The Daily Inter Lake

Consummate cook

It wasn't long after Anna Malpeli earned a degree in accounting that she realized a desk job was out of the question.

"I just can't sit behind a desk all day," she confessed.

So what does a super-organized outdoorswoman who loves to hunt and ski and who's "really good in math" do with her life?

Malpeli, 31, found the answer in the kitchen. She became a personal caterer and started a business called The Simple Chef in Whitefish five years ago.

As a personal caterer, she doesn't have a set menu and prices but rather adapts her skills and services to each cooking engagement. If a family needs a vegetarian wedding meal for 100, Malpeli searches through her repertoire of 400 menu items and finds what will best suit that client.

She's a stickler for using fresh ingredients.

"I really focus on health, nutrition and freshness," she said. "I use a lot of organic meat and veggies and I accommodate requests for organic [entrees]."

Flexibility and a staunch work ethic are prerequisites for catering, along with organizational skills.

"I'm very organized, and it's list after list after list," she said. "If you're not organized, you won't make it in this business."

Malpeli's clientele ranges from small private sit-down dinner parties or dropping off meals for a family entertaining guests, to grand openings that feed 700. The grand opening for First Interstate Bank in Whitefish was her biggest gig to date - a 200-person breakfast, followed by a 400-person day event and 150-person evening meal.

"I loved it. It was a huge success," she said. "I couldn't do 700 every week, though."

As it is, Malpeli works 18-hour days all summer in a business that's feast or famine.

"It's famine right now," she said, referring to the typical April lull. "It gets really rolling by mid-June, and last fall I was slammed. A lot of older second-home people are staying now through October."

The Christmas holiday season is equally as busy as summer, she said, but come January, "nobody wants a party."

CATERING IS the perfect business venture to allow time for her other passion: skiing. She and her fianc/, Bill McCabe, just returned from a heli-skiing trip to the Chugach Wilderness in Alaska, where they got engaged on a mountain top, then skied down in waist-deep powder.

This was Malpeli's third heli-skiing trip to Alaska, and she's addicted to the sport. A helicopter drops skiers off at the top and picks them up at the bottom.

It's a risky sport, she said, so it's important to go with a reputable company. Skiers go down one at a time, skiing to safety zones along the way.

"You always have your eyes on the person skiing," she said.

Safety concerns aside, Malpeli said heli-skiing is "my favorite thing in the world to do."

They plan to get married the end of April on one of the Chugach peaks.

"We thought 'Why wait? We're ready,'" she said. "It seemed kind of silly to wait another whole year."

But the couple can't pick a wedding date exactly, because the helicopter flies only in "bluebird" weather with clear skies.

IT WAS skiing that drew Malpeli to the West. She grew up in Michigan and the Carolinas, active in sports such as softball, waterskiing and snow skiing. After finishing college at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C., she headed to Utah, where she met a few folks from Whitefish.

"They said I'd really like Whitefish," she recalled.

Malpeli wasn't quite ready to pack her bags for Big Mountain, though. She went back to North Carolina, to Blowing Rock, an upscale resort town just off the Blue Ridge Parkway in the mountains. There she got a part-time accounting job and immediately went stir-crazy.

"I quickly realized I couldn't be in an office, behind a desk three days a week," Malpeli said.

Then she started cooking.

"I'd have 30 people over for dinner and was pulling it off," she said.

Her friends encouraged her to cook for a living, so she began by accepting a job that involved preparing dinner for a family three times a week.

"I really enjoyed, so I took a big jump and did it, and did well at it," she said.

Malpeli had no formal culinary training, but her mother and grandmother were good cooks. She had the cooking gene.

The seasonal nature of Blowing Rock allowed her to ski out West during the slow winter months. Her parents bought a second home in Whitefish and Malpeli lived in the basement.

"I saw Whitefish as an opportunity," she said. "I saw the growth and I knew this place would need a personal caterer one day."

Malpeli took a couple of years to get to know the Flathead Valley and do the research for her catering business. She worked for the U.S. Forest Service in the Bob Marshall Wilderness, living in the wilderness for two summers and developing a deep appreciation for the area. She serves on the Bob Marshall Foundation board.

"What a great way to volunteer time," she said about her foundation work. "It's a passion I believe in."

WOW (Women of Whitefish) is a women's networking group that Malpeli is active in. The group meets weekly to give presentations about their businesses and other areas of expertise.

MALPELI'S LOVE of the outdoors extends to hunting. She's been hunting since she was 18 and enjoys hunting antelope. Antelope empanada is one of the dishes she particularly enjoys.

Her creativity in cooking has not gone unnoticed in Whitefish, where she was a winner three consecutive years at the Taste of Whitefish. She garnered the People's Choice award in 2004; Judge's Choice in 2004 and took third in People's Choice in 2005.

Ordinary isn't in Malpeli's vocabulary.

"When someone comes to me and says 'I want heavy hors d' oeuvres with roast beef and rolls,' I die," she said with a laugh. "You can get that anywhere."

Her compromise: mini beef filets on crostini bread with horseradish thyme sauce.

Malpeli doesn't watch television at all, so tapping into the Food Channel is out of the question. She is, however, a voracious reader of cookbooks, though she doesn't typically follow recipes.

"Some recipes I'll dream up at night, like the almond Kahlua mousse cake" that's on the menu at Pescado Blanco restaurant in Whitefish. Tupello Grille in Whitefish also carries her desserts, including the hugely popular caramel chocolate pecan mousse tart.

Malpeli recently finished a new professional kitchen just a few steps from her rural Whitefish home. It's bright and spacious, with colors that reflect her livelihood - eggplant purple and lime green.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com