We’re so grateful to this team of amazing chefs!
Tony Burris
With over a decade in the culinary industry, Tony serves as the Director of Culinary Experience at Yavapai College, where he leads a team of chefs who focus on nutritious, local, and seasonal ingredients. In his spare time, Tony is passionate about intimate dining experiences and specializes in private chef dinners that showcase his flair for personalized, high-quality cuisine. In fact, he offered a private chef dinner for the Farm to Table silent auction back in 2018, and that was the beginning of a beautiful relationship! Since then, Tony has served as a PFM board member (2019-2025), participated in multiple PFM events, opened and closed his own smashburger stand at the market, and helped PFM open NoCo Community Kitchen.
Tony’s a huge fan of northern Arizona’s chile pepper season, coming up at the end of summer. You’ll probably taste some local spiciness or sweetness in his Farm to Table dish. Despite his love of peppers, his Nebraska roots are grounded in two other flavors that bring back memories for him: “a runza, a bread pocket filled with ground beef, cabbage, onion, and black pepper, brought to the Midwest by German-Russian immigrants. And my second is corn on the cob. There is nothing more nostalgic for me than sinking your teeth into a sweet corn on the cob, slathered in delicious butter, sprinkled with salt. It instantly brings my memories back to the warm summer evenings in Nebraska.”
Matt Hart
Chef Matt is the Director of Operations at Vivili Hospitality Group. He describes himself as a local food enthusiast with some classical training. When cooking, he challenges himself to let the ingredients speak for themselves and not get in the way. If you’ve tasted his food at The County Seat, at PFM’s Chef in Action event or at a previous Farm to Table Dinner, you know that he brings out the best in each ingredient. He’s super excited about doing this dinner again, getting to spend time out in the fields, and learning about the ingredients the farmers love to grow but don’t get the spotlight they deserve. We’re honored to have his support again this year.
We asked him about a nostalgic food memory: “Carrot cake is my favorite nostalgic dish and takes me right back to my childhood.”
Kristina Jones
Kristina Jones is the Executive Chef at The Eatery at Yavapai College and owner of KitchAcademy, where she teaches cooking classes. She is passionate about inspiring others to enjoy cooking and loves making fresh pasta and pizza, a dish that is the center of many Friday family dinner memories for her. Kristina grew up in Alaska, fishing for salmon and halibut, so those flavors are nostalgic for her too. If she had to choose between pizza and halibut, she’d choose halibut!
Kristina is a dedicated partner of ours: As a client of PFM’s NoCo Community Kitchen, she hosts KitchAcademy cooking classes; you’ve seen her in action at the market for Chef in Action events; and she’s taught most of the free community cooking classes that PFM has offered. Despite all of her community involvement, this will be her first Farm to Table Dinner with PFM, and she’s excited to create a dish with flavors that tell a story.
With 20 years in the restaurant industry, she is a thoughtful and patient teacher and we are fortunate to be the recipient of her knowledge and her food!
Tim Kispert
Chef Tim has been in town since 2010. He helped in the early success of Bill’s Grill and the two Bill’s Pizza locations in California. More recently, Tim was the opening chef at Red, White and Brew for two years and the executive chef at Yavapai College’s The Eatery for almost a year. Today, you can find Chef Tim cooking up kimchi fried rice at PFM. Since joining the market in November 2024, he and his wife Sarah have added spunk, tunes, sunglasses, and whiffs of kimchi to the southern aisle.
In keeping with this year’s theme, we asked Tim what food stirs nostalgia for him: “Growing up in Minneapolis, food that brings nostalgia is ‘hotdish casserole’ and Sunday night meat and potatoes of any kind with the whole family. I’m super excited to be working with Prescott Farmers Market and the talented pool of chefs for this event. I hope to push myself and use local products, showcasing things I don’t normally use.”
Max Pelham
Max Pelham started cooking with his father’s catering company as a child. He ran restaurants in Boston before moving to Prescott and opening his popular bagel shop and bakery, Theodore’s Fine Foods, which was started at the PFM four years ago! At PFM, we often talk about the market as a business incubator, a place where small businesses get started, build a following and launch into the brick-and-mortar world. We consider ourselves very lucky that Theodore’s Fine Foods still sets up shop at the market every Saturday.
This year’s Farm to Table Dinner will be Max’s first fundraiser with PFM. He jumped at the chance to make dessert for this event, and he’s “excited to share a new style of sweet with the community” and the chance to see and work with the farms. He recently visited Urban Orchards and Farming here in Prescott and the ideas are flowing!
The food that stirs nostalgia for Chef Max is “black raspberry ice cream from Friendly’s as a kid! Friendly’s is a local chain in New England; the ice cream window at their local store was a summer mainstay. After days at Walden Pond or Lake Cochichuate, we would definitely crush ice cream – black raspberry in the summers was the best!”