Chef Sam Kass is a busy guy. The New York Times ran a story in the Dining section today about the newest White House chef (official title: assistant White House chef and Food Initiative Coordinator). Not only does he feed the First Family, he helps Michelle Obama tend to her garden, and thinks of ways to fight childhood obesity.

Kass is unique among First Chefs in that most people in his position are not involved in public policy. Another distinctive characteristic is that he has no formal culinary training; he never went to culinary school or ran his own kitchen. His only restaurant experience before becoming a private chef was at Avec in Chicago. He has a personal relationship with the President, having cooked for him and his family for two years before they moved to Washington.

"He was a focused, clean, hardworking cook who really knew what good food should taste like," said Paul Kahan, the executive chef and a partner at Avec, where Kass worked. "But he always made it very clear that his goal was not to work his way up through the ranks in the kitchen. He wanted to be involved socially with food."

Despite his lack of food education (he has a history degree from the University of Chicago), he has a major influence on President Obama's food policy, especially the organic and local food movements and farm-to-school initiatives.

"He really has been put in place for a different role, for advising the first lady, for being the face of the place," Walter Scheib, who was the executive White House chef for the Clinton and Bush administrations, said. "It's great that someone who is still physically in the kitchen, chopping, dicing, roasting, physically cooking, not just talking about cooking, would be part of that discussion."

Kass is on the forefront of improving school lunches in order to get kids to eat healthier food, "It's got to taste good, you know?" he said. "They're not going to eat it, no matter how healthy it is, if it doesn't taste good."

So he's cute, he cooks, and he likes kids... Is he single?