How did a Fayette

County lad wind up an executive chef of his own restaurant? Specializing

in French cuisine? In Hamburg, Germany?

Drew Deckman

might ask himself the same questions.

He got his

degree in philosophy, for heaven's sakes, at Rhodes College in Memphis,

after several educational detours that included Georgia Southern and the

Merchant Marine Academy.

Never did have

any formal culinary training. Nor did he speak German. Yet his chances

of winning a coveted Michelin star for excellence look pretty good.

Let's hear

it for on the job training.

Deckman's Ellerbek

­ a 128-seat restaurant and bistro ­ opened in the Hamburg suburb

of the same name Oct. 5, 2001. The whole family was there: dad Jim, who

has had a dental practice in Tyrone since 1982; mother Sandy, a flight

attendant with Delta Air Lines, and sister Jill, a production manager

for a large advertising agency in Seattle.

Deckman's menu

is extensive, his father says, and includes rabbit, quail, seafood, some

traditional German dishes, a little American, some Asian, but mostly French.

"Everything

is really fresh," said Jim Deckman, at home again in Peachtree City.

"When we were at the grand opening, we met the guy who sells him

turkeys and chickens. His cost twice as much as regular chicken, but he

goes out and searches for the best and freshest."

So how do you

get to be executive chef in your own restaurant at the age of 31, with

chefs working for you, all probably better trained than you are?

You start young,

that's how.

Undoubtedly

Deckman's first teacher was his mother. From the time he was 3 or 4 years

old, as soon as he could climb up on a chair to watch her preparing family

meals, Drew was hooked on cooking. Sandy says that while she never especially

pushed him toward a career in the kitchen ­ he was just always interested

­ she certainly did nothing to discourage him.

Before Deckman

graduated from McIntosh High School, in 1988, he was learning his way

around a restaurant-sized kitchen. He was, after all, only 15 or 16 when

he apprenticed in the kitchen of the Aberdeen Woods Conference Center

in Peachtree City. The OJT had begun in earnest.

While at Rhodes

College, he began cooking at Café Max. The chef there thought Deckman

was going to culinary school.

Back in Atlanta,

Deckman worked as sous chef at the World Trade Center for a couple of

years. There he caught the eye of Henning Clausen, a German business owner

in the Atlanta area. Clausen asked the young cook if he'd like to come

to Germany and cook in the restaurant of his Hotel Bergström in Lüneburg,

not far from Hamburg.

The fact that

he spoke not a word of German did not daunt Deckman, who quickly picked

up what he calls kitchen Deutsche.

It didn't hurt

that he also found a German wife. Deckman met Heike when she was working

briefly as a server in the Hotel Bergström restaurant. She had been

in a formal program in hotel administration, waiting to go to a new job

in Geneva. He caught up with her later and spent a year and a half learning

French cuisine ­ and language ­ at Auberge du Lion d'Or, an

inn that boasts a one-star rating in the prestigious Michelin Guide. (See

sidebar.)

The Deckmans

moved on, in 1998, to Chez Bocuse at Collonge au Mont d'Or, in France.

Legendary chef Paul Bocuse won his third Michelin star in 1965 and became

the virtual leader of a new generation of chefs. His restaurant ­

very much the gold standard in traditional French dining ­ still

appears in Le Guide Rouge as the longest-standing continuous three-star

establishment in the ratings' history.

In 1999, Deckman's

OJT continued at two-star Restaurant Jacques Maximin in Vence, not far

from the Riviera in France. In what his dad describes as "a pivotal

time," Drew moved to Vitus in Reinstorf, Germany. He was executive

chef there less than a year when Vitus received its Michelin star.

A Hamburg businessman

who dined at Vitus saw an opportunity. He owned a building in which a

previous restaurant had closed, and approached Deckman: "Would you

come up and cook for me?" He invited the young American not only

to help turn the property into a fine dining space, but to become its

executive chef, supervising a kitchen with five chefs. Moreover, he could

name it whatever he wanted.

"Deckman's

Ellerbek" was born.

Drew Deckman

will be 32 this month. His peripatetic education behind him, the years

of apprenticeship have paid off. The biggest challenge now, his father

says, is finding qualified staff. Some came with him from his previous

locations.

He moved his

wife and sons ­ Samuel, 4, and Philip, 1 ­ into a house in nearby

Relingen, but doesn't get to spend much time there himself. "He works

long hours," Jim Deckman says, beginning in the morning when fresh

ingredients arrive, opening the restaurant for lunch, and staying late

for dinner guests.

Germans like

to linger over good meals.

And they linger

long at Deckman's Ellerbek.

The restaurant's

Web site is www.deckmans.com .