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Karen Lasher, Chef Owner
Karen is passionate about bringing people together over good food and fellowship. She grew up in a rural Oregon community where the land and its harvest were always present on the table, canned in the pantry or packaged in the freezer. Karen recalls her first job as a young girl in the strawberry fields. While in college Karen took a job with the university catering department where she first found her professional niche. At the same time, Karen fell in love with entertaining.
Her career in foodservice has included managing the catering department and dining halls at Western Washington University, managing the corporate dining facility for Bon Appetit Management Company at Silicon Graphics, and managing a fine dining restaurant in Hudson, Ohio.
In 2004 Karen and her family returned to the Northwest. She opened a personal chef business in Camas, where the idea for Around the Table began taking root. As a mother and wife of an elementary school teacher, Karen wanted to find a way to help other busy families gather around the table once again. Although not formally trained, Karen has 20 years of experience in and around the kitchen and a lifetime of passion for food.
Christiane Smith, Chef de Cuisine
Christiane was born into cooking. "One of my earliest memories is helping my grandmother pit cherries we picked from the tree in her backyard. I was happy enough to eat them straight from the tree, but she showed me how to make a simple sauce for homemade dumplings. I was three or four," Christiane says. "Everyone on both sides of my family cooks. Gathering around the table is an important part of my family history."
Christiane's career started at the age of 14 as a table busser at Pasquale's Italian Restaurant. Since then she has worked in the hospitality industry in just about every capacity, eventually working her way up the ladder to Executive Chef at The MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, N.H.
And while she greatly values her formal education from the French Culinary Institute in New York and kitchen stints under the direction of chefs such as Mario Batali, Jacques Pepin and Charlie Palmer, she feels it is her extensive travels that have given her the deepest appreciation for food and its unique ability to bring people together.
Amy McFall Prince, "Gal Friday"
Amy connected with Karen Lasher over a shared philosophy of the importance food and the table have in our lives.
Amy's professional background is writing, and her lifelong passion has been food and culture.
She grew up in Oklahoma watching her mother prepare the humble meals of her own childhood such as fried chicken, pinto beans and ham hock and fish fried in Saltine cracker crumbs. By the time she was in high school, she was the cook in her family's home. Amy believes strongly that food is the best reflection of culture. She enjoys traveling and believes the best way to discover a country and its people is over a meal.
Amy is passionate about bringing people back to the dinner table to celebrate their own family's past and present.
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