Several weeks ago (just before I got a job and still had time to do these sorts of things on a Tuesday afternoon, let alone write about them in a timely fashion), I went to a cooking demonstration by two stars of Bravo’s Chef Academy: Suzanne Winn and Leo Goodloe.

I meant to watch an episode or two before the demo, and ended up watching the whole series in three days or so. It’s easy to become addicted to any reality show, but when the people you’re watching are likable and deserving of the spotlight (Jersey Shore crew, I’m not talking about you), you don’t even feel guilty about it.

Leo was focused and professional throughout the show. He rarely had anything bad to say about anyone, and though he was always at the head of the class, he wasn’t cocky. Suzanne, love her, has a Real Housewives of Orange County look (because she’s a mother in the real OC), but the woman didn’t go that route. Instead, she enrolled in an intensive culinary program and subjected herself to some rigorous kitchen work. Ok, yeah, she got in trouble for wearing too much lip gloss and for meeting with a tailor in the middle of a lesson…but how much of that is orchestrated by producers anyway? She didn’t seem like a ditz to me. She seemed smart and funny and incredibly charismatic. I really wanted this woman to do well.

And you know what? Leo and Suzanne made an even better impression in person. After the demo, I waited to talk to Suzanne, who was talking to a group of women already. “Come join the circle, sweetie,” she said, motioning me over. Then she hugged me and thanked me for coming. Leo was equally gracious and easy to talk to. Both were so encouraging and forthcoming with stories and advice for me.

The food didn’t disappoint, either. Dark chocolate pots de cremes with rock-your-socks butterscotch sauce and vanilla bean whipped cream. French bread slices layered with goat cheese, freshly made tomato sauce and melted fontina. Either of which I could die happy after. (Some recipes from the demo are here.)

My point is, I don’t want this to be the last I see of Leo or Suzanne. Give them a book, a TV show, a catering/party-planning company…I’d support any of it.

You can find Chef Academy reruns on Bravo, iTunes or here. Check out Suzanne’s Meals in Heels demonstrations on YouTube.

And watch my favorite clip of Suzanne on Chef Academy here at the 6:08 mark.

Ruth Reichl has achieved first-name-only status with a few friends and me. Not because we personally know her, but we had read and adored her memoirs (my reviews here and here), seen some of her magazine work and even followed her tweets. The former LA Times and NY Times restaurant critic and sadly now-former Gourmet editor in chief is an icon to those who know and love food. I mean, the Reichl part is just unnecessary at this point.
So imagine how excited I am to tell you, I talked to Ruth!

Evan Kleiman, Ruth Reichl, Jonathan Gold and Laurie Ochoa.

I went up to her after she spoke as part of a panel including Jonathan Gold (first food critic to win a Pulitzer) and his wife Laurie Ochoa, another editor of Gourmet. KCRW’s Good Food host Evan Kleiman led the discussion about the magazine, which Conde Nast folded in November.

During the event, Ruth talked about the changes she, Jonathan and Laurie made to the publication. (Ruth had one condition for accepting the job: that she could bring Jonathan and Laurie, who she had worked with at the LA Times, on board too.)
“It (Gourmet) had become very polite and old fashioned,” Ruth said. “I thought of it as a publication for about a thousand very wealthy people to give to their travel agents and say these are the trips I want to take. There was no fun. There was no sense of the food revolution we had been through.”

To be honest, I woulda been let down if she hadn’t worn something iridescent.

So she set out to infuse politics, sociology and environmentalism into the magazine by encouraging the staff to come up with stories they cared about, instead of having everything come from the top down. When Ruth took control of Gourmet, all of the articles for the next year were already done. She wanted the magazine to be relevant and adapt to the times.
Sure, thousands of subscribers wrote to tell her how she had “ruined the best magazine in America.” But she trusted her vision, and hired people to handwrite responses to the naysayers. Ten years after she took the job, Gourmet had reached record circulation, but the economic recession and doubts about the future of print had sent advertising into a freefall. Without any warning, Conde Nast killed the magazine two weeks before the holiday issue would have gone to press.
“The December issue was done and it was wonderful,” Ruth said.
Each copy was going to have five covers. There would have been a pullout booklet of recipes. There were three dinner spreads: a Christmas meal, a Hanukkah feast with sweet and savory doughnuts, and a cocktail party all done in plaids. There was a story on Peru and another on the history of fruitcakes. Oh what could have been…
You could tell Ruth loved what she did and she thought of leading Gourmet as an honor and profound responsibility. She said she would “absolutely” want to be involved in a Gourmet Magazine of the future. Which, who knows, could end up being formatted for the anticipated Apple tablet.
“It’s such an exciting time for food and to have the magazine pulled out from under us…” she trailed off and started talking about current political and environmental movements related to food. “To not be able to be there for that is just devastating.”
Here’s to hoping Gourmet finds a way to return. At least I’ll always have this:

Ruth signed my January 2000 issue

See full video of the Zócalo even here.

Dan Perlman talks to students about removing skins from roasted peppers

While I was in Buenos Aires, chef Dan Perlman was kind enough to let me observe one of his cooking classes and talk to him about his in-home restaurant and other enterprises.

Casa SaltShaker is a restaurant in Buenos Aires popular among in-the-know tourists. It’s a cooking school for many expatriates. It’s the office of writer Dan Perlman. And it’s the one-bedroom apartment he shares with his partner Henry Tapia.

Casa SaltShaker is the place Perlman dons his many hats. In 2005, the American chef/sommelier/writer moved from New York City to Buenos Aires, where he added a few more slashes to his title: restaurateur/instructor/food blogger/author.

Tired of working restaurant hours, Perlman focused on freelance writing for Time Out Buenos Aires and other publications but kept cooking as a hobby. On weekends he had friends over for multi-course dinners as he had been doing in New York since 1994. In 2006, Perlman decided to turn his dinner parties into a business. Friends invited friends and so on until Casa SaltShaker became a destination for hip porteños, expats and tourists.

Dan Perlman and students in Casa SaltShaker's kitchen

The media has since described Casa SaltShaker as part of a new trend of “restaurantes a puertas cerradas” (“closed door restaurants”). Perlman says there’s nothing secret or underground about his or most other in-home restaurants in Buenos Aires.

“People forget that restaurants started in homes,” Perlman said. “We just stopped doing that as things became commercialized. But it continued that way here (in South America).”

It is easier to have a legal in-home restaurant in Buenos Aires than New York, Perlman said. He made some adjustments to his home to match restaurant code, he’s open to inspection and he pays taxes on what he earns.

In that way, his operation is not unlike traditional restaurants, but the dining experience is. Casa SaltShaker is usually open two nights a week, and each night Perlman offers a different five-course prix fixe menu, which he plans a month in advance. Diners must have a reservation. A maximum of 10 guests are seated at two communal tables.

It’s not for everyone. If you want an intimate evening with your significant other, or if you are someone who makes special requests to have a dish without olives or sauce on the side, SaltShaker is not right for you.

“People don’t understand that we’re not a regular restaurant,” Perlman said.

Although he will consider special requests made in advance, Perlman wants diners to realize he is the sole person in the kitchen. His partner helps serve food and drinks, but it is Perlman who plans, preps and plates each dish. Perlman says organization and planning is imperative.

“You have to learn to say no,” he said.

Diners should read the menu and the FAQ page before booking a reservation, lest they become the butt of a joke by asking about valet parking or whether they can be seated near the window.

Dishes prepared at a Casa SaltShaker cooking class

Perlman often finds inspiration for his dinners in historical events. Menu themes have included actor Errol Flynn’s 100th birthday and Thailand’s Sunthorn Phu Day. Perlman is mostly trained in Italian cuisine, but he has experience in Japanese, Chinese and French schools, and he is trying to learn more about Peruvian and Brazilian cooking. Like his dinners, his cooking courses reflect his international influence. He does not, however, cook much Argentine food.

“I think (Casa SaltShaker) fills the niche of food people can’t get at other places,” in Buenos Aires, he said.

But his blog, SaltShaker.net, is an unrivaled source for information about Buenos Aires food. He reviews restaurants and keeps lists of the best parillas (steakhouses), empanadas and gelato, for instance. He also writes about markets and food-related shopping.

“In terms of food and doing it in English, I don’t know of anything else like it,” he said.

Another useful tool for English-speaking foodies in Spanish-speaking lands is Perlman’s food and wine dictionary, now in its second edition. Perlman is working on another book, this time a Casa SaltShaker cookbook.

“I fit in the writing around everything else” — the menu planning, grocery shopping, cooking, teaching, Twittering… It’s a lot at once, but Perlman says he will hang up his hat if things become overwhelming.

“If we stop having fun and it gets difficult, we won’t do it anymore,” Perlman said.
Make reservations for dinner or cooking lessons at CasaSaltShaker.com. You can also read Perlman’s SaltShaker blog and follow him on Twitter.

Read more from my interview with Perlman at The Argentine Post.

On the opening day of Julie and Julia, Sarah Copeland tried to make clear why her husband needed to buy tickets in the morning. He just laughed.

“But everyone is talking about it,” she said, worried the movie would sell out and ruin date night.

“You just think everyone is talking about it because you work at the Food Network,” he said. It isn’t Star Wars, he reasoned.

For Copeland, whose 9-5 job and greatest passion is food — both cooking and growing it — it’s easy to get caught up in the culinary world. Professionally trained by the Institute for Culinary Education, Copeland worked as a personal chef in France and has experience in the famed kitchens of Savoy and Café Boulud. But as a recipe developer for the Food Network, she has to cater to a broader demographic.

Perhaps the biggest challenge of what many have told her would be their ideal job is translating her extensive culinary knowledge, belief in sustainability and love of fresh and occasionally gourmet food into something to be shared with the masses. She and a team of five chefs develop about 100 recipes each month for the Food Network Magazine, a publication more for moms than culinary students.

None of that, of course, is a bad thing. It just means Copeland has to be creative to keep recipes to a maximum of 12 ingredients and 40 minutes in the kitchen.

“I always try to think, ‘what’s a shortcut I feel good about telling my sister to do?’” she said. “How can I give my best friend, who has two kids and works, the tools she needs to cook a meal that she’s proud to serve her family?”

So the woman who used to cure her own duck pastrami and spent weekends making a dozen pie crusts in a row has learned to simplify. She might buy dough from a local pizzeria or use canned beans, and she’s happy to tell America to do the same.

“You don’t have to be a slave to cooking,” Copeland said.

For her own meals, Copeland keeps it fresh, simple and mostly vegetarian. But to make things interesting, she keeps what she calls “an arsenal of flavor.” For instance, she’ll take a few extra minutes on the weekend to make a chimichurri herb sauce and then have it on hand to use several ways throughout the week.

“It’s a smart way of infusing a meal with a lot of flavor,” she said.

That way, Copeland says, she has more time for “adventures,” which she writes about on her personal blog, Edible Living. Like any journalist at heart, Copeland has a passion for experiencing the world and sharing her stories.

Besides writing Edible Living and creating recipes for Food Network Magazine, Copeland contributes to the Food Network blog. Her focus is often gardening since she is a cofounder of Good Food Gardens, a collaborative effort by Food Network and Share Our Strength to raise awareness of child hunger and to promote healthful eating habits. The latest Good Food Garden will be in Altadena, Calif.

Most New York chefs aren’t also planning where carrots will grow in a West Coast garden, but that’s what Copeland gets to do and she loves it.

“Cooking and growing food represents such a value,” she said.

“To put this little seed in the ground and one day have a meal on your plate…” she trails off in wonder of one of the world’s greatest processes. Copeland hopes to own a small farm and orchard one day.

In the meantime, Copeland will be in her office, a nook in the Food Network test kitchen above Chelsea Market in New York. On one side of the space is a tiny desk and a computer. Just a chair swivel away on the opposite wall is a full oven.

It’s there that she creates recipes like Masa Corn Cakes with Poached Eggs and Chocolate Pots de Creme that are tested between four and 10 times before publication.

And although as chefs, she and the other recipe developers don’t get especially excited about chicken breast, they will remember their audience and do what they can to make it interesting.

“The whole point,” she said, ”is to create recipes that are beautiful, easy and inspire people.”

Rob and Angela, while still new to the farming scene, have built quite a reputation for themselves.  Growing vegetables mostly, with some poultry too, they provide CSA shares as well as supply restaurants like Sycamore with ingredients.  They live just south of Columbia, on some really old land.  They’ve implemented these Haygrove tunnels, that allow them to extend their season with the sheltering and refraction properties of the plastic shell.  I had a hard time not taking the picture in their awesome old barn, even though it had nothing to do with their business, haha.

Mark, the manager of the place, and Austin, the grandson of Harry (who owns the farm), pose for me here.  Harry was busy fixing up a tractor, and these two seemed more than happy to be in the photo.  After rounding up the buffalo with some feed and the big red pickup they seemed to love, I started shooting.  I think I like this one best.  The 1000+ acre farm is out by Kingdom City.

Jacques Laboile, originally from France, keeps bees all over Columbia (these were just in his backyard).  He prides himself on subtle flavors other than clover honey.  Besides making honey, he also is the Executive Chef of Boone County National Bank, and all around awesome guy.  Strike up a conversation with him next time you see him at the farmers market.

Located in Salisbury, MO Mark and Susie have been trying to raise cattle like his grandfather did 100 years ago.  The cattle are combination grass and grain fed, and they have well over 1000 acres for the cattle to graze and roam on.  Good mission, great beef.  I’m going to be making tacos de lengua this weekend (tongue!) and eating the smoked brisket soon too.

http://www.missourilegacybeef.com/

With a name like Chef LaLa and a cookbook called Latin Lover Lite, Laura Diaz-Brown highlights her funky — and easily marketable — side. But after a Cinco de Mayo cooking demonstration, I found more to admire about the woman.

Chef LaLa cooked and spoke at an Inside Columbia Magazine event Friday night. She was also in town for the Speaking of Women’s Health conference. In an hour, I learned she used to be a pop singer, went to med school to be a heart and lung specialist, became a certified nutritionist and studied at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris.

She also made four dishes in real time — without the tricks cooking demonstrators usually use. On her menu was:

• Coca-Cola-Marinated Pork with Fruit Salad
• Chicken Fajitas
• Chicken Enchiladas
• Colorful Bean Salad (Recipe on her website here.)

Chef LaLa, an advocate for healthy eating and diabetes awareness, spent a good part of the demonstration dispelling myths that Mexican food isn’t good for you. To a crowd of mid-Missourians, this might have been a surprise to some. She said real Mexican food includes a lot of fruit and vegetables. “We do not eat chimichangas,” she said.

LaLa talked about her family’s history with diabetes and her own issues with weight. “I look at cake and get fat,” she said. She chooses healthy options like low-fat sour cream and corn tortillas instead of flour ones. Some flour tortillas have as much fat as 16 corn tortillas, she said.

Chef LaLa also encouraged people to cook with their families and be open to experimenting with recipes — both important to us at He Cooks, She Cooks. “Recipes are a blueprint for what you like,” Chef LaLa said. “Do it your way.”

Overall, Chef LaLa gave a strong presentation with easily accessible recipes, helpful information and her own personal style. Best line of the night:

“Come closer. I’m not going to bite,” she said to the cameraman. “And if I do, you’ll like it.”

Chef LaLa will be on the Today Show on Cinco de Mayo (Tuesday morning).

Dan & Joanne Nelson run a pretty busy farm up in Moberly, MO.  Known for their heirloom tomatoes (more than 50 varieties!), they also grow a plethora of produce and berries, keep a few hogs, chickens and turkeys.  They run a country store, and consider themselves the largest CSA (community supported agriculture) in the area.  They’re in the process of building a professional kitchen to promote Joanne’s baking.   Their products are often found at the three farmer’s markets nearby.

Dustin (16) and Austin (12) Stanton, of Centralia, MO sell the eggs from their 3,000 free range hens at the Farmer’s Market every Saturday.  The farm has been in their family, “longer than Boone County has been Boone County.”  More to come as the week goes on…

Since I do not feel I can accurately tell someone’s story in only 30 days, I have chosen to work on an essay, and am calling it “Farmer Portraits”, tentatively.  Essentially, I will be going around to local farms and growers, setting up a white backdrop, one umbrella-ed light, and make the subject’s portraits at dawn or dusk.  Friday was my first “fact-finding” mission was at Pierpont Farms just south of town.  Rob and Angela have a great new system up that kinda of acts like a green house for a half-acre.  When I do their individual write-up, of course, I’ll include all these details, but bottom-line, they were incredibly friendly, gave me a whole tour of their beautiful property, and on top of that, it was a gorgeous day.  If you didn’t go outside Friday, you missed out.

Other families I plan on visiting so far:  Bonne Femme (honey), Goatsbeard (goats), HWL Meats (bison), and the Stanton boys (chickens).  If you, or anyone you know is willing to let me make their portrait on their property, please let me know.

Brook Harlan, CIA graduate and all around awesome dude talks about what its like to teach kids how to cook at the Columbia Area Career Center.

UNRELATED SIDENOTE:  We made burgers tonight with buns made from Shakespeare’s dough and Goatsbeard Farm cheese I got from Jenn and Chert Hollow Farm chives from Eric.  They were phenomenal.  Thanks Farmers Market!

B roll has all been shot, I’m running back over to the career center after class today to get the interview.  It’ll be edited and uploaded by next Wednesday, hopefully sooner.

Gand is the Executive Pastry Chef/Owner of TRU and host of Sweet Dreams on Food Network

One day a few months back my mom was at the library in our hometown north of Chicago and found out Gale Gand, pastry chef extraordinaire, was talking there.  I’ve always wanted big things for this blog, so I did some investigative reporting, turns out she’s a sweet woman and had no problem talking to me between her discussions as part of a panel at Robert Morris College’s Culinary Symposium on Friday, March 27 in downtown Chicago.

I’m not going to list everything she’s accomplished, a quick Google search will tell you how impressive her resume is.  That’s not why I was interviewing her; in fact I generally asked her the same questions I’d ask any chef.  After meeting Tyler Florence last weekend though, I was curious about the idea of being a celebrity chef and the dynamic of not only proving your prowess in the kitchen, but the ability to sell yourself too.

Robert Morris College students ask Gand for advice on success in the culinary industry

Does she ever feel nervous doing cooking demos, meeting dignitaries, or even have a rough night in the kitchen?  Nope.  Never.  Ok, once, she said.  It was a cooking demo really early on in her career, it lasted two minutes and then it was over.

How could she not get nervous meeting presidents and other legendary chefs?  Gale Gand’s father, Bob Gand, owns a music store in my hometown, and in fact, I took guitar lessons there in 7th grade, purchased a few mouthpieces for my trombone and got all my piano sheet music there as well.  Needless to say, Gand was performing on stage from an early age.  She credits this to giving her the confidence to once tell President Clinton she was the most important person in the room at Mayor Daly’s birthday party.  It worked, as she got to sit next to him the rest of the night.

As I’ve interviewed more and more successful professionals, a pattern emerges.

People who have achieved great success seem not to have had that as a goal.  Gand didn’t plan to get where she is, it happened because she loved what she was doing, and consequentially worked incredibly hard.  Several students asked how to break in to higher end restaurants– a question I’ve heard come up a lot lately.

Culinary school exists and certainly can help, but many chefs from Gand’s era came up just by getting work in the kitchen, apprenticing, helping make pie crust every Thursday morning.  Gand believes you can learn just as much doing the work as going to school, and it doesn’t cost anything.

A branch of this discussion was the decision to be a chef.  She made it clear that if you’re gonna commit, you’ll know.   It will feel like there is nothing else you can do in the world other than be a chef.  If you don’t feel that, you can’t dedicate your time and life to the study with enough passion to do it well.

I asked if any treats from childhood stick with her.  I personally grew up with Italian Knot Cookies (or as we called them phonetically “tudd-alls”) every Christmas, and it was my great grandmother’s recipe.  I can eat about 30 of them, if I’m a bit hungry.  Gand had an answer for me before I even finished asking the question.  Her mother used to ball together ground pecans and cover them in powerdered sugar, giving them away as gifts in thank you and greeting card boxes.  Gand still remembers the smell and the feel of the box, seeping with grease from the butter.

We talked more about why she moved back to Chicago (it is better place to raise a family than NYC), why Chicago is such a great place to cook and eat (she believes the people understand the historical significance of food, the diversity of culture, and the geographical location is fantastic).

I asked what she thought of trends.  As a photojournalist, I see trends all the time.  A couple years ago people started making their own ring flashes, and all of a sudden, everyone had a shadowless picture in their portfolio thanks to some tupperware and tinfoil.  Gand’s take is that its not original, but you’re not alone in doing it.  She once tried to see if she could start her own, when a journalist had asked her to try and predict the future trends, she just made it up.  She declared it the year of the rutabaga.  Ironically, it kinda worked.

Besides actually serving someone the food you cooked, I asked, what was the best medium to reach people, the best way to communicate without sitting at the table?  She replied teaching.  She loves giving some part of her knowledge to others, to share in that joy that is food.  If television is the easiest, most efficient way to teach others how to cook, then so be it.

Finally, Gand has a root beer she’s been brewing for a while now, but just recently made the switch over to cane sugar, something I’m super excited about (read my post on Pepsi Throwback for more info on cane sugar in soda).  The closest Sunset Foods to me never seems to have it in stock, but I’m gonna have a word with the manager when I move back to Chicago in May.

I asked what was next on her plate, any big news?  She’ll be touring the release of her new book, Brunch! for the next 6 weeks, and it will be released on April 7th.  I caught a glance of a copy, and it looked awesome.  I mean really, who can argue against brunch?  I don’t even wake up in time for breakfast on the weekend, so besides being my only option, its also delicious.  You can pre-order it on Amazon with that link.