James Ritchie

Chef and Restaurant Owner
Fresno, California

Our featured chef serves up a special dish for this feature using ingredients that were chosen by the chef from the company's list of quality products available during the month of February.

Chef James Ritchie's South Asian Glazed Tofu on Steamed Baby Bok Choy combines some tasty flavors accented by a very interesting Soy-Lime sauce. The dish offers all the components of an immensely satisfying meal that is seasonally based. The pan seared tofu creates a hearty and robust foundation, while the sauce's ingredients and the freshness of the Baby Bok Choy offer the spicy brightness that balances out the dish.

Chef Ritchie, chef-owner of Senses Cuisine in Fresno, California, is a great inspiration for anyone thinking of making a career leap into their dream job. The notion of actually hopping the professional fence, where the grass always appears to be shades greener, is a universal fantasy of most, but an achieved reality for only a few brave hearts.

Early Years

Jim has always been comfortable in the kitchen, having been raised by parents who both enjoyed cooking everything from scratch at home. In fact, his mother later opened her own successful bakery as Jim got older. So, when it came time to get an after-school job as a teenager, he naturally gravitated to a position in a delicatessen. Restaurant jobs continued to be just a means of income, but not so much an aspiration during his college days even though he was aware of his increasing culinary knowledge and talent. In fact, the chef admits that opening his own eatery someday was no more than a casual thought in the back of his head as he graduated, got married and followed another career path.

 In 2002, that "someday" was still only a distant dream and definitely not scheduled for serious consideration until after Dr. Jim Ritchie, now a 36-year-old with a PHD in Linguistics, retired from his position as a speech engineer for a Bay Area IT firm. At the time, he certainly never projected that in four years he would be standing in his own restaurant's kitchen planning a menu based on the organic vegetable availability of the season.

"Life's big changes always seem to come along when one least expects," mused Jim. "One day my wife and I were cruising along, enjoying a full life, working and living in the hub of the Bay Area's high-tech industry. Then, in a few very harrowing hours, our lives took a 90-degree detour with absolutely no warning."

(Without going into detail, the event was an armed daylight break-in of the Ritchies' residence. Jim was at his office at the time, but his wife Catherine was at home. While no one was physically harmed, the trauma was enough to cause the Ritchies to immediately move out of the area. Immediately, meaning the very next day. Catherine's family lived in nearby Fresno, so the region was a natural refuge for the couple.)

"It's still hard to believe," reflected the chef, "four years and a lot of hard work later, here I am operating my own restaurant in a unique neighborhood in the middle of the Central Valley, surrounded by farmland, far from the Silicon culture that was our life for so long."

Technology being what it is, Jim was able to continue his work by telecommunication for over two years from his new Fresno location but the long-distance vocation had lost its challenge for him.

He began thinking about possibly moving up his time-line for running his own eatery. The decision to actually pursue his culinary leanings came at about the same time that he happened to drive by the building that Senses occupies today and saw the "For Lease" sign. Jim recalls that with his first ten steps inside the building the professional jump was sealed; the PHD became a restaurant entrepreneur on the spot and he has never looked back.

Current Projects

SENSES WORLD CUISINE combines two concepts that Chef Jim is passionate about: small, multiple-dish dining and organic ingredients. "We offer dishes in the Spanish style of Tapas, with influences and flavors from cuisines around the world," explained the chef. "Many cultures offer a style of small plate dining that allows people to linger at the table in good company while enjoying a bounty of flavors in a variety of dishes. Such cultures include Spanish (Tapas), Greek (Meze), and Indian (Chaat) among others. While I do not replicate traditional dishes from these countries, my cuisine is heavily influenced by the spices, flavors and cooking techniques of these cultures."

The contacts that Ritchie has cultivated in this agricultural-based community of California's bountiful Central Valley are the source for most of the restaurant's organic produce. "Our dishes are made from significantly organic products and seasoned with spices from around the world that we have roasted and ground from the whole. We also use only the finest organic, free-range, grass-fed, hormone and chemical-free meats and poultry. Besides the obvious environmental upside, I simply believe that organic foods have better flavors than conventionally-produced alternatives."

Another great source of ingredients and menu ideas come from the people in the Hmong community where Senses is located. The specialty grocery stores in the neighborhood have provided a wealth of exotic ingredients, and the relationship with the proprietors has led him to small plots of ethnic produce, grown by this population, that is not available through commercial foodservice suppliers. These unique sources have served as inspiration for much of the restaurant's eclectic fare.

 "The best way to enjoy Senses," suggested the chef "is with a group of friends swapping bites of an array of international dishes. The more people at a table, the more dishes to share. I know that the business plan of many restaurants focuses on "table time" and counts on two seatings per night per table to maximize efficiency. Here at Senses Cuisine we encourage the art of lingering and count only the number of forks used by each group as the measure of our success."

Melissa's thanks Chef Jim for the beautiful dish he created for this feature. Senses Cuisine is truly a unique eatery in the heartland of California's steakhouse country. So, on your next visit to Fresno, give your taste buds a real treat; drop in for a flavorful evening of counting forks!