He can be found cooking with amazing local products anywhere from 8,000 to 11,000 feet around Aspen and Snowmass. Executive Sous Chef Andrew Helsley has helped build Aspen Ski Company's local food sourcing program with a passion and dedication that is at the peak of the Chefs with Chops mountain! Quick to acknowledge the deep values of the Aspen Ski Co leadership, including Executive Chef Jim Butchart, Andrew points out that environmental conservation and sustainability are at the core of the Aspen SKI CO business culture and that he has big support for his efforts.

Chef Andrew grew up in the Hudson Valley of New York, where he had his first job washing dishes at 14 years old and later cooked on the weekends while studying biology at SUNY Albany. Chef Helsley worked at a "chalkboard menu" restaurant called Loretta Charles near Woodstock where he'd write the menu for the week each Tuesday night after visiting the farmers market earlier in the day. He remembers real-deal, old school Italian recipes he grew up cooking with his Italian grandmother, and likes to quote a mentor, "perfection in cooking is achieved not when nothing is left to add, but when nothing is left to take away."

After skiing for a winter in Colorado, Andrew made the move to Aspen and dropped some roots at the Little Nell as Chef de Cuisine. Now in Mountain F&B, Helsley leads dozens of chefs at several on mountain concepts and shows them the way of sourcing local foods for their guests. He says, "Our guests love the local cherry tomatoes we provide them from the Eagle Springs greenhouses, and rave about the bison available at Elk Camp that we get from SOURCE Local." He knows guests traveling to Aspen from around the world enjoy the taste and quality of Colorado foods.

When not cooking, Chef can be found fly-fishing on gold meadow waters throughout the region, sharing his longer term plans with wife Sarah (also a chef) to create a trout fishery and hunting/fishing bed and breakfast and hiking with his Springer Spaniel, River.