We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jay Minaya. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jay below.

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

I always had a fascination for learning more about renowned international home-made dishes. I had lots of curiosity in making prestigious home-made cultural dishes such as: Gazpacho, Shakshuka, Ratatouille, Coq au vin, etc. Dishes like those tell you more than just food. They also tell a story, they tell the cultural aspect of a country or a region. I had the dream of becoming an expert in the preparation of old renowned world cuisine dishes using fresh and organic ingredients. My goal was to learn this culinary skill in order to show and teach others , either beginning cooks or foodies that they can also become both culinary experts and great cooks in their own kitchen. To make my vision a reality I studied at Auguste Escoffier – School of Culinary Arts in Boulder, Colorado in 2017 and at the end of 2019 I opened my own Culinary School “Journey Culinary”.

Jay, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I was born in Lima , Perú. I came to the United States in 2003 with no much money, no knowledge of English language and without having a solid plan about my future. I graduated with a degree in Business Administration with Emphasis in Marketing from the Leeds School of Business at CU. After graduation, I worked for a couple of years in a local bank and a mortgage firm. I though working for these financial institutions will be my new life but shrotly I realized that they were not a good fit for me. In 2007 and quit my job and opened my first Language Agency business with $2,000 in my pocket. I started off this business in my house by providing a couple of Spanish classes and using my dining room as my classroom. I remember that I had only 7 students back then. It is never easy to run a new business from the ground up, but I learned quickly that with passion, discipline and be surrounded by great employees you can make your dream business idea a reality. Passion is to believe 100% and totally love for what your product or service can do to benefit others.
In 2019 I opened another business called Journey Culinary. This business have helped many food lovers to learn or improve their culinary skills by attending our cooking classes and be able to experience the fascinating rich gastronomy from countries like: France, Spain, Perú, Iran, Italy, Morocco & Greece.
At Journey Culinary we truly believe the following phrase: “We are what we eat”, therefore we put emphasis in making healthy food using fresh natural organic ingredients in every single class.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

Our cooking teaching style is pretty unique. When you attend one of our group classes or private events you may feel like they are not just in a cooking class. You may feel transported to a food country destination. Besides the preparation of the dishes we also focus on the cultural aspect of the dish itself. That means the history, language and traditions.

How’d you meet your business partner?

David Minaya, my brother, is my business partner, right hand and best friend. I founded Journey Language Center and Journey Culinary Ltd. David joined me a couple of years after to help me to work on creating our first language books and now he our program Coordinator at Journey Culinary.

I also would like to thank our amazing Journey team and clients for trusting us from day one. Without their support and love to local businesses we wouldn’t be here.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.journeyculinary.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Minayagroup

Image Credits
David Minaya took these pictures. I don’t have image credits.