“I was raised in Minnesota at a time when beets came out of a can and green beans from a frozen box. You all were born into a more evolved culinary world,” Kaysen told 49 recipients of CIA associate degrees in culinary arts and baking and pastry arts. "But, standards keep rising. Customers are more sophisticated and demanding than they have ever been. Do you have the passion to meet their standards and demands? Do you have the passion to want to exceed them?"
Kaysen spoke to the graduates in Farquharson Hall on the CIA's Hyde Park campus—the same hall where, three years ago, he faced the judges as a contestant on the first season of “The Next Iron Chef” on The Food Network. (Michael Symon '90 won the competition.)