Napa's Greystone Restaurant Hires New Executive Chef

Dana Nigro
Posted: February 13, 1999

The Wine Spectator Greystone Restaurant in Napa Valley has hired Todd Humphries of San Francisco's acclaimed Campton Place as its new executive chef. He will join the staff in mid-March.

The restaurant, on the western campus of the Culinary Institute of America in St. Helena, has been without a full-time executive chef for about two years, though Joyce Goldstein -- cookbook author and former chef and owner of San Francisco's Square One -- has been its visiting executive chef.

Under Humphries' direction for the past several years, Campton Place racked up numerous accolades and high ratings for imaginative food. Wine Spectator last rated his cooking at Campton Place in October 1996, giving the food 91 points and the restaurant an overall score of 90. Prior to moving to San Francisco, Humphries had worked under Gray Kunz at New York City's Lespinasse. The Canadian-born chef is a graduate of the CIA.

Greystone's menu will undergo gradual changes once Humphries takes over, according to Reuben Katz, director of food and beverage operations at CIA's Greystone campus. "We're going to take advantage of his work and develop what he calls 'wild American' cuisine, which uses wild and foraged greens, herbs, berries and vegetables," said Katz. Ingredients in this type of cuisine include chickweed, wild currants, stinging nettles and wood sorrel.

Wine Spectator magazine does not own or operate the restaurant, but as a donor to the Culinary Institute of America, the Wine Spectator Scholarship Foundation was instrumental in the restaurant's creation. The dining spot also holds a Wine Spectator Award of Excellence for its wine list.

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