Last Wednesday, First Lady Jill Biden announced that White House Executive Chef Cristeta Comerford would be retiring at the end of the week after nearly three decades of cooking for five presidents, first families, and foreign dignitaries.
While Comerford spent almost 30 years in the White House kitchen, preparing dishes for the Clintons, Bushes, Obamas, Trumps, and Bidens, the chef’s roots are overseas. Comerford was born in Manila in the Philippines, where she studied food science at the University of the Philippines in Quezon City before moving to the US in 1983 and becoming a naturalized American Citizen.
Before her time in the White House, Comerford refined her culinary skills while working at hotels in Chicago as a “salad girl,” as well as a chef in two Washington, DC restaurants. She even spent some time in Austria, training in French culinary techniques while working as a chef in Le Ciel in Vienna.
Joining the White House in 1995 as part of President Bill Clinton’s White House staff as an assistant chef under Executive Chef Walter Scheib III, Comerford was eventually promoted to executive chef by former First Lady Laura Bush in 2005, ahead of about 450 applicants for the role and went through, what Comerford described, as a final “cook off” round.
It was Comerford’s handling of an official dinner for 134 guests that year, honoring Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, that made her a favorite for the executive chef role. And Comerford’s promotion marked her as the first-ever woman to hold the title in the White House.
The chef’s new position in the White House was quite a distance away from her first job at a Sheraton Hotel near the Windy City’s O’Hare airport, where she garnered a nickname from her older brother Juanito Pasia, who stated in 2005, “That’s what I called her, ‘salad girl.’”
Comerford’s responsibilities as the White House executive chef included designing and executing menus for state dinners, social events, holiday functions, receptions, and official luncheons.
During her time in the position, Comerford has led her culinary team in preparing not only day-to-day family meals but also important public events, overseeing a team of three sous chefs and executive pastry chef, Susie Morrison, through the Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations. She has prepared 54 state dinners, which are large-scale operations that begin six months in advance of the event. In 2014, Comerford planned a dinner event for 50 African leaders that incorporated ingredients from their homelands.
“To be a White House chef, it’s really your temperance that really counts for a lot. Because it’s not just your knowledge and your skills and the way you cook—it has to be the way you treat people, the way you delegate your work, the way you put your team as a cohesive force,” Comerford stated in a 2014 interview. The chef further added, “At any point in time that you cook for the first family and cook for the president of the United States, it’s such a humbling experience.”
In a tribute post on X, Spanish-American Michelin-star chef and restauranter José Andrés shared, “You are a national treasure, a culinary diplomat who has shown the world how an immigrant can celebrate American food & share it with the world’s leaders… for almost 30 years!”
Following the announcement of her retirement, First Lady Jill Biden expressed gratitude and praise for the chef, stating, “I always say, food is love. Through her barrier-breaking career, Chef Cris has led her team with warmth and creativity and nourished our souls along the way. With all our hearts, Joe and I are filled with gratitude for her dedication and years of service.”
