Chef Aaron Moran

From an early age i always enjoyed cooking. My father was a large inspiration for me to pursue a career in food, as he was an avid cook and a large part of my upbringing was learning to live off the land and use natures larder to provide our produce. After a stint as a teen working as a dishwasher and cook at mom and pop establishments and truck stops I moved to Seattle to pursue my career as a chef. I worked at Sharis and Anthonys on the waterfront in Seattle and became very serious about becoming a chef, enrolling in Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts at 25. Culinary School was a fantastic experience that taught me classic French cooking techniques and expanded my view of what food could be. During culinary school for my required externship I worked at Pintxos Tapas Restaurant and completed my schooling through work experience. Eventually completing the program with a Bachelor’s Degree in Culinary Arts and Hospitality Management. I continued working at Pintxos and helped the restaurant obtain a reputation for one of the best restaurants in Belltown. After that I chose to do seasonal work and ending up working at Jenny Lake Lodge in the Grand Teton National Park for a season, during which it was reviewed and received five stars from the New York Times. After that due to family constraints I moved back to Wyoming to help care for my father that was battling MS. During this time i worked as a breakfast cook at a local diner where i made a name for myself cooking daily soups from scratch, eventually obtaining a large repertoire of from scratch soup recipes that turned into a cookbook that i published myself in 2014. I then got a job through Sodexo and worked my way up there ladder from cook all the way to executive chef by the time i was 33, running that operation successfully. In 2020, due to the pandemic i once again started doing seasonal work and my first job for that stretch was being the AM lead cook at the luxury resort Turpin Meadow Ranch, where i worked for a summer season and met my wife. After that I worked at numerous other lodges and resorts from Montana, Utah, Colorado and as far as Georgia. My next main gig was as the Executive Chef at Red Canyon Lodge, where i worked for four consecutive seasons making new menus and running the kitchen for a high end resort. During this time i worked there during the summer and took seasonal jobs in Colorado working as a personal chef to cater for high end clients, worked as a Sous chef at a renowned BBQ spot, Sous Chef at Mambo Italiano, and Lodge Chef at a hunting resort in Georgia. Recently I was Executive Chef at Snowgoose Grill in St Marys Montana.