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CONCORD, New Hampshire (AP) - As tempting as it may be to see the Obama family's choice of a new chef at the White House as a competition among celebrity chefs, former White House chefs say the job is about selfless service, not star power.
Walter Scheib, White House executive chef for Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, believes there's a 90-percent chance the new administration will stick with the current chef, Cristeta Comerford, a Filipino-American.
And if the Obamas do hire someone new, it won't be a television personality or any of the celebrity names bandied about on food and political blogs, he says.
"None of these people have any idea what the job is about," Scheib says. "And they're temperamentally not suited for it. You have to be a person who has a real heart of service, and it can't be someone who needs to see themselves on camera."
Roland Mesnier, who retired in 2004 after 25 years as the White House's executive pastry chef, will never recommend a TV chef for the first family.
Celebrity chefs are entertainers
"Celebrity chefs, in my book, are not chefs. They're entertainers," Mesnier says. "All these people on TV? Forget it."
Comerford was a food technology major from the University of the Philippines.
A naturalized US citizen, she was born Cristeta Gomez Pasia in 1962 to Honesto, an assistant principal in a public elementary school in Manila, and Erlinda, a homemaker.
First female executive chef
Comerford studied at the Padre Gomez Elementary School in Sta. Cruz, Manila, and finished her secondary education at Manila Science High School.
In 2005, under the administration of President George W. Bush, she became the first female executive chef at the White House.
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