Andrew Carmellini’s cooking is soulful and flavorful, rustic and refined. It’s a style that reflects his American roots, his work in some of New York and Italy’s best kitchens, and his travels across Europe, Asia and America.

Born and raised in Seven Hills, OH, Andrew learned from parents who loved simple, delicious food made well. At 20, Andrew took off to work in a series of great restaurants in Italy, including Valentino Mercatile’s Michelin two-star San Domenico in Emilio-Romagna. He hunted truffles in Umbria and Piedmonte, studied pasta-making with an artisanal master, and learned everything he could from the wine, cheese and prosciutto-makers that he visited.

When back in New York, Andrew served as chef de partie on Gray Kunz’s four-star crew at Lespinasse. He was sous chef at Le Cirque when that restaurant regained its fourth star from The New York Times. Andrew then returned to Europe to spend time in France and England’s top restaurant kitchens, including the three-star L’Arpège in Paris.

Upon his final return to the States, Andrew became Daniel Boulud’s first chef de cuisine at Café Boulud on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. During his six years there, he won a James Beard Award for Rising Star Chef of the Year and was added to Food & Wine magazine’s Best New Chef roster. In 2004, Frank Bruni wrote of this “first-rate” chef’s “comforting, seductive” and altogether “glorious food” in The New York Times. In his last month at Café Boulud, Andrew was awarded Best Chef: New York City by the James Beard Foundation.

In 2007 he opened an upscale Italian restaurant in Madison Square Park as executive chef, earning another three-star review from The New York Times, his first Michelin star and a James Beard Award nomination for Best New Restaurant 2007.

In December 2008, Andrew published his first book of recipes and stories, Urban Italian (Bloomsbury Press), with his wife, Gwen Hyman, which climbed to the year’s Top Ten Cookbooks list on Amazon.com. Their second cookbook, American Flavor, was published in October 2011 (Ecco: Harper Collins).

In May 2009, Carmellini was approached by Robert DeNiro and the owners of The Greenwich Hotel to re-open the existing restaurant as Locanda Verde, which has since been handed two stars by The New York Times and a nomination from the James Beard Foundation for Best New Restaurant in 2009.

The Dutch came to be when Carmellini and two of his partners in Locanda Verde, Josh Pickard and Luke Ostrom, banded together and took over a historic space on the corner of Prince and Sullivan Street in SoHo, instantaneously creating a downtown locale that Sam Sifton called “A-list in the extreme,” and “the song of the summer.” The trio entertained an encore of The Dutch inside the W South Beach Hotel & Residences with local impresarios Karim Masri and Nicola Siervo in November of that same year, bringing an original American restaurant to Miami Beach.