User:Chef Dr, Mike/sandbox

Dr. Mike, The Grassroots Gourmet™ Dr. Michael S. Fenster, known as The Grassroots Gourmet™, was born in the south Bronx, in New York City. He attended college at The University of Virginia (UVA) where he also first cooked professionally. He started as a dishwasher and worked his way up, eventually apprenticing to local chefs in Charlottesville, Virginia while attending college there. He attended medical school at The Medical College of Virginia and completed an internal medicine residency at The Wake Forest School of Medicine/North Carolina Baptist Hospital in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He returned to UVA where he completed his cardiology and interventional cardiology fellowships and also participated in National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded research in microvascular physiology. He was awarded a faculty position at UVA as a clinical instructor. After leaving The University of Virginia, Dr. Fenster performed many clinical research trials, contributed and authored peer-reviewed articles, chaired the Virigina Chapter meeting of The American College of Cardiology in 2002 and was appointed an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the North East Ohio University College of Medicine (NEOUCOM) in 2006. He has presented research and spoken at meetings of both The American Heart Association and The American College of Cardiology.

He continued his culinary pursuits and recieved his degree with honors in Gourmet Cooking and Catering from Ashworth University in 2009. He also graduated from Auburn University's business school that same year; graduating summa cum laude while attaining his Physician Executive Masters of Business Administration degree. That same year his first television production, What's Cookin' with Doc aired locally. Following that initial success, he continued to uniquely combine his cardiovascular and culinary interests. His first book, Eating Well, Living Better: A Grassroots Gourmet™ Guide to Good Health and Great Food, published by Rowman and Littlefield is scheduled for release in June, 2012. His recipes have been published worldwide and he writes a monthly column for The Tampa Tribune as well as the on-line culinary magazine, Basil. He is also a regular contributor to The Atlantic Magazine, as well as various websites and blogs. He has been featured worldwide on radio programs including Martha Stewart's Living Today. His own radio program, Code Delicious with Dr. Mike, is slated to air on The Foxxhole, SiriusXM Channel 98 in spring 2012. He has appeared on multiple television programs as both a medical expert and demonstrating his culinary craft. His segment, Healthy Bytes with Dr. Mike is a regular feature on The Daily Buzz, nationally syndicated morning program. He has also appeared on the PBS series The Bikini Chef and the upcoming television series Ocean Models. He has been invited faculty at prestigious culinary events such as The American Culinary Federation national meeting. His one of a kind approach to gastronomy has been heavily influenced not only by his extensive medical and culinary background, but by a lifetime of study in the martial arts. He currently holds the rank of Ju-Dan, in the Japanese based martial art of Bujinkan Budo.