Hello, my name is Andy Richmer. I am the Chef and Owner of Crystal & Jules. I was born and raised in Madison, IN. The "Crystal" in the name comes from my wife Crystal, and the "Jules" comes from my late mother Julie, whom I always called Jules. Jules fought cancer in 2006 and passed away at the age of 50. Everyday I try to still make her proud, and treat people in the loving way she did.
My culinary career began at the age of 14 when I started working at McDonalds. It not only taught me speed and working fast with food, but it gave me an even stronger lesson, which is, how to make people happy. I worked there all through High School and even began taking my first Culinary Vocational Class in High School, being taught by Shirley Herrick. I was hooked, I loved food and cooking from the start. As I was finishing up High School as a senior, I knew I wanted to make a career out of cooking, so I enrolled and was accepted to Sullivan University in Louisville, KY. Sullivan is known as one of the top Culinary Arts schools in the nation. I went there for 3 1/2 years and received my diplomas in Culinary Arts, Baking and Pastry Arts and Professional Catering. After Culinary School, I started working at Belterra Casino and quickly moved up to Room Chef and ran several kitchens there. While at Belterra, I did 2 continuing education classes at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. After working at Belterra for 5 years, I then purchased Crystal & Jules on
November 1, 2011.