"chef" news and stories

Anthony Bourdain. Photo: New York City Wine & Food Festival.

When we got our hands on a coveted ticket to the Frank Bruni/Anthony Bourdain TimesTalks event, we were psyched to attend. What could be more fun than witnessing the outgoing New York Times restaurant critic participating in a culinary spar with the preeminent enfant terrible of the chef world?

Not surprisingly, Bourdain is a natural and answered practically every Bruni question with a clever, brutally honest quip. Bruni began by inquiring about one of the more unusual things he had seen Bourdain eat on his Travel Channel show, "No Reservations." The delicacy in question was a warthog's rectum. After firing off a few expletives, Bourdain admitted that while he was eating the warthog delicacy, he knew he was "in trouble," adding he humbly tries to eat everything that people around the globe offer him.

"Where we're going is based on directors we like and want to dupe," Bourdain said of the show. "We want to make something along the lines of films we admire." Of course, he capped the exchange off with a self-mocking, "But, it's all about me in the end."

He may be the David Chang of the West Coast. At 29 (two years younger than Sir David) Nate Appleman of A16 and SPQR is on the verge of opening an A16 offshoot in Tokyo, a new restaurant in San Francisco, has penned an award-winning cookbook and been showered with praise. Now, after three years on the nominee list, he is the owner of the Rising Star Chef James Beard Award. We caught up with Appleman yesterday afternoon to chat about his wayward childhood, why he lives in California, whole animals and his favorite kitchen utensil -- a bloody cleaver.

What did it feel like to finally win?
The third time is the charm. It was incredible. It was kind of all surreal.

How did it feel when you were passed over for the second time?
It was disappointing, but I thought, I got next year. (A Rising Star must be 30 or under.)

What's it like to be the only non-New Yorker to win a national award?
That's a huge, huge honor. It's not a secret that the awards are New York-dominated. To win from being outside of New York makes it that much sweeter.

Until this Monday, Babbo Pastry Chef Gina DePalma was the Kate Winslet of the culinary world, earning six James Beard Award nominations for the honor of Outstanding Pastry Chef but never taking the cake. The seventh time, though, proved to be the ... er ... icing. We caught up with DePalma this morning to chat about victory, pastry, her battle with ovarian cancer and her boss, the boisterous Mario Batali (aka Mr. Fanta Pants).

What did it feel like to the finally win a James Beard Award?
I tried not to break down into tears. I tried to keep myself together up there. After seven years, you try to emotionally turn yourself off. In past years I thought it was such a big deal to win, but it still felt good.

Is that why you were emotional on stage? That was part of it. It's also been a very tough year for me. I don't know if you know, I have been battling ovarian cancer. I was diagnosed four days after my sixth loss. I had a huge operation and went through chemo and lost all my hair. I am still in treatment. It was stage four. It was end of the line, but they got it all in surgery.

Hear why salted caramels should die and why DePalma is afraid to rock orange crocs after the jump.

When people think of chefs and restaurant food, the work "skinny" usually doesn't pop into their minds. While the food is often delicious and satisfying, it can be high in calories and fat.

I dine out each week, but I know there's a downside to indulging every day. When I worked in New York City restaurant kitchens, I learned something really valuable -- cooking techniques that I could apply to make healthier versions of those meals, so I could enjoy them more often. I also learned how to fit restaurant food into a balanced lifestyle.

My mission as the Skinny Chef is to recreate those flavors and experiences by making food that can be enjoyed guilt free, more often, at home. While I discovered great ways to maintaining a healthy weight, I chose the name Skinny Chef to remind us that food can be fun, flavorful, beautiful, satisfying and healthy at the same time.

Sharing my knowledge and love of food with others has completely changed my life and put me in touch with so many wonderful people I might have never had the chance to meet. I want to hear more about you and your food experiences, so that we can start together our journey to easy, fun ways to cook tasty nourishing meals.

Responses to questions from last post's comments are after the jump.

For many foodies, becoming a professional chef is a little bit like running away to join the circus. It seems impossible, the kind of bold, crazy move that is compelling simply because it is so unlikely. On the other hand, after hearing dinner guests repeatedly praise your cooking and loudly declaring that you should open a restaurant, it is easy to get lost in daydreams of culinary glory, imagining yourself joyfully preparing outstanding food, day after day, for a dining room full of excited, appreciative customers.

To get a better feel for the realities of the cooking trade, I talked to David Herr, a former engineer who followed the ultimate foodie dream and became a professional chef. For him, the path to culinary contentment began with a job that was, increasingly, becoming unenjoyable. After 20 years in the structural engineering field, he found that "Work was drying up, I was burning out, and I wanted something new. Since cooking was an innate part of my life, I decided that that was what I wanted to do next." After a great deal of research, David determined that his best route would be to enter a chef training program at either the Culinary Institute of America or New York City's French Culinary Institute. After a great deal of consideration, he decided to go with The French Culinary Institute, as its six-month program was shorter and cost less than CIA's 2-year course of study.