Jaime Rodríguez Camacho

Celele

Colombian chef, Creative Development and Research Chef at Celele Restaurant in Cartagena. Co-founder of Proyecto Caribe Lab, a research project that seeks to highlight the gastronomic culture and diversity of the Colombian Caribbean.

At the age of 32, he has more than 14 years of experience in the gastronomic environment working in important restaurants and hotels at a national and international level; six of these years as executive chef in different projects for chef Jorge Rausch in Colombia and Panama.

For several years Jaime has been working to promote Colombian gastronomy by traveling throughout the country collecting information on products of the traditional ancestral and popular cuisine, which are part of his proposal and inspire his creations of contemporary cuisine.

For the past 3 years, he has traveled the Colombian Caribbean region to let the world know about its importance. As part of his professional training, he traveled to San Sebastián, Spain, a few years ago for a few months to acquire knowledge of modern cooking techniques at the Akelarre restaurant. During this period, he shared his knowledge with the students of the Basque Culinary Center, he was part of a group of cooks and set pop-ups of Colombian cuisine with this group in Madrid and San Sebastián. He is currently collaborating with the Galapagos Foundation in the Muyu project on the island of San Cristobal, Galápagos, whose director is the prestigious gastronomic journalist, Luciana Bianchi.

Caribe Lab Project

Proyecto Caribe Lab was born as a research initiative that focused for over 4 years on making visible the gastronomic culture and biodiversity of the Colombian Caribbean through exploration trips, where Chefs Jaime Rodríguez and Sebastián Pinzón set out to teach people that this region is much more than fried fish, coconut rice and fried plantain.

The cuisine of the Colombian Caribbean is the product of a crossbreeding of cultures that arrived in the Caribbean hundreds of years ago: Spanish and European, African, Syrian, and Lebanese, but also indigenous people who inhabited the territory long before, and that together made their contributions to what today is known as the Colombian Caribbean cuisine.

“Contemporary cuisine based on the gastronomic culture and biodiversity of the Colombian Caribbean”

Opened on December 20, 2018, Celele Restaurant is the materialization of a dream of the two Colombian chefs: Jaime Rodríguez and Sebastián Pinzón. In this space located in a small house in the Getsemani neighborhood in the historic district of Cartagena de Indias, they quickly managed to position Celele as one of the best restaurants in the country.

Chef Jaime Rodríguez Camacho spent years exploring the Caribbean coast of Colombia to perfect his proposition before opening, meeting indigenous people and discovering flavours and ingredients he had no idea existed. He researched techniques and documented recipes that were in danger of being lost in a bid to capture the authentic identity of the region.

Instagram: @jaimedrc87 @celele_restaurante
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/celelebyproyectocaribelab
Restaurant web site: https://celelerestaurante.com/
Restaurant address: Calle del Espíritu Santo, Cra. 10c #29-200, Getsemaní, Cartagena de Indias, Provincia de Cartagena, Bolívar, Kolumbia