by Madison Rutherford | Photography by Angelina Aragon
Chef Steve Short spent his childhood in the commissary kitchens of his father’s Phoenix catering company. In 1999, he purchased the business and quickly secured plum contracts with Desert Botanical Garden and Arizona State University to transform the modest food-service operation into a multifaceted powerhouse. Today, the Steve Short Culinary Team portfolio encompasses six catering, consulting and management brands – by some accounts, trailing only M Culinary as the state’s largest caterer. Meanwhile, Short has also cultivated a garden of boutique clients, underscoring his desire to evolve out of the Sterno-chicken catering norm. “Catering food got such a bad reputation for three or four decades, and we’re still trying to pull out of that,” he says. “We look for approachability, but we look for different… The only people who get bored with my food is me.”
Rather than relying on digital tools, Short prefers pen and paper to meticulously track daily to-dos and long-term projects. “People think I’m crazy for it, but it helps my brain keep everything in front of me,” he says.
Business cards designed by Phoenix brand agency MMPR are a fixture in Short’s bag – for networking on the go. “I can never find them, so I have to leave them in my backpack,” he says.
Short was 16 when his father gifted him this portable collection of professional blades. The Henckels knife kit has remained a reliable companion throughout his culinary career. “I use them every day,” he says.
The company’s vision – from brand decks to future concepts – lives inside this three-ring binder. “That’s the book I go to every single time I have an idea,” he says.
Short keeps his Lenovo ThinkPad close by to stay connected to the stream of correspondence that comes with running a culinary empire. “I am copied on 100 percent of every email that goes out of my company,” he says.
A sleek reusable water bottle with Live Nation co-branding commemorates Steve Short Culinary Team’s partnership with the entertainment giant’s private events division.
This personalized Carhartt backpack reflects Short’s commitment to camaraderie, recognizing employees who demonstrate “uncommon hospitality” with a custom carryall of their own. “We have a back-pack ceremony when they get them and the whole company comes around,” he says.
