Chef serving up in Surf City after facing Hurricane Irma

SURF CITY, NC (WWAY) — Jeremy Ebert is the executive Chef at Beauchaines 211 in Surf City and a survivor of Hurricane Irma.

Before coming to Surf City, he lived a quiet life with his wife as a chef on the shores of St. John. That was until the storm devastated everything. Ebert says he can still remember the feeling of the winds ripping through his home.

“I don’t recommend anybody going through a category five hurricane. And we had 185 sustained winds for five and a half hours,” Ebert said. “We’re about six miles from the eye and we had upwards of 220 mile an hour winds, of gusts. Literally for five and a half hours, my wife and I were in a bathroom for five and a half hours with our animals.”

He says the Coast Guard was able to save them and then they got on a ship to Miami. They then relocated to North Carolina and found a new beach to call home. And it’s thanks, in part, to the support from the community.

“No one even knows us, you know? And that was the good thing is that when I came down here, I mean it was open arms. That to me is life changing,” Ebert said.

Now he just wants to keep doing what he’s done for 22 years: put a smile on other people’s faces with food he cooks.

“It’s that smile, man. I keep doing what I do because of that smile you’re going through,” Ebert said. “When you come down into the kitchen and say ‘that was the best meal you ever had’ that makes me even more proud of being a chef.”

Ebert looks forward to serving even more customers once tourist season kicks off.