Bel Lago Signing – Leelanau Peninsula July 25, 2009
Posted by Eli in : Uncategorized , add a commentThanks to the Leelanau Peninsula Vinter’s Association for hosting a book signing and to Absolute Michigan for covering the event. Full recap from max to come soon!
BOOK SIGNING: MAX SUSSMAN “FRESHMAN IN THE KITCHEN, CLUELESS TO CREATIVE CHEF” AT BEL LAGO JULY 24TH
Friday July 24th, 4-6 PM at Bel Lago, Max Sussman, chef and author of the cookbook, “Freshman in the Kitchen, Clueless to Creative Chef” will be on hand to sign his book and chat about cooking.
Eating out at restaurants? In THIS economy? July 15, 2009
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Across the nation, people are cooking more at home and not venturing out to restaurants as much in order to save money. Penny pinching is rampant since the economy is the #2 national obsession (after John and Kate plus 8). I even just heard a report on NPR that really rich people are grouping together for fractional ownership of yachts because they can’t buy them outright! So I guess that means that everyone is struggling right now. Because of everyone depriving themselves of luxuries in this economy (and using the economy as an excuse for everything), as of of late my favorite phrase has become variations of “in this economy??” I use it as a qualifier, excuse and explanation for everything.
Some recent examples:
Everyone in world – “Did you hear about Michael Jackson? He died today.” Me- “and with THIS economy…”
My buddy “want to go go-karting tonight?” me – “in THIS economy?”
Someone who reads CNN a lot – “Did you hear economists are predicting that Obama’s stimulus will fail if it itself doesn’t receive a stimulus?” Me – “ THIS ECONOMYYY!!”
So ‘in this economy’, we happen to think our cookbook is a great way to help you cook some delicious food on the cheap.In these harsh economic times, everyone is looking for a tour guide out of the wilderness of financial dispair and we want to be your kitchen guide. Your other options are Jim Cramer and that dude from AIG…so we prob look like a pretty sweet option right now.
Another great place to look for advice on how to save dolla’ dolla bills ya’ll is on the bloggasphere where Ellen at Cheapcooking.com/blog (an awesome blog that discusses – you guessed it - cheap cooking) just reviewed our cookbook.
The full review is below and we are happy to report that Ellen’s daughter will be heading to college in the fall with a copy of Freshman in the Kitchen to get her through the year without relying too heavily on delivery. Please read the review and visit her blog for more great food reads.
Asian Chicken Salad: Freshman In the Kitchen Book Review
I saw a review of this book, Freshman in the Kitchen: From Clueless Cook to Creative Chef
First, the binding and the book production itself is fantatsic! The cookbook is bound a bit differently than I’ve seen before, with spiral binding along the top third and the bottom third. There are pictures for at least half, and probably more, of the finished dishes and they are inspiring. The ingredients are called out clearly, the directions are clear and just detailed enough. Most recipes fit on a single page or are at least on facing pages (I hate having to turn a page in the middle of cooking!). Aside from all that, they “read” great (I’m pretty good at interpreting recipes by reading them through at this point) and the three I’ve tried have been fantastic.
If all you’re looking for is Ramen noodle recipes, tuna melts, and grilled cheese sandwiches, pick up a different book. But if you’re looking for creative recipes that will be fun to cook and don’t require much special equipment, buy this book or send it to your budding college cook. I had hoped to have my daughter try out a few recipes but somehow summer job and a social life has gotten in the way. I will send her off to college with this book (after photocopying a few recipes!) since she has a kitchen in her dorm and is looking forward to cooking.
Chef Ben Ford Interview – Behind the scenes pics July 9, 2009
Posted by Eli in : Uncategorized , 1 comment so farHaving lived in LA for close to 2 years and visited several amazing LA Farmer’s markets, I know that many chefs swear by several of the markets. I thought that a series of interviews conducted AT the farmer’s markets about LA chefs who use them would be a nice little spin on the whole interview routine.
Being with a chef amongst the produce he/she buys seemed like a cool setting to discuss food usage, organics, the locavorization (my word) of society and food culture. LA is a restaurant city on the rise but its had strong roots for decades… so where (and with whom) to begin?
Who would let me peer into their grocery bag, peek into their chef brain and prod their creative medulla oblongata? After consulting with @barfood and @foodwoolf over Canter’s pastrami stacked high, Chef Ben Ford became a logical and excellent choice for my first interview. He is well known for using the farmer’s market and having awesome relationships with his farmers. (several farms donated seeds, produce, soil and supplies to Ben’s Culver City school garden project – not only because it’s a great project but because they love and respect Ben). He agreed to meet me both at his restaurant to talk and then to follow him at the market to discuss his purchases and his market mindset.
Ben is a real cool unassuming dude. While sitting outside of Ford’s Filling Station sipping coffee, he talked about coming to Culver City and becoming a part of the community. Just as he was talking about this, as if on Hollywood cue, a guy biking past Ford’s Filling stopped and motioned to me (I was facing the street) to get Ben’s attention. Ben turned, called the guy by name, exchanged some neighborly pleasantries and then launched right back into his answer.
And his answers were not stock answers that he was feeding to an interviewer. He legitimately considered each answer before he spoke and provided insightful answers. For my first LAist interview (which made me a bit nervous) it was great because I didn’t need to coax anything out of him, it was just like talking to a dude about his job. A dude who happens to absolutely love his job more than anything.
We covered a lot of topics that didn’t make the interview including a lot of questions regarding FFS and the Taste of the Nation event of which Ben is integrally involved. In the end, and even on the web I guess a 10,000 word interview just doesn’t scream “read me!” We’ll leave that to Vanity Fair and it’s expose’ of Sarah Palin (which I totally just read on my lunch break)
Here are some of the pictures of Ben in his element at the market foraging for the best product possible to bring back to Ford’s Filling Station and below is the interview as it ran on LAist.com. Thanks not only to LAist but to the staff of EaterLA who picked it up and ran it front page on the site. (That was food writer heaven). And to Ben for giving some of his time and being accomodating to make this work.
By Eli Sussman for LAist
Ben Ford, head chef and owner of Culver City’s Ford’s Filling Station speaks of the farmer’s market and its farmers with great reverence. Chef Ford grew up with his hands in the soil, gardening from a very young age so his respect for the food grown by the farmers comes naturally.
It’s this connection between the grower, the food and the dishes he creates, that he honors by utilizing the farmer’s market products. Ford’s menu can change daily, depending on what he has fresh on hand, has selected from the farmer’s market or has delivered from a select group of trusted farms he regularly visits.
Ford’s Filling Station led the emergence of Culver City as a dining destination and Chef Ford has been at the forefront of the Taste of the Nation event, held in Culver City for the past 5 years.
On a cloudy “June-Gloom” Wednesday morning, LAist caught up with Ford as he shopped at the Santa Monica farmer’s market. Dressed in Chef pants and a Ford’s Filling station T-shirt, the upbeat chef moved through the market, stopping to talk with several of his favorite farmers as he shopped.
Ford spoke about how the farmer’s market influences his cooking style and his process of using the fresh produce he buys when conceptualizing dishes. He let LAist in on where he buys his favorite leeks, his thoughts on organic certification, what drew him to open his restaurant in Culver City and his process for teaching chefs in the kitchen.
When you go to the market, does the market influence your cooking ideas, or do your ideas drive your purchases?
It’s very infrequent that it’s the latter. Most of the time I’m going in and trying to work with what looks good that day. Sometimes in anticipation of certain seasons you might go in there differently with more intent. I’m always there looking for the things that I think provide the most bang for the buck on the menu as far as quality and flavor. Plus there are about 10-12 ingredients on my menu right now that I cant get anywhere else besides at the farmer’s market. They run throughout my whole menu.
Why do you buy items from the market specifically as opposed to having them delivered from a vendor?
Some of the reasons why I buy stuff at the Farmer’s Market is because there is a quality of the product there that you are looking for that you want to hand pick. And the farmer’s market is one of the best ways of being able to do that. The vegetables there are even better quality that what the purveyor can bring you.
Are there certain items you only will buy from the Farmer’s Market?
At any given time there are 10-12 ingredients I use that I can only get through the farmer’s market. I have my core ten (farmers) that I buy from and then another 5 or 6 I keep my eye on. I get these wonderful long leaks from Windrose farms. She really takes a lot of care in how she grows them and they are a thing of pride for her. They are incredible and then they are gone! They just went out of season. That’s an example of something that’s really special at the farmer’s market because yes, you can get leeks year round pretty much, but these, because of the care put in to them and their seasonality and how they are taken care of are just beautiful.
Another example is these red frill mustard greens from McGrath and these tiny red and white onions that I love. No matter how many times you might explain it to a purveyor they won’t understand what it is. Plus the quality is that much better and they are grown with care and consideration.
We are also getting duck eggs, turkey eggs and pheasant eggs and guinea hen eggs, and chicken eggs, from Peter Schaner at Schaner Farms. And we are using a lot of those in our brunch menu to sort of extend the egg offerings. And that’s been a nice addition.
We are getting most of our lettuce from Coleman Farm. He grows a lot of different kinds of lettuce that you can build salads with. It seems like it’s almost made for building salad combinations.
How much does the personal relationship with the farmer figure into your decision to shop at the Farmer’s Market?
The thing about the farmer’s market is those guys really care about what they are doing. Another farmer, I don’t know them personally and I’ve never been to their farms. These guys, I’ve been to their farms. I’ve seen how much pride they take in the growing.
Does Certified Organic matter to you when you are buying ingredients for your restaurant?
Whether 100% it’s organic or not doesn’t really even really matter that much to me as long as they are taking pride in doing the right thing. There might be a lot of reasons why they can’t get certification. Maybe it’s a family owned business for 6 generations and they’ve always farmed it the same way and they’ve always done a great job at what they do. But that doesn’t mean they were doing the wrong thing or shouldn’t have a place in what we are trying to do as chefs.
So you just purchased about 15 pounds of these beautiful heirloom tomatoes. With these tomatoes, what’s the process of these coming back into the restaurant and then ending up on the menu?
Well first off all I love the three colors together and so I think the fact that they are all tasting really good right now is a unique day for me anyhow. So I really want to combine all of them into a really simple tomato salad. I’m going to totally let it speak for itself. With these guys really…garlic is going to come into play a little bit. I might do a really good bruschetta with them. Or maybe a bulgur salad. And if I marinate them I’m not going to use anything emulsified on these. It’s definitely going to be a very light vinaigrette just seasoned right with a little bit of salt and pepper. Salt and pepper is going to be even more important than the vinaigrette I put on it.
Who are you using to screen new dishes before they go on the menu? Entire staff? Kitchen staff only? Select people you trust?
Just me. It goes on really fast.
Are there any ingredients that define your cooking?
It’s always changing. My cooks are always laughing at me because last year it was fennel. This year it’s definitely onions. The onions I am going after because there is a subtle sweetness to them I can use in my food. I can caramelize them a little bit.
Do you fall in love with an ingredient and then try to do as many things with it as you possibly can?
Yeah, because it’ll be gone tomorrow and then you turn around (to the farmer) and you’re like “you don’t have that?”
What do you say to someone who says I can’t afford to shop at the Farmer’s Market or it’s an intimidating place for me and I don’t know what I’m doing when I’m there?
There is a way of life that I think people are returning to and sort of learning how enjoyable it is to forage for your ingredients to build a meal. To go buy bread from the person who makes really good bread, then go to the market and get your vegetables and then go to your meat or fish monger … those processes are a way of living your life with a little more rhythm. That way of life slows us down a little bit and is good for everyone. You can shop around easily at a farmer’s markets. They are still competitively pricing and if you are buying what’s plentiful at the market, there are lots of good deals to be had.
When you opened up Ford’s Filing Station, you were one of the first to come down to Culver City. At first it wasn’t this vibrant area with tons of restaurants. What drew you to Culver City?
The buildings next to me were vacant. And across the street where Rush and Gyenari are were vacant buildings. When I lived in Cheviot Hills, I’d invite over people who were potential investors for a BBQ and then tell them we were going on a beer run and just whip by (the current location of Ford’s Filling Station), and say hey, there’s the place, want to go look at it? And nobody would get out. And they were all like “no we aren’t interested. Anywhere but here.”
But (Culver City) had the studio, the cool hotel, this great city hall, they had developed the streets and it looked nice. I knew a movie theater was going in, I knew Kirk Douglas Theater was going in, and so in that way, I wasn’t worried about the neighborhood. I thought I’d grow with the neighborhood. When I first developed this menu I developed it for the people that live in this neighborhood. I didn’t expect this to become a destination location for Los Angeles.
So you want to design a restaurant that’s for everybody. My idea was to not overpower them. I wanted to have a concept that had some flexibility so we could evolve with them. Coming in with a high profile restaurant I didn’t want them to think I was trying to change their town. I was sensitive to the people that lived here.
When you are teaching your chefs in the kitchen, is it a process of you letting them run free and reeling them back in if something is not up to your standards or do you begin step by step and have them follow so its all uniform?
I don’t really ever start step by step. I want to see how certain guys will put their arms around a position. (I want to see) if someone understands that area fairly quickly and if you give someone some freedom you can see what they are more capable of.
So in the beginning I’ll throw guys into a station that isn’t that difficult. And then you teach them the salads but you don’t stop them from starting to peek at what the pizza guy is doing. And when they aren’t busy you never stop them from peeking down the line and letting them get interested in that. Because if you see those peeks, you know they are interested. You see they want to get better and you can then nurture that. But if you never give them the chance and only show them you want them to do A-B-C, you may not get those chances to see a glimpse of what potential have there.
Now that this restaurant row has sprung up around you, is there any competition between you and Chef Akasha Richmond of Akasha and Jason Travi of Fraiche? Are you surveying the entire LA restaurant landscape or just doing your own thing?
Well we brought all these new cooks into the neighborhood. And you start off with diner cooks and these waffle house cooks because you are breaking new ground. It doesn’t matter who you are, to a certain extent it was hard to get cooks and waiters to come down here in the beginning so we found ourselves training staff for the whole neighborhood. Now we are kind of trading back and forth and it’s all fun and good. Their styles are different. I think there is an idea that we should all be really good at what we do so we can get more people down here.
What’s a restaurant in LA that you are constantly returning to and why?
I like going places where it gets my wheel turning a little bit. I really don’t eat that much for sustenance and I really am out there for an experience. And it really doesn’t have to be anything crazy. It could be a really good French onion soup.
So places I go to are gonna be places that I believe may be able to help me forward my own concepts. So that’s one way of going to eat out. Another way is to go and eat something I don’t let into my cuisine, which is Asian influence. So I’ll go and have Vietnamese noodles and sushi. Places I go to learn something and get that experience [are] Church and State, Comme Ca, Animal, Grace and BLD. I have an affinity for [those chefs] combination’s and artistry of what they are trying to do on their menu.
Eli Sussman is one half of the Freshman in the Kitchen duo. LAist spoke with him in April 2009 about his own cooking adventures and philosophy. Ford’s Filling Station is at 9531 Culver Boulevard in Culver City.
TOP CHEF -Season 6 – EVE! July 8, 2009
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THIS BREAKING NEWS JUST IN – Padma and Gail are still smoking hot and love food. Tom is still badass and Toby is only so-so in my book. That’s right folks the finest reality TV show is coming back Aug.26th and Freshman in the Kitchen has an obvious favorite (although we are mega biased). Eve Aronoff, the owner and executive chef of eve-the restaurant located in Ann Arbor Michigan has been selected as one of the chef-testants this season. 1/2 of the Freshman in the Kitchen brother duo, the esteemed chef Max Sussman, is head chef at eve and handled all duties while Eve was away shooting in LV.
Good luck Eve!
HERE IS HER BIO FROM THE TOP CHEF WEBSITE:
Eve is the chef/owner of Eve, an intimate, independent restaurant in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She has a distinctive style of cooking based on French Philosophy with influences including North African, West African Cuban and Vietnamese. Her style expresses her love for bold, complex and exotic flavors paired with cool, clean contrasts and textures. Author of her own cookbook, Eve: Contemporary Cuisine, Methode Traditionelle, she recently received the honor of being invited to travel to The James Beard Foundation in New York to create a multi-course dinner to showcase her style of cooking. She also served as a delegate to Terra Madre, the bi-annual international slow food meeting in Torino, Italy on behalf of the Slow Food Movement, which was founded to help facilitate working closely with local farmers and artisans.
and here is a picture of eve – the restaurant. In the last few weeks diners at eve have included Mario Batali, Ed Norton, Milla Jovovich and Hilary Swank.
Ludobites contest win! With a special guest appearance by J. Gold July 4, 2009
Posted by Eli in : Uncategorized , 8commentsTwitter has its critics. People think it’s weird, they fear it or they say it’s a fad like slap bracelets or jnco jeans. For the FITK crew, its been a wildly efficient marketing tool. As anyone who’s ever tried to sell anything before knows, word of mouth cannot be bought. When it’s organic, it can be amazing. So when i saw a RT (”re-twit” for those of you over 30 yrs old) from @chefludo (are you confused yet??) that he was having a contest to let someone be his sous-chef for the night at Ludo-Bites (http://www.ludolefebvre.com/ludo-bites/) i thought first - “genius! what an awesome promotional idea.” and then I immediately thought, “im’a bout to win that.” I crafted a @reply tweet to chefludo and then sent it along through the inter-web. This is what I wrote squeaking in under the confines of the 160 characters rule:
@chefludo xperience catring.wrote cookbook w/bro(a chef).love free food but love to cook own food more.I take orders well+own chef pants12:04 PM Jun 23rd from web
I thought it had potential…i mean, a little bit of bragadocious never hurt anyone and I wanted him to know I’m not a total dolt in the kitchen. About 2 days later, I got the reply that I’d won and instantly hopped on the phone with the chef half of FITK and said “Max, I’m gonna be chef Ludo’s sous for a night. I’m out of practice, my knife skills are not 100%, I haven’t been in a professional kitchen going on 8 months! I’m a desk lackey!! boost my self esteem immediatly.” In typical Max fashion he said something to the extent of “It’ll be cool. You’ll be ok dude.” THANKS older brother for that riveting pep talk. Basically, I felt like I’d lost my restaurant mojo and knew I was about to be working on food put out by a world class chef so i was sweating. I mean, I expected to be cutting veggies and observing a lot but still, I wanted to bring my A-game and not embaress myself and most importantly the chef.
I arrived at Ludo-Bites on Friday at about 3.30pm and since it’s housed in Breadbar which is open for bfast-lunch, they need to change over the kitchen which is a pretty hectic switchover since time is off the essence. Here’s Breadbar before the switch
By 4.10pm I was in the kitchen standing at a cutting board doing a fine dice on some rosemary and i loosened up a tad and was getting into it. Just like riding a bike I told myself… Chef Ludo was accomodating and wanted me to feel comfortable, ask a lot of of questions and get into it. He seemed legit excited to be cooking dinner that night and when you see that kind of passion from a chef, it makes you excited to be around them. Right then and there, watching everyone prepping, rushing around I knew the night was gonna kick ass. After the rosemary, I did a nice lil Chiffonade on some mint and didn’t cut my finger off which made me feel good. Then I did a fine Brunoise on apples (that were actually quite even) and in no time I was just like Stella getting her groove back. Chef Ludo called out “1 hour guys! 1 hour.” My heart was beating faster and faster. Ge’Dang I love working in restaurants.
Chef Ludo put a guy in charge of me and he seemed down to show me stuff even though he was frantically prepping about 40 things himself. Along with another girl in her 2nd week working there, I was set up in the front of the house in plain view of the patrons. While the hot entrees are cooked in back, several of the smaller plate dishes are executed and plated on the front counter. This lends the restaurant a cool feel as people peer over to get a peek at what may be coming to their table. After showing me how to execute a few full dishes, I got the hang of most of them and put myself to work as a helper doing the less complex executions. The spooning of the mousse and cornichon was incredibly precise and there wasn’t much time for me to practice so I left that to the others but every other part I felt confident working on. These are the dishes I had a hand in during the night:
Poached Egg 65 degrees,Savory Toast, black truffle, Parmesan Onions
Chicken Liver Mousse Cornichons and Green Apple
King Red Salmon cubes,Watermelon, Mint Orange Confit ,Sesame oil
Chorizo Cantaloupe Cornichon
Shrimp sweet and sour emulsion Rosemary
At around 7.30, Chef Ludo was standing up in front surverying the scene in front of him looking relaxed and ready for the rush. Perhaps lucky for me (or unlucky since a dinner rush experience would have been epic…) the patrons ordered smaller quantities than Ludo Bites is used to, and we never got a flurry of tickets that wasn’t completely manageable by Chef Ludo’s staff. Here’s Chef Ludo totally kicked back about to put together the Foie Gras tart:
It was awesome that Chef Ludo (and the other cooks) allowed me to actually get my hands dirty. I plated full dishes that went out to diners which was a lot more involved than I thought I would be. At around 9pm, my friends, the uncouthgourmands (http://uncouthgourmands.com/) and some of 8449 (http://eightfourfournine.blogspot.com/) came in to check out Ludo Bites and show support for ya boy. That made me feel pretty spectacular so a big internet shout out to both of ya.
Soon after, none other than Jonathan Gold (http://www.laweekly.com/restaurants/) the pulitzer prize winning food writer for LA Weekly came in to eat which was a major personal thrill as he’s incredible at what he does and I respect his work to the highest degree. Chef Ludo jokingly turned to me and said that I was making J.Gold’s food so that if he didn’t like it, it was all on me. Even as a joke, the thought sent sheer terror surging through my body. That’d be like Michael Jordan critiquing my jump shot which…isn’t that tight right now. Here’s Chef Ludo working on one of the many plates for J Gold
The entire experience was amazing and to be back in the kitchen made me feel alive again (as absolutely cheesy as that sounds). I give a major shout out and thanks to Chef Ludo, his wife and the entire staff for not being weirded out by me staring at them while they work (and taking lots pictures…god they must have thought i was insane) and actually teaching me things during my night in the kitchen. If you haven’t been to Ludo Bites yet, you have to go. Not only for the food, but for the eating experience. The staff’s passion spills into every dish and for Chef Ludo, it’s all about opening up people’s eyes to new flavor profiles and dish executions. I say go with friends and make sure to order 10 things and try them.
As the night was winding down, Chef Ludo had me plate a shrimp dish for my friends to try. Upon receiving it, he told them “eat it in one bite.” One of the girls replied right back to his face that it was much to big and she was going to cut it. Instead of being offended (as some chefs might be) at this lack of following his directions, Chef Ludo actually laughed. He had given someone an instruction about his food which they had clearly defied to his face. Later on, I asked Chef Ludo how he felt about this. He said that older people are apologetic and be embarrassed when they eat wrong. He was happy to see my friends enjoying his food the way they wanted while trying a new dish that by their own admissions ”remarkable.” (I think they ordered 5 of them). Chef Ludo went on to say that they are the customer and he cooks for them so they can enjoy his food how they like. That provides insight into Chef Ludo cooking mindset.
Chef Ludo loves to cook incredible food, but if the patron doesn’t feel comfortable and enjoy it while expanding their culinary horizons, then Ludo Bites has missed it’s mark. I can assure you after working there for a night and tasting his creations, Ludo Bites never misses the mark. It flips your expectations and playfully engages your palette with every dish. Going in you may expect the food to be great, but I can assure you it will be extraordinary.
