We did see Vera for about two seconds, just before she got hit in the face with a flying pie (Thanksgiving food fight). No idea who played her. But to get back on topic...we've seen Chef's legs? Does Chef have a name or rank?

Chef has legs??? Which ep? Or even a voice?

Personally I've always thought Chef was short for AutomatChef ®, a forerunner of the replicator... remember they use a protein resequencer to synthetize steaks, right? It must meet most of their needs, after all.

It's not like Voyager where Neelix wanted to restock with sundry veggies every 20 solar systems. The idea of a real chef whipping up protein-resequenced meals daily seems odd.... somebody who could reprogram that crap seems more likely.

I vote for Phlox being the secret Chef programmer; after all he'd want to keep an eye on the crew's nutrition.

Nope, we saw Chef in "The Catwalk." Everyone was camped out in a nacelle, and they were sitting a couple of feet below the actual catwalk- so when Chef came by with food, we saw his legs.

Even with resequencers, I guess it'd still be helpful for someone to make the actual recipes, set menus/nutrition, make special meals, etc.

I saw the title of this thread and was hoping keckler posted some wonderful stew recipes here...curses, foiled again!

(Seriously, I need some good recipes...)

http://www.reluctantgourmet.com/beefstew.htm <--- a good recipe for stew!!

Hm. It could have been someone CARRYING the AutomatChef ®. Or maybe someone carries the dishes to and fro from the AutomatChef ®, as an AutomatChef ® might be quite huge.