Today we’d like to introduce you to Nick Zocco.
Nick, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
NICK ZOCCO
EXECUTIVE CHEF
To the delight of Urban Hill’s guests, you can take the chef out of New Mexico, but you can’t take New Mexico out of the chef! True to his roots, Chef Nick infuses many of his creative dishes with the bold, flavorful influences of his native state. He started his career in 2001 at lauded Southwestern fine-dining restaurant La Casa Sena, followed by the Spanish-focused La Boca, where he studied under eight-time James Beard Award-nominated Chef James Campbell. It took Nick just Urban Hill’s opening year to earn his own James Beard Best Chef finalist nomination in early 2024 — followed by a semifinalist nod in 2025. Nick honed his skills for nine years in Las Vegas, where he worked as a sous chef at Bobby Flay’s Mesa Grill and under Chef David Walzog at the acclaimed SW Steakhouse in the five-star Wynn Resort — and in 2025, came full circle by beating Flay on his TV show Beat Bobby Flay. In 2017 he moved to Salt Lake City, where he started as Chef at popular Tupelo, before Brooks Kirchheimer recruited him in 2021, a year before Urban Hill’s opening, to ensure ample time to build the restaurant’s award-winning team and develop its diverse menu while helping run the kitchen at Hearth and Hill.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
For the most part it’s been a fairly smooth road, with lots of twists and turns and a few dead ends. Trying to find the right position for growth can be hard. I’ve had a lot of challenges that have made me into what kind of Chef I am today. Too many to note, but this kind of job requires a lot of sacrifices. I have missed a lot of important time with my spouse and family. Working holidays, missing birthdays and celebrations. Its never gets easier missing important moments like these.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Being a chef is something I wanted to do as a young child. I pursued it right out of high school. I have worked tirelessly in the hospitality industry since turning 18 years old. I challenged myself to learn as quickly as possible from my first professional cooking job in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I soon found that I was good at cooking and learned better from a visual perspective. I wouldn’t say that I specialize in certain specific ways, but I love to cook using my southwest background in developing recipes or dishes that translate my style of cooking. This means, that chiles are an integral part of many ingredients that I use in making food.
A few of my most proud moments in becoming a Chef, would be that I was nominated as a James Beard Finalist in 2024 for “best chef mountain”. This was a huge accomplishment for me being my first nomination and being recognized by my community was really incredible. I was honored to receive a Semi-Finalist nomination again in 2025.
Another proud moment was recently being able to share that I had won my very first Food Network show by defeating culinary giant and legendary Chef Bobby Flay on the Beat Bobby Flay show. This was an incredible moment for me in my career, being able to step out of my comfort zone and do something as challenging as that. Especially after working for Bobby’s restaurant Mesa Grill in Las Vegas for 6 1/2 years.
I think what sets me apart from others, is my attention to creating a strong team oriented environment. Really challenging those that work for me and helping them understand why it’s so important to work together. By creating a fun, but professional arena for all of us to achieve our goals of being a successful operation. It’s important to show my team why we want to create an exceptional guest experience. I’ve always worked very hard in whatever I am doing and haven’t stopped working since I was 15 years old.
Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
I was born in Utah and grew up in New Mexico since I was 1 where my parents moved to Los Alamos. Now here I am back in Utah since late 2017. I always felt like I would do something in law enforcement, and almost decided to become a homicide detective.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://urban-hill.com
- Instagram: chefnick.zocco
