Thomas Keller was born on the 14th October 1955 in Camp Pendleton, Oceanside, California, USA, and is a restaurateur, chef and writer on cooking, best known for his award-winning restaurant The French Laundry in Yountville, California. Keller was Best Chef in California in 1996 and also Best Chef in America in 1997. Thanks to his cooking and entrepreneurial skills, Keller has significantly increased his net worth.
Have you ever wondered how rich Thomas Keller is, as of mid-2016? According to authoritative sources, it has been estimated that Thomas Keller’s net worth is as high as $30 million, mostly garnered through his career as a chef and restaurant owner, however, Keller’s cookbooks have also generated more money to his account.
Thomas Keller Net Worth $30 Million
Thomas helped his mother in the restaurant when the sous chef was sick and unable to work. There he learned the basics of a restauranteur, and after the family had moved to Palm Beach, Florida following his parents’ divorce, Thomas started as a dishwasher at the Palm Beach Yacht Club and quickly went forward to become a cook. Keller later moved to Long Island to work as a cook, before Master Chef Roland Henin discovered him and employed him to prepare meals for the staff at The Dunes Club.
Keller went back to Florida and later New York where he worked at a small restaurant called La Rive for three years before he moved to Paris after the owners of La Rive refused to sell the restaurant to him. Thomas returned to the US in 1984, and was immediately hired as chef de cuisine at La Reserve in New York where he stayed for nearly three years, and then moved to Rakel, a French restaurant at Wall Street. His net worth was building all the time.
He left Rakel at the end of the 80’s and worked as a chef and consultant in various restaurants in New York and Los Angeles, but in 1992, he came up with an idea to buy the old French steam laundry in Yountville, California and turn it into a restaurant. Keller managed to raise $1.2 million thanks to investors and acquaintances, and bought the restaurant in 1994. Over the course of the next decade, the French Laundry became one of the best known in California, earning numerous awards including Michelin Guide three stars and Mobil Guide five stars.
Thomas and his brother Joseph, who is owner/chef of Josef’s in Las Vegas, opened Bouchon restaurant in 1998, located only a couple of minutes away from the French Laundry, and later they established Bouchon Bakery as well. In 2004, Keller opened another two restaurants: Bouchon in Las Vegas and Per Se in New York. His latest restaurant is an ad hoc establishment opened in 2006 in Yountville as a temporary solution until Keller could find a location for his hamburger and wine restaurant, but later decided to make it permanent due to its high popularity.
Thomas Keller also owned small olive oil company by the name of EVO, Inc. in 1992, and was involved in various food related establishments. Keller wrote his debut cookbook in 1999 called “The French Laundry Cookbook”,and later published “Bouchon” (2004), “Under Pressure: Cooking Sous Vide” (2008), “Ad Hoc at Home” (2009), and “Bouchon Bakery” (2012).
Regarding his personal life, since 2009 Thomas Keller has been engaged to the former general manager at the French Laundry and his longtime girlfriend, Laura Cunningham.
