We were lucky to catch up with Daniel Gaspar recently and have shared our conversation below.

Daniel, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

At first, the idea for Daffodil was to host donation-based dinner parties to promote and help charities and non-profit organizations here in Austin. This concept would allow me to have a creative outlet, which is what I was craving at that point in my life. After pitching this idea to a couple of people here in our city and getting them excited about the project we booked our first event and then, the pandemic hit and the world stopped.
I was one of the few to keep my job, although things were a lot different by that point. Our focus at the restaurant went from serving our customers to helping our community through the city of Austin and our school district. We fed so many people on the daily and that was fulfilling all on its own. After a while it began to take its toll on me mentally and I began scrambling for ideas and day dreaming about doing “my own thing” again.
I was asked by one of my mentors to cook for a birthday party and I accepted, at the end of the evening she mentioned that I should consider becoming a personal chef, I think she could tell I was afraid, nervous & insecure about doing anything on my own, at which point she said- “Sometimes it just takes one person to believe in you, and I believe in you.” Those words motivated me and I decided to take a leap and bring the idea for Daffodil back, but this time as a business and not just a creative outlet.

I began my journey to become a personal chef but quickly decided to take on bigger events and promote restaurant-style food as a caterer in order to push my limits and creativity. I have 15 years of restaurant experience and I wanted to showcase the things I love the most about restaurants, the service and the food, so I took it on to reimagine catering. I believe our city is hungry for something “new” and part of our mission is to always create and impress by not only providing top notch service but by creating food that gets us and our clients excited.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I fell in love with restaurants at an early age but didn’t get to experience them in full until my 20’s. I worked my way up in different kitchens under different managers for years and eventually met some of the most influential chefs in the city, from catering to restaurant kitchens.

I never had the opportunity to travel to other cities/countries to expand my skills and knowledge so I picked at the brains of the chefs in this town. I am happy to say that I shaped my career and developed all my skills in this beautiful city full of talent.

I want to share my experience with my clients by showing them that catering services can be fun and impressive. Locality is a no brainer nowadays but I also want to highlight my favorite ingredients around the world and elevate our local food to a level that can co-exist with the best foods around the world and introduce people to new and creative ways of cooking.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

I always wanted to be the manager I didn’t have. Praise a job well done but also promote accountability. This applies not only to your team but to yourself, you have to lead by example.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

Taking a leap is scary no matter what. For me the time I had to leave my job, which meant leaving a steady income behind, was the most challenging but has also been the most rewarding so far. This has taught me a level of resilience I didn’t know I had and has also made me appreciate every aspect of this business no matter how tough. The good, the bad, and the ugly, I love everything about it.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.daffodilculinary.com
• Instagram: @daffodil_atx

Image Credits
Cameron Kisel, Darrin Commerford