client.rb

require 'rubygems'
require 'syslog_logger'
Chef::Log.logger = SyslogLogger.new('ruby-chef-client')
log_level        :info
log_location     STDOUT
chef_server_url  "https://api.opscode.com/organizations/REDACTED"
validation_client_name "REDACTED-validator"

logtest.rb

Chef::Log.info(Chef::Log.logger)
Chef::Config.from_file("/etc/chef/client.rb")
Chef::Log.info(Chef::Log.logger)

stdout

$ sudo chef-client 
[Wed, 19 Jan 2011 17:14:42 -0700] INFO: Starting Chef Run (Version 0.9.12)
[Wed, 19 Jan 2011 17:14:43 -0700] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/loggertest/recipes/default.rb in the cache.[Wed, 19 Jan 2011 17:14:43 -0700] INFO: #<Logger:0x7f70cf2ef288 @formatter=#<Mixlib::Log::Formatter:0x7f70cf2ef260 @datetime_format=nil>, @progname=nil, @default_formatter=#<Logger::Formatter:0x7f70cf2ef238 @datetime_format=nil>, @logdev=#<Logger::LogDevice:0x7f70cf2ef1e8 @dev=#<IO:0x7f70d39d2ad8>, @shift_size=nil, @shift_age=nil, @filename=nil, @mutex=#<Logger::LogDevice::LogDeviceMutex:0x7f70cf2ef198 @mon_waiting_queue=[], @mon_entering_queue=[], @mon_count=0, @mon_owner=nil>>, @level=1>

syslog

Jan 19 17:14:43 guineapig ruby-chef-client[12289]: #<SyslogLogger:0x7f70cf277350>
Jan 19 17:14:44 guineapig ruby-chef-client[12289]: Chef Run complete in 2.065848 seconds
Jan 19 17:14:44 guineapig ruby-chef-client[12289]: cleaning the checksum cache
Jan 19 17:14:44 guineapig ruby-chef-client[12289]: Running report handlers
Jan 19 17:14:44 guineapig ruby-chef-client[12289]: Report handlers complete

logtest.rb is a recipe applied to the node

second output line in stdout is logtest.rb line 1.

all output in syslog is after loading the client.rb config file from logtest.rb line 3.