i. Biography
Culver City puts seafood, vegetables, grilled meat and hand-shaped dough in close working range. In Michael Williams’s cooking, those materials have been handled through coastal product, Mediterranean reference points and the discipline of service: fish to flame, greens under heat, pasta made by hand, and dough treated as part of the meal rather than a carrier.
The Climb
Formal kitchen craft set the base at Le Cordon Bleu - San Francisco, where Michael Williams trained in technique, repetition and the working habits required before food reaches the dining room. Restaurant work then supplied the service register: pace, pressure, station discipline and the practical understanding of how cooking changes when it is tied to a room. Cooking in public-service and independent settings gave the work a direct shape. At Our Place dining room in Victoria, Michael Williams served as chef for the day / volunteer chef in Victoria (2013), a role defined by immediacy and communal dining rather than restaurant theatre. At Urban Forage (from 2020), his self-employed chef and catering business owner role put menu, execution and hospitality under one roof. Executive Chef work at Margot and chef / operator work at Urban Forage at The Atrium in downtown Victoria placed authorship inside service constraints. Those rooms required personal cooking to meet timing, appetite and consistency. Today, Michael is Private Chef of Private Chef, working from a base shaped by restaurant rigor, coastal product and handwork.
Today
At Margot, the menu worked in a Spanish and Italian register: handmade pastas, grilled meats, seafood, lunchtime focaccia sandwiches, and dinners refocused on vegetables. The craft was tactile and heat-led: dough stretched and folded, fish cooked over fire, greens sharpened, meat marked on the grill, and Southern Italian condiments used for heat and sweetness inside a broader Mediterranean frame. The cooking was built through contact and control. Handmade pastas carried softness and structure; grilled meats and seafood relied on smoke, char and clear product; focaccia sandwiches set bread, filling and appetite into a lunch rhythm. Dinner’s vegetable focus shifted the work toward brightness, texture and restraint. Juliet in Culver City, Los Angeles, uses a different seasonal register: bright, French-inspired, seafood-forward, and focused on ingredients and seafood from Southern California. Set beside the earlier Spanish- and Italian-influenced work, Michael Williams’s cooking reads less as allegiance to one template than as a response to product and coastline. The continuity is in the handling. The coastline changes, and the emphasis turns toward Southern California seafood and French-inspired brightness, but the kitchen grammar remains legible: clean ingredients, disciplined technique, and plates carried by fire, acid, fat and texture rather than excess construction.
Signature
Michael's signature dishes include culurgiones with ‘nduja, arugula pesto and Calabrian honey, whole grilled sea bream, prime rib-eye, Kampachi crudo, and Fried chicken with Calabrian-chili honey. The set shows a kitchen moving between handwork, grill work, raw preparation and fried texture. Culurgiones with ‘nduja, arugula pesto and Calabrian honey put filled pasta against richness, bitterness, chile and sweetness. Whole grilled sea bream depends on the structure of the fish and the accuracy of heat. Prime rib-eye places the emphasis on grilled meat, while Kampachi crudo turns on freshness, cutting and restraint. Fried chicken with Calabrian-chili honey brings crunch, heat and sweetness into the same register.
Recognition
Two dishes mark the Margot period with particular clarity. The culurgiones show the pasta station as a place of contrast: filled dough, chile-rich sausage, green pesto and Calabrian honey. The dish sits inside a Mediterranean vocabulary, with softness, spice, brightness and sweetness kept close to the comfort of the pasta. The sea bream uses a simpler structure: whole fish on the grill, with skin, bone, salt and flame carrying the result. That kind of cooking leaves little cover for technique. The fish has to be handled cleanly, the grill has to be managed, and the plate depends on restraint as much as addition.
Profile updated July 2026
FAQ
Asked of Michael
What is Michael Williams's current role?
Michael Williams is Chef and Culinary Director.
Where did Michael Williams train or study?
Michael Williams trained at Le Cordon Bleu - San Francisco.
What is Michael Williams known for?
Spanish- and Italian-influenced cooking at Margot.
