Corporate Executive Chef
Unique Restaurant Corporation

Jim Barnett has gone to more than 1500 weddings, bar and bat mitzvahs and social galas over the past five years. Barnett is not metro Detroit’s biggest socialite, but rather the culinary mastermind behind the largest catering group in southeastern Michigan. In an average week he personally orchestrates three to six high-end affairs, and in his spare time he is the master cylinder in the culinary engine that owns and operates 12 successful multi-concept restaurants.

Raised in Kirkwood, Missouri, Barnett traces his passion for cooking to his parents. He fondly remembers the many meals his mother prepared from recipes his father had garnered during his extensive business travels. Barnett credits these adventurous family meals as the foundation for his highly developed palate.

After graduating from Johnson & Wales College in Rhode Island with a Culinary Arts degree, Barnett took his talent west into the kitchens of Mirabeau in Seattle and Chez Melange in southern California. Working on the West Coast, Barnett developed a passion for fresh fish and an affinity for pairing food and wine. Barnett met and married Gina while out west. His wife’s career in catering management brought the couple to Michigan, where Barnett’s mastery in the kitchen garnered him the executive chef position with Unique Restaurant Corporation.

Matt Prentice, owner of the Unique Restaurant Corporation (URC), credits Barnett’s culinary artistry and vision for his company’s tremendous growth over the past five years. During that time, URC’s restaurant division experienced exponential growth. Almost simultaneously, Barnett directed the opening of an 11,000 square foot bakery that today services many of metro Detroit’s restaurants and gourmet groceries.

To try to capture a typical day for Barnett would be as difficult as deciding what has been his most memorable experience as a chef. Barnett’s career highlights include preparing a wedding celebration for a sports superstar, creating the feast for the governor of Michigan’s inaugural gala – outdoors – during a record-breaking ice and snow storm, and orchestrating the grand-opening celebration, for 3000 people, for Hudson’s largest department store at the Somerset Collection in Troy, Michigan.