Dave Arnold’s long-standing love of food, combined with a Masters of Fine Arts degree from Columbia University, led to a habit of tinkering with restaurant equipment in both artistic and scientific ways. After meeting fellow food tinkerer, Wylie Dufresne, Arnold became even more passionate about all things culinary and the high-tech cooking movement in particular.

His hobby became a profession in 2005 when The French Culinary Institute tapped him to head its new Culinary Technology department. As director, Arnold dedicated himself to helping chefs achieve their most ambitious cooking goals using new technologies, techniques, and ingredients. He taught tech classes about sous vide, low-temperature cooking, and hydrocolloids. He also played with culinary and mixology tools (try to wrap your head around beef-and-tomato distilled vodka).

Arnold has become a well-known name in the field of culinary technology; he’s Food Arts magazine's contributing editor for equipment and food science and frequently lectures at leading industry conferences, including The National Restaurant Show and The International Hotel, Motel, and Restaurant Show. And his most recent venture, Booker and Dax, brings technical acumen to a craft cocktail list. Arnold has participated in think-tanks for companies such as Unilever, offering his insights on the future of cooking. His work at the FCI has been covered in several publications, including Food & Wine, Time, The Economist, and Popular Science, and his own hi-tech kitchen was featured in New York Magazine.