Exerpts from the ELLSWORTH AMERICAN newspaper
Written by Jennifer Osborn
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Everyday Gourmet
ELLSWORTH — Former Riverside Café co-owner Barbara Guida has found a new life as a personal chef after more than a decade in the restaurant business.
Guida has been cooking for nearly 30 years, including 14 years at the Riverside Café, which she and her sister Beth Fendl founded in 1992. The sisters sold the popular restaurant to Leon Harrington in 2006.
“Honestly, I didn’t think I was going to keep cooking,” Guida said.
But, Fendl suggested Guida start a personal chef business, which began a year ago.
“It kind of lit a fire,” Guida said. “I got really excited about it again.”
Guida just returned from a two-week job in Florida cooking for a family who spends a month in Northeast Harbor each summer.
The family learned about Guida when their nanny was telling a clerk at a Whole Foods Market in Florida that she was looking for a personal chef in Maine. A woman standing behind the nanny in line gave her the name of someone in Maine who suggested Guida.
The family entertains frequently so Guida really enjoys her work for them.
“The dinner party stuff is fun because I like to do hors d’oeuvres.”
On a monthlong stint cooking for the family, Guida said she took just two days off, cooking new dinners daily.
“I don’t think I ever repeated anything, which they really liked — that’s where the Food Network helps. I get a lot of great ideas from it. I’m addicted to the cooking channel,” she said.
. . . .
Guida’s first job cooking came at 19 after spending a summer waitressing at a large, grand hotel, which had several restaurants, including a four-star. She didn’t care for the waitressing so when the summer ended Guida asked the Austrian chef if she could work in the kitchen. He agreed. “…And I never left,” she said and laughed.
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