Personal dining experiences don’t just come down to the ingredients in the dish, they also include a genuine appreciation for the people producing those ingredients.

Francis Derby grew up on Long Island, spending time on his grandfather’s duck farm in Patchogue. Growing up in a family where gatherings were always centered around food and around kitchen tables. At 14, started his first job at Varney’s Restaurant, a restaurant adored by the locals. Later Francis would work his way through LI kitchens learning from chefs at The Bellport as well as other local restaurants.

In 2001, Derby made the move to Manhattan to work at Atlas with Paul Liebrant, and, in 2003, he was part of the opening team of Wylie Dufresne’s wd~50. In 2005, Derby took a trip to Spain that would change the way he looked at food: he worked as a stage at Andoni Luis Aduriz’s Mugaritz. Later that year, Derby returned to work with Liebrant to open Gilt. Derby spent the following years at Tailor, which he opened with wd~50 alum Pastry Chef Sam Mason, before moving onto David Chang’s Momofuku’s Ssäm Bar and then Josh Eden’s Shorty’s .32. Francis then joined The Cannibal team in 2012 as executive chef, overseeing all restaurants in NYC and LA. In 2018 Franics makes the move back to LI and takes on the executive chef role at BRG’s Prime, a high volume chop house in Huntington, leaving in the summer of 2021.

As a Long Island native, Francis has done his part in both representing his community and building up inter-communal relationships by paying homage to them with his food. Personal dining experiences don’t just come down to the ingredients in the dish, they also include a genuine appreciation for the people producing those ingredients. Francis is now back in his home town of Bellport and is available for booking dinner parties and private events.