Born in Canada to a Canadian-Italian family, Gordon is a dual citizen of both Canada and the United States. Raised in rural Ontario, he developed a passion for the great outdoors and a tenacious desire to see the world.

“My hometown had a feed store, a hockey arena and one traffic light,” Gordon explains. “I loved it, but as I completed High School I developed a bad case of wanderlust.”

Gordon's mother, Gabriella Stefanini, immigrated from Italy at the age of 20. She married an aspiring artist and car parts manager named Gordon George Morton and together they raised five children with a strong spirit of independence, and a love for healthy living.

Gordon loving describes his parents as entrepreneurial “herbal gerbils” with an incredible passion for life. His family home was a place of love, laughter, music and Italian cooking.

Surrounded by forests and farms, Gordon enjoyed canoeing and baseball in the summer, and skiing and hockey in the winter. Endless hours of hockey on the family pond left a lasting impression. Gordon recalls: “I think our pond was 90% water and 10% manure and cattails, so getting a ’soaker’ was something you really learned to avoid.”

Gordon paid his way through university working in the restaurant industry and still marvels at the artistry of a well-run restaurant.