Time and time again, I hear from Grand Circle travelers who simply can’t stop raving about the delectable meals they’ve enjoyed aboard our river ships. So I figured it was high time to introduce you to the man responsible for creating those mouth-watering menus: Christian Seegatz, Corporate Executive Chef for Grand Circle and our sister company, Overseas Adventure Travel.
From savory soups to decadent desserts, Chef Seegatz—who earned a coveted Michelin Star while serving as Chef de Cuisine for a restaurant in Hanover, Germany—has developed more than 1,500 recipes for our European fleet that reflect regional specialties as well as American favorites.
The Man Behind the Menu: Catching Up with Grand Circle’s Corporate Executive Chef Christian Seegatz
As a young boy growing up in Bochum, an industrial city in the Ruhr area of northwest Germany, Christian Seegatz didn’t exactly envision a career for himself in the kitchen.
Although he admits he’s always been interested in cooking—“I have a picture taken when I was seven years old where I’m dressed as a chef,” he says—as a teenager, Christian enjoyed other pursuits, namely music and canoeing. He decided to focus on cooking full-time when he was 20, and began his culinary studies at one of the premier hotels in his hometown.
After a series of chef exams, Christian then began working at a restaurant in Switzerland; though he started his tenure as Cook de Tournant (a sort of “relief” chef who, rather than being assigned to a specific kitchen station, fills in wherever needed), he soon worked his way up to Assistant Sous Chef—and distinguished himself further by being named “Employee of the Year.”
His success in Switzerland led to an opportunity in Asia, where Chef Seegatz enjoyed a seven-month stint at the Kempinski Lufthansa Hotel in Beijing. He also worked in Spain and France before taking his culinary talents to the high seas: Joining the staff of Germany-based Peter Deilmann Cruises as First Cook, Chef Seegatz quickly became the Executive Chef, gaining insight into the unique challenges of creating menus for hotels that float.
Soon after, Chef Seegatz decided to open his own restaurant. However, he soon found that the high-pressure demands of running his own business left little time for family life—and he felt it was far more important to spend time with his wife, Kirsten, and their son, Gawan, than keep the restaurant’s doors open. (On the rare occasions when he’s not in a kitchen, Chef Seegatz enjoys traveling with his family—"This year we will go to Tanzania”—and creating special memory books filled with photos from their experiences.) So he went to work as Chef de Cuisine at Patio Gastronomie im Alten Rathaus in Hanover, Germany, where, “after working there for only one year, I was surprised to discover I’d earned a Michelin Star!”—one of the culinary world’s highest honors.
In 2002, Chef Seegatz made his way to Grand Circle where, as Corporate Executive Chef, he oversees every aspect of meal service delivery for our entire European fleet, from developing recipes and meal plans to training new employees on topics ranging from food cost and calculations to sanitary standards. It’s a demanding job—to date, Chef Seegatz has created or developed nearly 1,500 regionally-specific recipes (including the widely praised fruit-and-yogurt “Flip” Soups, the recipes for which you’ll find in this edition of Global Kitchen)—but, as he’s quick to point out, a rewarding one: “We really work hard to satisfy our travelers.”
As for recipes that rank among his personal favorites, Chef Seegatz says it’s hard to top a great Tafelspitz—a typical Austrian dish consisting of tender rump steak braised in broth with root vegetables. He’s also partial to German sauerbraten and other, similar dishes, which, he says, “demand a chef’s passion and patience as well as his skill.”
For Chef Seegatz, there’s simply no other place he’d rather be than with Grand Circle. As he explains, “I visit the ships often to monitor the standards and quality—and every time I’m on board I spend some time with our travelers. In fact, there’s a couple from the Inner Circle I’ve met several times over the past four or five years. If you ask me what is my favorite part of my job, it is very difficult to answer because I can only say: Everything.”