Chris Santos Biography
Chris Santos is a New York City chef who was previously the executive chef and owner of The Stanton Social on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. He opened Beauty & Essex, a 250-seat, 10,000-square-foot (930 m2) restaurant in the center of the lower east side, in late 2010.
How old is Chris Santos? – Age
He is 52 years old as of 26 March 2023. He was born in 1971 in Fall River, Massachusetts, United States.
Chris Santos Family – Education
His mother was Irish, and his father was of Portuguese descent. He is the youngest of four siblings, with two brothers and one sister. He graduated from Bristol High School in Bristol, Rhode Island, in 1989. Santos attended Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island, after graduating, with the intention of studying culinary arts for two years. However, after receiving a stipend from the school, he stayed for two more years to study restaurant and hotel management, graduating with honors in 1993.
Chris Santos Net Worth
He has an estimated net worth of $8 million.
Chris Santos Beauty & Essex
Beauty & Essex, Santos’s largest restaurant to date, opened in December 2010. The historic M. Katz Furniture store on the Lower East Side was transformed into a dramatic restaurant and lounge on two levels with a twenty-foot skylight and a two-story crystal chandelier. Beauty & Essex was named the “Hottest Restaurant in the United States” just a few months after it opened. The consistently full restaurant has continued to advance Santos’ career as an influential celebrity chef.
Chris Santos Career
Santos is grateful for his training in culinary arts at Johnson & Wales, but he considers himself more of a “self-taught” chef because he never received formal training from renowned master chefs like Jean Georges, Boulud, or Batali.
Santos moved to New York City after graduating from Johnson & Wales University. In 1994, he was hired by the well-known Time Café. At the age of 23, he would become executive chef, a position he held until 1998. He spent the better part of 1999 traveling to over 40 European cities and 14 countries, which only served to fuel his enthusiasm for cooking.
Santos went back to New York City in 2000. When he first arrived in the United States, he worked in the kitchen at the French-themed Cranebook Restaurant and Tearoom in Boston. He worked as a consulting chef for Rue 57 for a brief time. At the age of 29, Santos opened his first restaurant, Wyanoka, as partner and executive chef in November 2000. With only 27 seats, Wyanoka was a tiny “hidden gem” restaurant that quickly gained a dedicated following and received glowing reviews from publications like The New York Times, where he was praised by the current food critic Sam Sifton.
He took on the role of executive chef at the award-winning Latin restaurant Suba in 2003, and the following year, he worked at Mojo in Brooklyn, New York. He also worked as executive chef and co-owner at The Mexican Sandwich Company in Brooklyn, New York.
Together with partners Rich Wolf and Peter Kane, Santos opened his most successful restaurant at the time, The Stanton Social, in January 2005. Time Out New York, New York Magazine, and The New York Times have all given this restaurant, which is in the Lower East Side of New York City, high marks for its excellent service. With its extensive selection of multi-cultural small plates, The Stanton Social introduced the world to Santos’ distinctive style of experiential communal dining. At the close of 2018, it was closed. After receiving the Rising Star Chef award from Star Chefs in 2007, he began work on a sister restaurant to his initial success.
Boxing For All, Inc. was founded in April 2013 by Santos and Brian Pedone. The company would later develop Quiet Punch, a home boxing product that reflects Santos’s love of boxing. Vandal, Santos’ third Lower East Side restaurant, is scheduled to open in January 2016. In 2016, Santos is working on two new restaurants for Los Angeles and Las Vegas. He is also working on his first cookbook and still wants to launch a long-rumored line of chef apparel inspired by tattoos with celebrity tattoo artist Michelle Myles.
In partnership with Metal Blade Records, Santos established the hard rock and heavy metal label Blacklight Media Records in February 2016. Santos announced on July 14, 2022, that Stanton Social Prime would open in 2023 at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas.