Duff Goldman

Chef 

Chef Duff Goldman has been cooking since the age of four, when his Mom caught him in the kitchen watching Chef Tell and swinging around a meat cleaver. A few years later, his culinary curiosity almost cost him a finger when he decided the best way to carve a pumpkin was with the largest knife he could find in the kitchen. Despite the incident, Chef Duff found his calling and started working professionally when he was just 14 and has never turned back.

When people ask how he got into making cakes, you might say he really had no choice in the matter as he comes from a long line of cooks: Duff's Great-Grandmother, "Mamo", came to the U.S. from the Ukraine at age 16 was a legendary baker and cook. Her daughter, Duff's Grandmother, "Nana", was a professional artist, whose early works included water color painting, printmaking, stunning works in silversmithing, enameling and later in her life, photography. Duff's Mom, Jackie, is also an artist who began printmaking in college, created and taught ceramics in her own commercial studio, then moved on to stained glass for over 30 years, and is now incorporating her love of all into clay silver and gold creations. During his younger years in Northern Virginia, Duff studied art himself at the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington, D.C. and was also a local graffiti artist of some notoriety.

Duff started working for acclaimed Baltimore Chef Cindy Wolf while attending the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. After graduating with degrees in History and Philosophy, Duff left Baltimore to study pastries at the Culinary Institute of America in Napa Valley, California.

Duff would spend the following years earning his culinary degree and honing his craft, working as a baker and pastry chef with some of the country's most notable and acclaimed chefs in different cities across the country.

Inspired by the chefs he'd been working for, Duff's entrepreneurial spirit took him back to Baltimore in 2000, where he finally realized his dream and opened Charm City Cakes...

...in his apartment. He wasn't there very long; as word-of-mouth, the media, and even the health department all began to take an interest, he soon found himself in a real bakery of his very own. The health department happy, and increased coverage in the press and a growing clients list helped propel Duff into an even bigger location: an old church he retrofitted into his current modern bakery, a converted church in the Remington area of his adopted hometown - and the Charm City Cakes as we know it was firmly established.

As word about his unusual and daring cakes got out, Duff hired staff with more artistic experience than the typical pastry chef, like painters, architects and sculptors. His out-of-the-ordinary team is known for producing highly creative cakes that range from Star Wars characters and vehicles, to a replica of the Stanley Cup, to a working life-size motorcycle, a Hogwarts Castle for Warner Bros. and their premiere of Harry Potter - to thousands of more astonishing creations for everyone from the bar across the street to the NFL in celebration of the Super Bowl.

Following several appearances on its cake competition Challenge series, in 2006, Food Network tapped Chef Duff and his fellow cake baking artists at Charm City Cakes to star in Ace of Cakes. Four years and nine seasons later, the show is still wildly popular. In addition to Ace of Cakes, Duff also stars in the Food Network series, The Best Thing I Ever Ate, has been featured in episodes of Iron Chef America; The Next Food Network Star; Diners, Drive-Ins, and Drives; Chef vs. City; Cupcake Wars; and has just completed several guest-starring roles in both TV and film, including Fox's King of the Hill, Walt Disney Pictures's You Again, Disney's Imagination Movers, and Below the Beltway. Today, Duff's work has also been featured on Man Caves, Dr. Oz, The View, Oprah, Good Morning America, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and more.

Chef Duff has also made his first foray into the publishing world with the New York Times Bestseller, "Ace of Cakes: Inside the World of Charm City Cakes" from HarperCollins/William Morrow.

In addition to owning and operating Charm City Cakes, Duff is also a sculptor, artist, and musician - he plays bass in the indie instrumental band "so I had to...", has an affinity for wearing his signature hockey jerseys, and is an all-around good guy with the cleanest hands in town.