He kids you not

At the age when most boys would be picking out the latest Nintendo Switch consoles or camera drones as toys, 10-year-old Flynn McGarry had his eyes set on vacuum sealers, immersion circulators and binchotan grills. Fed on a diet of cookbooks, including Thomas Keller’s The French Laundry Cookbook, and YouTube videos, McGarry’s love for gastronomy led him to run his own popup kitchen called Eureka in his mother’s house three years later, where he served up ambitious 14-course tasting menus.

This was followed by several internships at notable establishments: Eleven Madison Park, Geranium and Alinea. His two-week stint at the latter saw the then 15-year-old assigned to the pastry kitchen, where he was taught how to make Alinea’s signature Edible Balloons. He had to carefully inflate pieces