At 4 years old, most kids are only beginning to learn how to behave in a restaurant. But Carmelo Gabriele wasn’t just any kid and he wasn’t in just any restaurant. Dressed in a mini-tuxedo, he was busy pouring water for customers in his father’s upscale St. Louis restaurant.

There was little doubt in anyone’s mind that he would one day move into the kitchen. “My career was preordained. With family in the restaurant business, I was used to being asked when I was going to start working with my father. I was 9 years old at the time," Gabriele said.