A Naperville chef will soon represent the city on national television. Alonso Beckford, Chef for The Matrix Club, will be on the newest season of the Food Network show “Chopped.”
Cooking up inspiration from family
“It was a great experience, definitely a lot of stress,” said Beckford, whose passion for cooking started when he was just five years old, taking inspiration from two influential women in his life.
“My godmother was the first person to sit down and teach me how to read recipes and we baked a cake together,” he said. “I used to watch [my grandmother]. She had her own gardens. She used to pick her own vegetables. Every time I went over there, she was always cooking.”
He would go on to culinary school in Miami and has cooked professionally for restaurants all over the country. He came to Naperville two years ago to be head chef at The Matrix Club, a large banquet and performance hall that also features a restaurant – The Matrix Room – open five days a week.
Casting for “Chopped”
When Beckford saw a casting call for chefs to be on “Chopped,” he got fired up at the opportunity…