James Tracey
Executive Chef & Partner
Chef James Tracey is Executive Chef/Partner of Monterey, Midtown Manhattan’s latest retro-chic American Brasserie and Isabelle’s Osteria, a seasonally driven Italian restaurant in New York City’s Gramercy Park neighborhood. A nationally acclaimed chef with over 30 years of culinary experience in the kitchens of Craft, Starr Restaurants, Gramercy Tavern, Colicchio & Sons and Lespinasse, Chef Tracey’s culinary inspiration comes from greenmarkets and local farms, creating dishes with clean, bold flavors that best showcase the ingredients. Tracey garnered Craft and Colicchio & Sons three-star reviews from The New York Times.
Trained at the Culinary Institute of America, he started his career as a line cook in Washington, D.C. before moving to New York City in 1997 where he held several positions in top restaurants including Executive Chef of Crafted Hospitality. He moved to Philadelphia where he was the Director of Culinary Operations at Starr Restaurant Organization, overseeing 34 restaurants along the East Coast, and collaborated with external chef partners on new restaurant food concepts and staff development. In 2016, Chef Tracey moved to Washington, D.C., where he served as the Culinary Director of Neighborhood Restaurant Group, overseeing 18 restaurants in Washington D.C., Virginia and Maryland, including directing and collaborating with chefs on menu development, staffing, and the overall running of their restaurant. In 2019, he moved back to New York City to open Isabelle’s Osteria, a neighborhood favorite offering contemporary Italian and Mediterranean dishes. In his free time he loves to fish and golf.