The arithmetic
78 published menus, four kitchens, every figure per guest
Most people asking about a private chef in Calgary are really asking one question, and nobody answers it in public. Nothing on this page is an estimate: every figure comes off a menu one of the four published, in Canadian dollars, counted per guest. What follows is what those numbers include, what a full evening adds up to, and why the figure a guest pays is not the figure a chef keeps.
A night, by the size of the table
Per-guest pricing is easy to underestimate at eight people and easy to overestimate at two. Here is the multiplication, at the cheapest menu, the middle of the pile and the dearest.
| Per guest | 2 guests | 4 guests | 6 guests | 8 guests | 12 guests |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C$100Cheapest menu published | C$200 | C$400 | C$600 | C$800 | C$1,200 |
| C$176Middle of everything listed | C$352 | C$704 | C$1,056 | C$1,408 | C$2,112 |
| C$277Dearest menu published | C$554 | C$1,108 | C$1,662 | C$2,216 | C$3,324 |
Marina Mellino’s menus need ten guests or more, so the two left-hand columns are not open to her. The C$100 row is her batch card — twelve portions cooked to store, not a dinner served in courses.
What the per-guest figure covers
What the figure buys
- Prep before the booking — for a tasting menu, most of the actual work
- The groceries, bought by the cook against your menu
- Their hours at your stove, plating and sending the courses out
- Counters wiped and the bins out before they go
- Planning the card with you — allergies, kids’ timings, the dish someone will not touch
What it does not
- Drinks and wine, in every case
- Travel once you are outside Calgary — Canmore, Banff, Okotoks, the acreages
- A second cook or server on a large table, when the menu needs one
- Rented glassware, linen or furniture for a party
- Anything you want bought that is not on the agreed menu
What moves the number
- Which card, not how many people
- Same cook, same evening, three prices. Nathaniel Davis charges C$176, C$220 or C$250 a head for what is structurally the same four-course menu — the step buys wagyu and lobster, not extra courses.
- How many are eating
- It sets who you can book at all. Marina Mellino writes for ten to twenty guests; Igor Dudkin builds one plate per course, which is a different job at eighteen than at four.
- What is on the plate
- The dear end is oysters, lobster tail, tomahawk and Alberta beef. The cheap end is batch cooking. Protein is most of the gap between them.
- How it is served
- Plated courses cost more to deliver than family style, and standing tapas for a company party is a different job again. All three formats show up in the record at broadly similar per-guest prices.
- Where your kitchen is
- Inside Calgary, the drive is assumed. Canmore, Banff, Okotoks and the acreages west of the city are a separate conversation, and two of the four have menus or history out there.
Cooking on repeat, and what that costs a month
One menu of the four is built for repetition rather than an occasion: Marina Mellino’s batch card, C$100 a head for twelve to twenty portions, cooked to be stored and eaten through the week. The twelve-portion minimum makes a single session about C$1,200 — which is C$400 a month for each person eating, if you run it weekly and three of you are splitting the portions.
Plated dinners are a different order of magnitude. A weekly dinner for four at the middle rate of C$176 works out near C$3,050 a month. Neither figure is a package anybody sells — they are just the listed prices, multiplied out, so you can see what a standing arrangement would actually involve before you ask for one.
Where the money goes
The most common question chefs get asked in this city is some version of “why does that cost C$200 a head?”, and the honest answer is that most of it leaves again. Groceries come out first, and a menu built on beef tenderloin, scallops or lobster takes a serious bite. Then prep hours before the booking, the drive, an assistant when the table is long, kit, insurance, and whatever the booking channel takes.
That is also the answer to the question chefs themselves search for — what to charge. The spread here is what the Calgary market currently bears: C$100 to C$277, with roughly seven in ten menus between C$154 and C$185. Pricing under that band without a reason usually means absorbing the grocery bill personally.
What none of this tells you is what a private chef earns in a year. That depends on how many bookings a month get filled, and it is worth noticing that one of the four holds an executive chef post alongside the private work.
The four, cheapest entry first
- Marina MellinoC$100 – C$225Batch cooking
- Nicolas DesinaiC$160 – C$176Casual Italian
- Nathaniel DavisC$176 – C$250The menu, as listed
- Igor DudkinC$185 – C$277Alberta style and the regional cards
Still deciding? The questions page covers meal prep, hibachi, dietary work and rentals outside the city.