HILLSBOROUGH, NJ — A Detective with the Essex County Sheriff’s Office and Hillsborough local, Alexandra Donnadio, has a fiery passion for cooking that is igniting as she competes on the FOX television series “Next Level Chef.”
Donnadio is among the cooks to compete on the show, which airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. ET.
The show follows Chefs Gordon Ramsay, Nyesha Arrington and Richard Blais who look to “recruit talented chefs and take them under their wings as they face unique cooking challenges in a one-of-a-kind culinary gauntlet with the goal of finding the food world’s newest superstar,” according to fox.com/next-level-chef.
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Donnadio grew up in Hillsborough with four younger brothers.
“My mom always cooked but it wasn’t until recently that I took it more seriously,” said Donnadio to Patch.
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During the day, Donnadio serves as a Detective with the Essex County Sheriff’s Department and at night finds that cooking is therapeutic.
“It is definitely a nice stress relief,” said Donnadio. “Some people go to the gym to get their minds off of work and I will make homemade pasta.”
It began as a hobby outside of work where she would cook for friends. Her passion and niche was the “primal cooking of meat over open fire.”
And then with the encouragement of her boyfriend, she began posting on social media.
“Then I started getting all these opportunities such as being invited to cook a whole cow in Texas over an open fire,” said Donnadio. “I realized then I was good at it, I was good at controlling open fire and cooking animals over an open flame.”
She kept getting invited back to do more BBQ competitions before eventually a casting director for “Next Level Chef” reached out to her to be on the show.
They filmed in September and Donnadio loved the entire experience.
“Being on the show, honestly, I would do it over again. Everyone on the show was so kind even down to Gordon Ramsey,” said Donnadio. “It pushed me outside of my comfort zone. I didn’t go to culinary school. I didn’t have time to learn techniques or basics, so being on the show gave me the push to learn the basics and techniques and to be successful.”
Taking the momentum from filming the show, Donnadio said she followed through on her culinary dream to open Iron & Oak Catering where she specializes in open fire cooking and offers a wide range of catering services to suit any occasion.
“I will come to you with a whole hog, chickens… it’s pretty much an entire experience to watch us cook an entire animal over open fire,” said Donnadio. “We bring everything. We bring the fire table, bring the wood so you just hang out. We show up, cook, clean and we leave.”
Donnadio still works as a Detective Monday through Friday and loves helping people through her career and food passion.
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“I love being able to have the best of both worlds,” said Donnadio. “I went into being detective genuinely to help people and now I have a business to make people feel good by feeding them.”
Don’t miss Donnadio as she competes on the third episode of season 3 of FOX’s Next Level Chef on Thursday at 8 p.m.
For more information on Iron and Oak Catering visit ironandoakcatering.com or Donnadio and her career at instagram.com/cookingwithzandge_s.
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