- Chef Kieron Hales crafts custom farm-to-table menus for elegant barn weddings at Zingerman's Cornman Farms in Dexter, Michigan.
- The British-born Michelin-starred chef has lived in 27 countries, cooked for presidents and royalty, and now calls Michigan home.
- His favorite food memory — his mother's crepe cannelloni — inspires how he helps couples create their own culinary traditions.
For Kieron Hales, food is a time machine. A single dish can transport him back to his childhood — to his father at the candy store, or his mother's kitchen where she transformed leftovers into dozens of different meals.
“Both my parents have passed away and food to me is that time-travel device,” he said. “I can go back to be with my dad at that candy store, eating rope apple candy and [drinking] dandelion and burdock.” His most cherished dish is his mother’s crepe cannelloni. It’s a labor-intensive lasagna-like creation of crepes stuffed with bolognese and baked in bechamel sauce.
“That's like being with my mother in the home kitchen, and I feel like I'm 6 or 7 years old doing that,” he said about making the dish now.
Hales is a Michelin-starred chef who has cooked for presidents and royalty at establishments including the three-Michelin-star Paul Bocuse in France, Dal Pescatore in Italy, and The French Laundry in California. But he calls his current role the most fulfilling job he's ever had.
He's executive chef at Zingerman's Cornman Farms in Dexter, Michigan, a farmhouse and event space with a restored red barn on the property. He works with couples to create custom menus, crafting farm-to-table meals or recreating family favorites, and provides them with the recipes to keep.
“Imagine being able to stand around a kitchen table with your significant other, with your kids, and be able to remake the thing that you had at your wedding,” he said. “That's a pretty wonderful place to be.”
Early in his career, Hales said, he was chasing recognition from fellow chefs, but over time his priorities shifted.
Hales recalled the moment he realized he didn’t know where the food he was cooking came from. “I remember feeling so stupid,” he said. “All of a sudden I was like, ‘wow, I really don't understand the farm or the person where it came from.’ And it started to change my mind.”
Then, Hales met Ari Weinzweig, co-founder of Zingerman’s, while working in London. Later, the two did a visioning session together that planted the seed for Cornman Farms, which opened in 2014.
“I just wanted to cook really good food that made people emotional and took them back,” he said.
That kind of experience is what he wants couples at Cornman Farms to have — not just at their wedding, but throughout their life. It’s why he gives them the recipes for the food he creates at their wedding.
“I want food that you can interact with for the rest of your life,” he said. “We did a wedding last weekend and they had polenta. I want them to make that polenta next month. And they're like, ‘Oh, when I eat that polenta, it's like being at my wedding again.’”
Making food in this way also helps him connect with his children, just as he connected with his mother in her kitchen. “I think we finally have decided what the Hales household brownie is. It's not as good as Zingerman's Bakehouse brownie, but it's ours, which is kind of fun.”
Hales is glad he got the many years of fine dining experience, but prefers what he’s doing now - making food memories. “I want my kids to remember rolling fresh pasta with me in the kitchen, making that [family] brownie,” he said. “That's a very powerful thing.”
