Learn with Chef Dan Butler

I'm a fun-loving hard-working family man. I love the immediate satisfaction of creating a dish and executing it for others to enjoy. In that way, my satisfaction is similar to an artist's, who thrives on others' appreciation of their work. I've designed my restaurants with open kitchens so that I and my kitchen staff can be a part of the celebration and for our guests' appreciation.

A Wilmington, Delaware boy, my first job was as a dishwasher at the famed Hotel DuPont at 16 years old. I loved the bustle and the interaction with my kitchen mates. My path was set when I realized that the dishwashing crew was allowed to get sodas from the Grill Room...for FREE!

I moved quickly up the ladder at the Hotel DuPont. From dishwasher to silver sorter to pot washer to garbage detail (there really was an hierarchy...and that really WAS the progression). As I rose the "ladder" at the Hotel Dupont, I remember coming home and excitedly telling my parents that I'd been given another promotion - this time from pantry runner to line cook! I explained the details of the new job from stocking the prep line with "mise en place" to cooking orders to wrapping up and mopping the floor. "I'll know I've really made it in this career when I don't have to be the one mopping the floor at the end of the night. I'm still confident that day will come."

After I became a pantry cook at the Hotel, it was off to the CIA for Culinary school. My first job out of school was in Washington DC at "THE" most expensive Italian restaurant in DC (a point of distinct pride for the restaurant's owner).

I have been a cook or chef in many international kitchens. That facilitated my ability to learn and become fluent in 5 languages. After 10 years of being a chef at a number of restaurants in DC, Miami, Tampa and Atlanta, I returned to my hometown to open my own restaurant. Toscana opened in '92, over 30 years ago, to wild acclaim and success. "I brought the big city sensibilities I had been exposed to, to the relatively small and quite parochial town of Wilmington."

It's not an exaggeration to say that Toscana changed the landscape of the Wilmington dining scene and is even the favorite dining spot of President Biden as mentioned in an answer on Jeopardy!