Since it's the 27th of September, we thought we'd tell a little story about the birthday of someone we once met...
We first ate the cuisine of Mario Batali back in the mid-Nineties at Po, and knew with a glance at the menu that a pasta tasting menu was the best invention since ice. We got ourselves to Babbo not long after it opened, and in the fall of 2000 started working there. Superlatives are inadequate to describe Molto Mario's cuisine, and we can still recite large portions of the menu by heart. Goat Cheese Truffles. Lamb Tartare with Mint. Whole Branzino, which we filleted at the tables in the centers of each dining room. The pastas: Goat Cheese Tortelloni with Fennel Pollen and Orange. Mint Love Letters--meat-stuffed, envelope-shaped ravioli. Beef Cheek Ravioli. We recently made Mario's sauce for Pappardelle Bolognese; Batali writes in his cookbook that the traditional ground meat sauce is normally tossed with fresh fettucine, but that he prefers it with the wide ribbon pasta, so we got out the hand-cranked Atlas machine. Though it wasn't as good as Mario's, it came close.
We were working in the second-floor dining room one night, when the maitre d' conducted a party up to our section. Nothing unusual, except that this party caused the kind of stir a celebrity sighting causes--only this was multiplied several times over. Gwyneth Paltrow, Ben Stiller, and Luke Wilson were seated at a four-top in our station, and around the room there were murmurs and nods and eyebrows raised and heads jerked almost imperceptibly toward said table. Complimentary appetizers were sent out by the kitchen; Molto Mario was absent for the night, so he didn't make a tableside appearance. In the usual way of celebrities, the three were very low-key. They were together in New York--and at Babbo--because Wes Anderson was filming "The Royal Tenebaums". Over the next several weeks, most of the all-star cast came in to dine in a variety of groupings, with and without Mr. Anderson. Particularly memorable was the night that the "youngsters" came for a late dinner and were joined by a post-theater Bill Murray and Anjelica Huston. We saw the maternal side of Miss Huston that night, and we actually made Bill Murray laugh--which still makes us proud.
The night that Paltrow, Stiller and Wilson came in as a trio, the two men spent most of the time talking to each other. We decided to chat up Miss Paltrow simply beyond asking her what she wanted to eat and drink. At one point we couldn't resist telling her that we'd admired her mother, the beautiful, patrician Blythe Danner, ever since we first saw her in "A Love Story: the Eleanor and Lou Gehrig Story" way back in the late Seventies. We confided in Miss Paltrow that we always thought her mother was the epitome of class, and that she was fortunate to have had such good parents. As if to prove that she had her mother's good taste, good sense and sensibility, Miss Paltrow picked up the tab of the neighboring table, a couple who was celebrating their anniversary, and asked me to promise not to tell that she had done so.
Anyway, it's Gwyneth Paltrow's birthday today, and because it's been a quiet couple of weeks, we thought we'd spend a little time walking down the lane of memory with one of the more memorable anecdotes from our days in the world when and where you never knew who was coming to dinner...
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Zuni
Over Labor Day Weekend we were invited to a reunion at an institution--culinary, not academic.
Zuni Cafe has occupied at least some part of an odd triangular block on upper Market Street in San Francisco since 1979. The restaurant was founded by the late Billy West, who wanted to open a place people wanted to hang out in from sunrise to midnight and beyond. We worked at Zuni for two years in the early 1990s, but our own relationship with the restaurant goes back to 1984, and a pre-concert dinner. We remember the now-legendary margarita, made with fresh lime and served in a Martini glass. We remember the ambience of the restaurant, which was a mix of California comfort, Southwestern-style, urban edge, and San Francisco attitude. We don't remember exactly what we ate, but we returned to Zuni many, many times with other friends for many, many memorable meals.
The original restaurant expanded in 1986, and a year later Judy Rodgers came aboard. We knew of her because of the reputation of Chez Panisse, where she had once worked. Under Rodgers, the Zuni menu evolved gradually, organically, away from Southwestern cuisine and toward something more Californian, more seasonal, more Mediterranean--more Zuni. Though we missed the guacamole served in genuine pumice molcajetes, the new dishes were so amazing they often stopped us mid-bite. We kept chewing, but slower; we wanted to savor every flavor as long as we possibly could: fresh fettucine tossed with sauteed cherry tomatoes in a reduction of light cream with a chiffonade of fresh basil. The roast chicken with the bread salad. The Gateau Victoire--a sublime flourless chocolate cake--with whipped cream. The dish we remember most was a cold summer soup of pureed yellow tomatoes drizzled with good-quality olive oil and seasoned with exactly the right amount of salt. When Darrell, our waiter, asked if we wanted any dessert, we said, "You're going to laugh, but--" "You want another bowl of that soup, don't you?" he said with a smile. "I totally understand..."
We ourselves went to work at Zuni in August 1990, and were still very young, and very immature. In various ways and nefarious means, we got caught up in the chaos and silliness that often obtains among restaurant co-workers, yet amid the individual and collective dysfunction, something lasting developed: already familiar with Rodgers' cuisine from a diner's point-of-view, we now had the chance to experience what it was like to taste it, serve it, and watch it in action, day after day, meal after meal. Working there, we were even more intrigued by Judy Rodgers. Towards her, publicly, we acted less than honorably and less than professionally, more like a brattish student in an exclusive academic institution; privately, we realized that she was sui generis, that we'd never met anyone like her, and that we'd never been in the presence of a palate as developed as hers. We marveled that she could taste so much food over and over, and know so quickly and so exactly what was good about it and what it still needed. We sensed that she was a genuine professional, the first we'd worked with so closely, and that she was possibly some kind of artist.
It was a culinary education like no other, our first opportunity to taste the work of a chef who cooked with the deepest possible thought and care about what she was doing. And because the Zuni menu changed every single day, we got to taste every new dish. We got to experience the flavors of foods that were seasonal, that had been chosen expressly for that seasonality, that had been combined with other flavors in ways that made it seem that cooking was the inevitable next stage in the life of the food, as if cooking was almost another form of ripening. Salmon with a piece of bacon and mesclun greens over French lentils. Lamb shank en daube. Pissaladieres. Fritto misto with sprigs of fresh sage and slices of lemon that had been lightly battered and fried to exactly the right amount of crispness; we wanted to eat nothing else. Ribeyes with lavender. Fennel, its edges perfectly browned. Fusilli with breadcrumbs, anchovies, garlic, and parsley. Eggs en cocotte. The wines. Rhone reds. Bandol. Vouvray. And cheeses. We grew up on Velveeta, and now we were eating Bleu d'Auvergne drizzled with wildflower honey with an unctuous glass of Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise in the rare San Francisco sun. Creamy Fougerus. Salty, buttery Morbier. And of course, the classics: the oysters, the burger, the shoestring fries.
We left Zuni, and California, and went on to eat at other restaurants, cook in other kitchens, taste foods we never had before because...well, because you don't find Atlantic lobsters in the Pacific, because there's no taste like the succulence of fresh pate eaten on the side of the Route Napoleon in Provence, because the experience of fresh fried squash blossoms on the North Fork of Long Island in August is one worth having at least once. We didn't make it to the reunion; we didn't need to: the foods and flavors of Zuni are something we carry with us every day.
Zuni Cafe has occupied at least some part of an odd triangular block on upper Market Street in San Francisco since 1979. The restaurant was founded by the late Billy West, who wanted to open a place people wanted to hang out in from sunrise to midnight and beyond. We worked at Zuni for two years in the early 1990s, but our own relationship with the restaurant goes back to 1984, and a pre-concert dinner. We remember the now-legendary margarita, made with fresh lime and served in a Martini glass. We remember the ambience of the restaurant, which was a mix of California comfort, Southwestern-style, urban edge, and San Francisco attitude. We don't remember exactly what we ate, but we returned to Zuni many, many times with other friends for many, many memorable meals.
The original restaurant expanded in 1986, and a year later Judy Rodgers came aboard. We knew of her because of the reputation of Chez Panisse, where she had once worked. Under Rodgers, the Zuni menu evolved gradually, organically, away from Southwestern cuisine and toward something more Californian, more seasonal, more Mediterranean--more Zuni. Though we missed the guacamole served in genuine pumice molcajetes, the new dishes were so amazing they often stopped us mid-bite. We kept chewing, but slower; we wanted to savor every flavor as long as we possibly could: fresh fettucine tossed with sauteed cherry tomatoes in a reduction of light cream with a chiffonade of fresh basil. The roast chicken with the bread salad. The Gateau Victoire--a sublime flourless chocolate cake--with whipped cream. The dish we remember most was a cold summer soup of pureed yellow tomatoes drizzled with good-quality olive oil and seasoned with exactly the right amount of salt. When Darrell, our waiter, asked if we wanted any dessert, we said, "You're going to laugh, but--" "You want another bowl of that soup, don't you?" he said with a smile. "I totally understand..."
We ourselves went to work at Zuni in August 1990, and were still very young, and very immature. In various ways and nefarious means, we got caught up in the chaos and silliness that often obtains among restaurant co-workers, yet amid the individual and collective dysfunction, something lasting developed: already familiar with Rodgers' cuisine from a diner's point-of-view, we now had the chance to experience what it was like to taste it, serve it, and watch it in action, day after day, meal after meal. Working there, we were even more intrigued by Judy Rodgers. Towards her, publicly, we acted less than honorably and less than professionally, more like a brattish student in an exclusive academic institution; privately, we realized that she was sui generis, that we'd never met anyone like her, and that we'd never been in the presence of a palate as developed as hers. We marveled that she could taste so much food over and over, and know so quickly and so exactly what was good about it and what it still needed. We sensed that she was a genuine professional, the first we'd worked with so closely, and that she was possibly some kind of artist.
It was a culinary education like no other, our first opportunity to taste the work of a chef who cooked with the deepest possible thought and care about what she was doing. And because the Zuni menu changed every single day, we got to taste every new dish. We got to experience the flavors of foods that were seasonal, that had been chosen expressly for that seasonality, that had been combined with other flavors in ways that made it seem that cooking was the inevitable next stage in the life of the food, as if cooking was almost another form of ripening. Salmon with a piece of bacon and mesclun greens over French lentils. Lamb shank en daube. Pissaladieres. Fritto misto with sprigs of fresh sage and slices of lemon that had been lightly battered and fried to exactly the right amount of crispness; we wanted to eat nothing else. Ribeyes with lavender. Fennel, its edges perfectly browned. Fusilli with breadcrumbs, anchovies, garlic, and parsley. Eggs en cocotte. The wines. Rhone reds. Bandol. Vouvray. And cheeses. We grew up on Velveeta, and now we were eating Bleu d'Auvergne drizzled with wildflower honey with an unctuous glass of Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise in the rare San Francisco sun. Creamy Fougerus. Salty, buttery Morbier. And of course, the classics: the oysters, the burger, the shoestring fries.
We left Zuni, and California, and went on to eat at other restaurants, cook in other kitchens, taste foods we never had before because...well, because you don't find Atlantic lobsters in the Pacific, because there's no taste like the succulence of fresh pate eaten on the side of the Route Napoleon in Provence, because the experience of fresh fried squash blossoms on the North Fork of Long Island in August is one worth having at least once. We didn't make it to the reunion; we didn't need to: the foods and flavors of Zuni are something we carry with us every day.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Wedding Bells at Chautauqua
This past Sunday, we catered a wedding for 64 guests in the shadow of the Miller Bell Tower on the grounds of the Chautauqua Institution. The nuptials were those of Amy Klostermann and Mathew Lipp, who live in the Seattle area. We were recommended by long-time acquaintance Gerta Christensen, who does flowers on a freelance basis, and we very much appreciate that contact. The bride’s parents have a home at Chautauqua, yet because of the geographical distances, the entire planning process took place by phone, fax, and e-mail. We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day or a more beautiful setting. The Miller Bell Tower dates to 1911, designed in the Italian style by Buffalo architect E. B. Green. The tower is Chautauqua’s icon, and is used as the institution’s symbol. A tent was set up with tables of eight, and we set them with china and glassware from All Season Rentals in Amherst. The cocktail hour began around 5:30 with Spanakopita, Bacon-Wrapped Medjool Dates Stuffed with Almonds, Smoked Salmon Canapes, and Caprese Skewers.
These last are a finger-food variation on the well-known salad of fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, and basil drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with cracked black pepper. We used grape tomato halves which we hollowed out with a melon baller and beckoning, and layered these like a sandwich onto a skewer. 
For dinner, we served a plated salad of Mixed Baby Greens with Chevre, Toasted Pignoli, and a Lemon-Thyme Vinaigrette. The entrée choices included Hunter’s Chicken--the Americanized version of the French classic Poulet Chasseur, where chicken pieces are dredged in seasoned flour, sauteed, and simmered with mushrooms, the idea being that hunters in the field find fresh ones to cook with their bagged game. We also had Pork Tenderloin Stuffed with Apricots and Prunes with Rosemary, and we served both with Garlic Chive Mashed Potatoes and a side of Roasted Beets and Fennel. There were a few vegans in attendance, so their option was a Vegan Eggplant Curry served with Minted Green Peas and Indian Wedding Rice. This last is a biryani-style toss of Basmati rice with dried fruits, orange peel, and slivered almonds. We’ve done this dish with dried apricots, golden raisins and cranberries; this time we used Zante currants. The wines served included a couple we didn’t know well. Mirth is a winery located in Sunnyside, Washingon, in the Yakima Valley appelation, and to give you an idea of how far north the vineyards are, that latitude lies north of Montreal, Canada. The valley is protected from the Pacific cool by three prominent Pacific Northwest mountains--Rainier, Adams, and Hood--and the growing season is hot and dry. (We still wonder whether a strange byproduct of climate change is ever better viticulture in places it wasn’t traditionally expected.) The other wine was a genuine discovery: a Marselan from Domaine de Couron, in the Coteaux de l’Ardeche. The grape is a cross between Grenache and Cabernet Sauvignon, producing a highly-drinkable, medium-full bodied Rhone red.
In addition to these wines, guests helped themselves to home-brewed beers and ales made by the groom’s family. There was an India Pale Ale called Classic Mag and Best Bitter, brewed by the groom’s father, Pat Lipps, and a pair of kegs with Best Man Brown and a Belgian Witbier, made by the best man, John Beystehner (there's a beermaking surname, if we've ever heard one).
After darkness fell, it was time for a Chautauqua County tradition, Light the Lakes in which fireworks are set off from one lakeside community to the next, and not just along Chautauqua Lake. The fireworks some twenty or so miles downlake in Lakewood and Jamestown could be seen, as well as those from Mayville, but we really liked how long it took the sounds to carry the length of the body of water. It was a fitting salute to the end of what has been a productive and busy summer, and a fitting way to send off the newlyweds on their life together. We wish Amy and Mat health and happiness together for years to come!
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