Chef put down his apron to serve after 9/11
(originally published in the San Diego Union-Tribune by Linda Mcintosh, September 3, 2005)

Cpl. Dave Krohn remembers being asked to cook Easter dinner for his company of 150 Marines in Iraq. Krohn, who is classically trained in French cuisine, welcomed the challenge.
He headed to a market in southern Iraq and sampled dozens of herbs and spices, fresh tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers and put together a menu. He couldn't read the Arabic on the ingredients, but true to his culinary training, he sampled everything.

His meal was a big hit. The main dish was fresh lamb grilled in herbs and curried spices along with potatoes fried in garlic and onion. The potato dish was so popular his buddies still talk about it now, two years later.

"You can tell the amount of work he puts into his cooking when you taste it," said Cpl. Michael Taylor. Off duty, Krohn is known as Chef Dave. He cooks gourmet fare for private parties throughout North County. Krohn, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in New York, has cooked for the Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown and would have remained a chef if it had not been for 9/11.

He joined the Marines after seeing the destruction at the Pentagon. He roller-bladed over there and offered help. "I met a man in uniform and he said if I wanted to help, I should join the military," said Krohn, 32.

Five days later, Krohn enlisted in the Marines and two months later started boot camp at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, S.C. He left behind his new cooking business called The Cooking Coach.

"It was the only thing that made sense to do," Krohn said. He was trained as an infantryman and deployed to Kuwait and later Iraq. "He put his life on hold to serve his country," Taylor said. "I really respect that."

But Krohn didn't forget about cooking. "You get creative when all you are eating are MREs (Meals Ready to Eat) that have a shelf life of 20 years," He said. Now that Krohn's tour of duty is coming to an end, he is restarting his cooking business. In his spare time, he has established a reputation."He is very committed to doing a good job and you can tell he loves what he's doing and is good at it," said Sandra Sexton Pike, owner of the Village Mill Bread Company in Del Mar. Krohn prepared a five course dinner for her birthday party of 20 people. He went to seven markets to choose the ingredients. On the morning of the party, he picked strawberries in the Carlsbad fields so they would be fresh for his rhubarb cobbler that evening.

"My cooking is not like a restaurant. I'll cook exactly what someone wants," Krohn said.

'The Cooking Coach' returns from serving country in Iraq to restart his business
(originally published in the Carmel Valley News by Adam Harju, July 7, 2005)

Easter Sunday in Nasiriyah, Iraq in 2003 was all about combat helmets and "Meals Ready to Eat MREs}," There were no "Easter Sunday best" clothing or bonnets or egg hunts. But there were fresh tomatoes and a home-cooked meal. Corporal Dave Krohn with the U.S. Marine Corps, G Company, Second Battalion, First Marine Regiment saw to that.

Krohn is a Fieuch classically-trained chef who joined the marines five days after witnessing the destruction of 9/11 first hand at the Pentagon. "I went down there [the Pentagon] to see if I could help that day and then just knew I had to join," he said.

A year and six months later, in March 2003, Krohn found himself on the border between Kuwait and Iraq fully armed and ready for combat as part of the initial invasion force into Iraq. "The night before we went in we started taking SCUDs and had to constantly mask up in case of biological attack,'" Krohn said.

The next day they were flown in to Umm Qasar and within 10 minutes on the ground were returning fire. His battalion lost one man that day.

Within days his company moved into Nasiriyah. "We went in at night and it was no holds barred. We went in guns blazing and by the nest morning the Iraqis were bringing us tea." Krohn said.

Major combat slowed considerably after that, he said, with their missions converting to patrols and humanitarian aid efforts.

By the time Krohn joined the Marines back home he had already graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in High Plains, N.Y. He was trained by the best in the business to cook French, Spanish, American and Italian cuisine.

His informal training had begun when he was a kid working for a catering company in Connecticut. By the time he was 18 he was an experienced sous chef handling weddings, graduations and social gatherings.

Years later, after graduating from the Culinary Institute, and sifting through 40 job offers, he went to work first in Terrytown, N.Y., at "The Castle" before exploring a job offer in Las Vegas at the Four Seasons. He decided Las Vegas was not his kind of town so he ended up in Washington, D.C. working at a Spanish food restaurant called Taberna del Albadalejo. "I learned so much about Spanish food and wine during my seven months there," Krohn said.

After a brief stint with the Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown, District of Columbia, Krohn started his own cooking school called "The Cooking Coach." That business was just getting on its feet when the terrorist attack occurred.

Over a year later, and despite the fact he was in the heart of a war zone thousands of miles from home, his reputation as a chef caught up with him. "I was on post [in Iraq] actually armed with a machine gun keeping my eye out when I got a call that I was needed." Krohn said.

He was dispatched with a detachment of four other Marines to a market place in Nasiriyah. "Being Marines we actually deployed at the market and I was able to go shopping," Krohn said.

He delighted in the fresh produce and the spices and the way the Iraqi people opened up to him and let him taste spices and liquids. "All the bottles had Arabic on them, so if it looked like vinegar, they would let me taste it and that's how I figured out what to get," Krohn said.

By that time it was pretty clear the Americans had taken over and Saddam Hussein was gone, so Krohn did not fear too much for the safety of himself and the other Marines at the market.

Back at his company command post, armed with fresh lamb, Iraqi curry and mounds of native flat bread, and fresh tomatoes, Krohn set out to make Easter dinner for 150 in his company. Separating all of the usable items in hundreds of prepackaged MREs, Krohn spread out the packaging insides for use as a sterile surface to prepare his master work, "One squad at a time I fed the entire company," he said.

Apparently the potato dish with garlic, onions, salt and pepper, and the Iraqi version of olive oil he prepared was the favorite among the Marines.

In July 2003, Krohn went home for a time before being deployed a second rime to Iraq from February to October 2004. The second time around was drastically different, he said. During the invasion the year before there was not support infrastructure for the Marines, they just went in with what they had on their backs. But during his second deployment there were bases and "chow lines." His cooking wasn't in demand as much, though he and his fellow squad members were able to acquire some live chickens to slaughter and grill. He remembers all the different rices and especially the dumplings. The thing Krohn remembers most about that second deployment, though, was the intensity of the combat. "We fought the whole time and the combat was much, much more intense," he said.

He was stationed near Fallujah then, where a three-day firefight in a cemetery there was recognized as the most intense engagement of urban warfare ever. Though Krohn wasn't involved in that battle, his friend John Place received a Silver Star for his role.

Now that he is home and has a mere 55 days left in the Marines, Krohn is ready to pick up where his life left off the day that airliner flew into the Pentagon.

'The Cooking Coach," is back to share his culinary skills, but is now a West Coast transplant. "This is home," said Krohn about North San Diego County. "When I was in Iraq I dreamed about the beaches of San Diego County."

Right now he is getting jobs as a personal chef to clients in their homes to cook for parties, social engagements and special occasions. Krohn just worked the 50th birthday party of Sandra Sexton-Pike, who owns the Village Mill Bread Co. in Carmel Valley (Del Mar Highlands Town Center). "I just have a lot of fun as long as I am cooking." he said.

He hopes to eventually reopen his cooking school as well, with a storefront in the area. Krohn doesn't want to run a restaurant, he wants a team of chefs under him to help teach culinary skills in the
area.

But until he gets out of the Marines, Krohn is available to cook for just about any type of event. He cooks everything from scratch, complete with carrying out the shopping. Prices vary, depending on what a customer wants. He will only prepare the best though, he says. "I'm a food dork, I want to create an experience and I have a commitment to not cutting corners," Krohn said.