Bayless winning).

A: It's surprising — as I've gotten older, I'm much less competitive than I was. It was like our little group became a team and we enjoyed working together. We had a really good time and we've all done other things for charity since then.

Q: What is your favorite guilty pleasure food?

A: Potato chips with chip dip. My dad used to make potato chips for a living so I think they are in my hard-wiring. I used to buy the onion soup mix when I was a kid and now I make my own; green onion and chive and cilantro dip. It's not that bad but it's not exactly health food.

Q: Do you cook at home in your down time, and is it still fun?

A: I still cook all the time. It's what I love to do. I just love it. I love reading cookbooks and designing menus and trying new things (her personal culinary library now exceeds 5,000 books). I love trying to impress my husband and stepkids, or surprising friends. And there are always new toys. I got one of those (Big Green) Eggs this year, a barbecue-smoker, so that's been a great hit. We're trying to do everything in there, from Indian food to basic American barbecue brisket.

Q: Do you sense more women in restaurant kitchens, owning their own businesses, and breaking through the glass ceiling of the male-dominated food world?

A: Not really. I was kind of pondering that today at the commencement (she gave the address to recent graduates of the Culinary Institute of America campus in St. Helena). There was a huge number of culinary graduates who are female, but they seem to disappear at some point in time. I'm thinking maybe it's the family situation. When you end up having children, then your priorities change and your desires change. Forty-five years ago when I applied to the Culinary Institute, they wouldn't take me because they had already filled their quota of women for the next three years. Now it's 75 percent female and I was surprised at all the smiling faces that were girls. It's changed a lot but I don't know where they are disappearing to. I did note that the instructors (five males and one female) is about the ratio in the industry.

Q: Why is America so fat?

A: Part of it is what our government subsidizes. We are not supporting small, organic neighborhood farms but large corn farmers and industrialized food. People are struggling and both parents need to work now. I understand they have to pick up kids, come home harried, and lot of time they don't have the energy to cook, so they go for convenience.

Q: And you can buy two burgers for a buck ...

A: Well, I wouldn't call them burgers, they may look like hamburgers. People aren't critical enough of what they put in their bodies. And that's why (fast food is) so successful. But it's not processed in a nice way and not good for you. I think Michelle Obama is on the right track (with her organic White House garden), but sometimes it's baby steps. It's supply and demand. I'd rather cook at the aquarium than open another restaurant just to reach a broader audience. so many young people and children there (at the aquarium). If I can reach 10 kids I'd be happy.

Q: It's still an uphill battle, though, right?

A: Yes, but when you make your successes it's huge, you know? It's great payback