Gaby Melian, a renowned Latin American chef, has quickly become a phenomenon in the culinary world. She has been a professional chef for 20 years now, dedicating her life to the knowledge of food. She has had many roles in the culinary field, including an empanada vendor at street fairs, private chef, culinary instructor, Food Revolution Ambassador, and also a manager at Bon Appetit Magazine’s Test Kitchen.
“Food rescued me so many other times — not only because I sold food to survive. I cook to entertain; I cook to be liked; I cook to be loved.”
She also has written two books in her career. Her first is entitled, “Food-Related Stories.” The book was written for young adults, sharing stories of the battles and struggles she has faced in her culinary career.
Her second is called “Gaby’s Latin American Kitchen.” It’s a children’s cookbook with 70 Latin American recipes, hoping to give children what she would have wanted as a child.
While Gaby has quite a resume, let’s look at where it all started. Born and raised in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Gaby grew to love cooking by watching and helping both her mother and grandmother in the kitchen. However, despite loving to cook, she got her degree in Journalism.
In 2003, she decided to try the work-study program at the Institute of Culinary Education in New York. From then on, she knew she needed to make this her career.
Being an excellent chef is not the only thing Gaby has achieved. She is extremely popular on social media with a following of 254K followers on Instagram. She also posts recipes and tips on Youtube, here’s one of my favorites:
Chef Gaby Melian has many delicious Latin American recipes including stir fry, ratatouille, empanadas, drinks, desserts, and more! Take a look at these on her website.
I decided to try one of these recipes out, coming from someone who cannot cook at all. I made her recipe for “Easy Chicken Empanadas” and it went better than I thought it would. First, I made the filling, and as someone with no cooking talent, it looked pretty good. Here are some pictures I took of the process. (I hope you like the photo of me posing with the filling)
The baking portion definitely was more of a challenge. I had to buy the frying dough instead of the baking dough which hurt me in the end, making it a little dryer than it would have been. I added some extra oil on top before it was baked though and it made a difference. I passed them out to all my friends and they were surprised I was able to cook them. Here’s the finished product.
Here’s the recipe I used!
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