Charles Cline can recall ordering rack of lamb and crème brulee at Sedona’s Heartline Café. At least five times a day, he would summon the waitstaff via the restaurant’s intercom to let them know he was hungry, and they would bring food back to the office, where he was sequestered as a child. His parents, Charles and Phyllis Cline, owned and worked in the restaurant.

Cline refers to the restaurant as his home — not his second home — but the home where he grew up.

“Even though I was an only child, with all the people at the restaurant, and being in a small town, surrounded by all the people in the community — many that I still know —it was like having brothers and sisters and uncles and all sorts of people that were in my life,” Cline said.

Family Tradition

Cline’s father, Charles was a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., and began his culinary career in his early 20s. He worked as a chef at a restaurant in Millburn, N.J., where he met Phyllis, a waitress who later became his wife.

Charles Jr. was born on Nov. 14, 1989. Cline said that his grandparents watched over him while his parents worked at the restaurant. He and his grandmother had an especially close bond.

“My grandma was the closest person to me — we had the same birthday. She always said, ‘You’re my favorite,’” Cline said. She would spend so much time with me, just encouraging me. I know that feeling of unconditional love … We were the same person.”

Cline remembered a chant they would recite during their birthday celebrations together, laughing as he told the story.

“She would say, ‘Here’s to those who wish us well, and those that don’t can go to hell.’”

“She always enjoyed my company, and she never yelled at me once in my whole life. She taught me how to judge character and if you value and respect people, they will take notice of that,” Cline said. “She was the first person in my family to pass away. It was a crazy experience.”

Cline’s grandfather apparently enlisted in the military at an early age and became a drill sergeant by the time he was 18. When he died, the family discovered that he had received two Purple Hearts he had never mentioned.

Cline’s parents later moved from New Jersey to Sedona to be closer to Phyllis’s sister Karen, a real estate agent. She helped them find the perfect site to build their restaurant. Heartline Café opened in March 1991.

The Pirate Ship

Cline started to work in the cafe’s kitchen at age 9. He would make all the desserts, serving 200 to 300 people a night.

“One of the best things about working in a kitchen is that you can work your way up, and you can learn as you go,” Cline said. “It’s like a pirate ship … Anthony Bourdain once said, ‘You can start at the bottom, like mopping the deck. And then be the captain in like 20 years.’”

However, Cline said that he learned his most important lessons from his father.

“My dad was in his prime. He would tell me to clean as you go, make sure you have this dry towel because if you use a wet towel to grab something hot, it’ll burn you,” Cline noted. “All these little tips that he taught me about how to move in the kitchen, but also organize myself in life — set yourself up for success so that you have everything you need, because when you’re prepared, you don’t have to be fast. So, I learned a lot of those things in my formative years that helped me to organize myself and move in the kitchen, but also move in life.” Cline said that while he is an organized person, not everything has to be perfect.

“One of the things I like most about the kitchen is the discipline and organization of chaos,” he observed. “It’s really calming in a way — sometimes you have to go slow to go fast.”

Cline acknowledges that he is much like his father — dedicated, overworked and lost in creativity. His father taught him how to cook, but he also taught him the meaning of talent.

“What is talent?” he asked. “Talent is freedom. Talent is the product of hard work and love.”

“Hard work can be exhausting. I often feel tired, stressed or overheated,” Cline acknowledged. “Some days, the kitchen can feel like the hottest place on earth. On those days, I try to remind myself that when I am in the kitchen, I am exactly where I want to be. Little by little, I take steps to become better. I remind myself to create. I remind myself to embrace my style and refine my talent when things get difficult.”

Cline likens his culinary learning process to the practice of Kung Fu — a skill through which practitioners develop their own style.

“Once you have it, you can never lose. Or you can never lose the passion and love for it. You can’t choose what you love. It just lifts you up,” he said.

Strolling Player

At age 20, Cline left Sedona in pursuit of a career in music and toured with a band in North Carolina. He traveled Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, New York and Washington, D.C., and eventually ended up in Canada to record.

“I love all kinds of music,” Cline said. “And it’s always changing to what I’m feeling. The greatest gift is accepting new hobbies and skills and not being tied to one thing. It’s who I am. Things change; seasons change; people change. I just follow my ear and follow my heart and mind. I’ve learned not to be attached to one idea.”

In 2009, a catastrophe at Heartline Café turned Cline’s life around. The ice machine caught on fire and caused $100,000 in damage to the kitchen.

A passerby saw the flames erupting and called 911, but the restaurant was shut down for repairs for over a year and the Clines struggled to get things up and running again. When Charles Cline returned home to visit, he wasn’t prepared for what he found.

“Everything was so messed up at the restaurant,” he said. “My mom was working all the time. They weren’t doing well financially because they had to close the business for so long. In my heart, I couldn’t leave. So, I started back in the kitchen. Everything was broken. I did a little bit every day … cleaning and fixing something every day. And then the next thing I knew, five years had gone by and I was a chef.”

The choice was not a difficult one, he said.

“You can’t choose what you love. You can choose what you do but can’t choose what you love. I don’t even know if it was love for the food, but it was love for my family and the business. I’ve seen people do much more with less, so I just did it.”

Art of Cooking

“[Cooking] is like a dance,” Cline said, “because you have to coordinate this, this, this, this, and this all at the same time. This takes the longest; this takes the shortest … Go. And you learn how to do that in your head. And then, it just like happens — your body goes. And especially now that I’m in my 30s, I realize I have to move with a purpose. I have to take care of my body. Because it is super physical.”

Cline is into martial arts, hikes, works out, meditates almost daily and finds spending time in nature is inspiring. He can describe the relationships between cooking and nature, how some flowers are edible and how his recipes can be adjusted based on the environment, seasons or weather. His diet is simple, consisting of fresh foods, no sugar. His favorite food is pancakes — his morning ritual.

“I love pancakes and I love flipping them — four pancakes at once,” Cline said.

He explained that every culture has pancakes.

“They can be savory; they can be sweet. And everyone has a memory of pancakes — it’s such a childhood thing. Everyone has this memory of different kinds of pancakes.”

His greatest memory was making pancakes with his grandma using the Aunt Jemima pancake mix.

Apart from his father, Cline’s favorite chef is restaurateur and cookbook author Thomas Keller.

“I love Thomas Keller, mostly for his attitude — because he’s just so calm,” Cline explained. “Some of the best chefs in the world made huge mistakes,” he added.

“Any great chef, any good chef, any chef, anyone that does this for a living, it’s your heart and soul. It’s easy to make a mistake.”

The worst recipe Cline has tried so far was a fish and chips recipe from Gordon Ramsay, a British chef, restaurateur and television personality.

“I swear, I followed it perfectly,” Cline said. “There was too much baking soda. It’s always too much baking soda. That’s where I always make mistakes — too much baking soda or baking powder. It will ruin anything.”

Making It Public

Cline is active on social media, recording recipe videos on several platforms and sharing stories about his life, the food he loves to eat and his music.

“I need to go back to the beginning,” he said. “And that’s why I like doing these TikTok videos. Doing these recipes has been so fun. Because I’m going back to the beginning. I’m making things by hand. I’m trying new things. I’m teaching people in a new way. And teaching myself.”

“Some people will love you; some people will hate you,” Cline reflected. “You’ll have good days; you’ll have bad days. Sometimes you’ll be poor, sometimes you’ll be rich. But you must always go back to why you started … go back to the food and to the art. Nothing compares to that. Nothing compares to someone taking a bite and having a good experience … something magical happens.”

Even as Cline is busy teaching others how to cook, he is also planning his own future. He is working on a trip to Asia and is considering opening a restaurant in Sedona one day.