Military Vet Joins The Guest House at Graceland as New Executive Chef

U.S. Navy rescue swimmer, turned executive chef, joins The Guest House.

The Guest House at Graceland welcomes J. Steven Brockman as its new executive chef, overseeing all food and beverage operations at the hotel, including the premiere restaurant, Delta’s Kitchen, E.P.’s Bar and Grill, Shake Rattle and Go coffee bar, Lobby Bar, catering and banquets for small meetings to events for 1,000 guests and room service for the 450-room property.

A Nebraska native, Brockman served in the U.S. Navy as a rescue swimmer, specializing in anti-submarine warfare. After circling the globe, he enrolled in the Culinary School of Washington, D.C., fulfilling a high school curiosity inspired by his grandmother. While in the capital, he launched his culinary career through celebrity benefit dinners with Julia Child, Paul Bocuse, charity fundraisers for Share Our Strength, and local professional associations in the company of accomplished (Jean Louis Palladin, Jimmy Sneed) and aspiring chefs.

Brockman honed his culinary skills at the Willard Intercontinental and the Canterbury Hotel in Washington, DC, the Powhatan Plantation Resort in historic Williamsburg, Virginia, then west to Northern California. In the San Francisco Bay Area, Brockman served in the kitchens of Claremont Resort & Spa, Stars of Palo Alto with Jeremiah Tower, and Nob Hill’s Mark Hopkins Intercontinental.

While based in Santa Fe, his culinary skills took him to Rancho Encantado Resort and Hotel Loretto. He also provided consulting service to several local restaurants and designed a top-of-the-line kitchen for a Relais & Chateaux plantation in southern Georgia.

Brockman taught at the Santa Fe School of Cooking and was sponsored in January of 2000 to cook for the James Beard House in New York City. He furthered his culinary diversity in Beijing and the Yucatan. He served as executive chef at South Eden Plantation Resort, Mystic Marriott Hotel & Spa and Vibrant Table Catering. Most recently, he was executive chef at Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill.

Brockman completed a Baking & Pastry Arts degree from Johnson & Wales University in 2007, followed by a bachelor’s degree with a minor in Sustainability from Portland State University in 2012.

“I cook because I love the magnetic society of food. I laugh with friends over homemade beer, grill lobsters on a fire pit in Maine, make holiday chocolates with my daughters, and forage for mushrooms in Oregon. Food is community,” said Brockman.  “I look forward to building upon the foundation of The Guest House at Graceland with the spirit of Southern hospitality, the back drop of Elvis and the bounty of the Mississippi River delta”.