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I didn't want to be an accountant; I found myself being a banker, which was a bit different. I went to university, and I was going to do a Ph.D. in the States, but I didn't get the funding for it, so I had two years where I had a bit of a wobble and didn't really know what I wanted to do, and I ended up working as a banker.

I had the opportunity to go to law school, and my dad, who was an accountant, couldn't believe I wanted to walk away from that and start cooking.

Did you ever hear of a kid playing accountant - even if they wanted to be one?

I was a schoolteacher for a while, and it was the worst job.

I went to work in accounting at Arthur Andersen. At one point, it was the creme de la creme. I wanted to work there because it looked like the hardest thing I could find, and I loved being on a steep learning curve. I progressed quickly, and two years out of college, I was managing a small team of people.

I was a per diem floater in the same junior high school I went to. I sat in the office and made $42.50 a day, and whenever a teacher was absent, I'd substitute. I taught everything from English to auto shop.

I worked in a gym. I was a trainer. I did all the crappy ex-football-player jobs.

Mom was a housewife; Dad was an accountant. They taught me a lot about the value of working hard.

My dad for a long time was an accounting professor at Rice University. And then he went out on his own, and he got hired by a client. He ended up being CEO of a hospital management company before he retired, called Lifemark.

I worked as a secretary, a waitress and a dance teacher - all in high school.