Executive Chef Jan Jorgensen
Brings a Sure Chocolate Touch to Classic Souffle and Southern Favorite Mississippi Mud Cake

Two Chefs Restaurant, located in the heart of South Miami, is known for its seven signature soufflés, chocolate being the most popular. The restaurant is owned by Jan Jorgensen, a classically trained chef whose cuisine has made Two Chefs one of the region’s landmark restaurants.

Besides the chocolate soufflé, the restaurant features other popular chocolate desserts. Chef Jorgensen’s version of the Southern favorite Mississippi Mud Cake incorporates a generous cup of bourbon and his truffle chocolate cake is simple and luscious. (Recipes:
 Truffle Chocolate Cake, Mississippi Mud Cake,  Chocolate Soufflé)

A native of Denmark, Jorgensen fell in love with cooking at the age of 16, when he enjoyed a classic European apprenticeship at a local restaurant. After graduating from high school, he trained in some of the leading European cooking schools, graduating with honors. Interested in a change of scenery, he moved to South Florida, where he began working at Secret Garden, where he met his future partner, fellow Dane Soren Bredahl.

Jorgensen joined Bredahl when the chef launched Soren’s Café, in North Miami. Four years later, Jorgensen relocated to San Francisco, where he began working with Jeremiah Tower, one of the West Coast’s vanguard culinary talents. Under Tower’s tutelage, he sharpened his skills at Speedo 690, one of the country’s first Pacific Rim restaurants, and Stars, which helped define the California style of cooking made legendary by Wolfgang Puck and Alice Waters.

But Jorgensen missed Miami. He returned and in 1992 and opened JanJo’s in Coconut Grove. It was here that Jorgensen developed his own style and first drew national attention in publications such as Esquire, Travel + Leisure and Food & Wine. In 1994, he teamed again with Bredahl and launched Two Chefs Cooking in South Miami. The small private cooking school and retail outlet soon became a culinary hotspot, drawing budding gourmets and Miami’s social elite. Soon the two chefs expanded the space and transformed their cooking school into a celebrated restaurant.

In 2001, Bredahl retired from the industry and returned to Denmark. Since then, Two Chefs has flourished under Jorgensen’s guidance and maintained its reputation as one of South Florida’s finest restaurants.

Beyond his culinary endeavors, Jorgensen, a diehard spirits aficionado, began to feed his passion for collecting rare and unique spirits and now proudly boasts the largest back bar in the Southeast—something he showcases with his inventive menu, popular cooking classes and series of spirits tastings. As Two Chefs Restaurant celebrates its ten year anniversary, in a region and industry marked with closures and uncertainty, Jorgensen says, “I’m very proud of what we’ve accomplished at Two Chefs. The last ten years have had their ups and downs but I couldn’t see myself doing anything else.”

Edited by Patricia D. Sherman

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