Matthew Accarrino
Restaurant SPQR (Read a review)
Location San Francisco, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because he incorporates secrets he learned from some of America’s greatest chefs, like Thomas Keller and Tom Colicchio, in his phenomenal updates on traditional Italian dishes.
Culinary School The Culinary Institute of America (Hyde Park, NY)
Background Olives, Oceana, RM Seafood, Per Se, Craft, Craftsteak, Craftbar (New York City); Craft Los Angeles
Quintessential Dish Smoked fettuccini with bacon, sea urchin and quail egg
Alternative Career Choice Growing up, Accarrino wanted to be a professional cyclist.
Recent Project Co-author of the cookbook SPQR: Modern Italian Food and Wine.
Favorite Cookbook Of All Time Thomas Keller’s The French Laundry Cookbook. “When I went through it, I found so much information tucked into the recipes and headnotes, little techniques like peeling the favas before you blanch them, which I still do to this day. People who trained me had told me to peel favas, but no one had ever explained why. In the book, Keller explained that the peel traps gases that will brown the beans when they’re cooked, so peeling them helps them stay greener. Little things like that, from this absolute perfectionist who takes everything to the thousandth degree, all helped shape how I cook today.”
Technique Everyone Should Know How to use xanthan gum. “It can add viscosity to just about anything that has water in it, without requiring any heat. It doesn’t taste like anything, either—it’s pretty magical. And it’s inexpensive.”
Kim Alter
Restaurant Haven (Read a review)
Location Oakland, CA
Why She’s Amazing Because she brings down-to-earth boldness to cerebral dishes.
Culinary School The California Culinary Academy (San Francisco)
Background Acquerello, Masa’s, Gary Danko, Coi (San Francisco); NoMI (Chicago); Manresa (Los Gatos, CA); Ubuntu (Napa); Plate Shop (Sausalito, CA)
Quintessential Dish Smoked pasta (noodles made with smoked flour) tossed with a smoky onion puree, pancetta and an egg yolk
On Chicago Alter interned at Blackbird, Charlie Trotter’s and Alinea before working at NoMI. “I’m from California. I wanted to see what Chicago was like, but winter there destroyed me.”
Money-Making Secret Waiting tables. While working in the kitchen at Manresa, “I was pretty grumpy because I had to wait tables to pay for my commute from San Francisco.”
Jacob Burton
Restaurant Stella (Read a review)
Location Truckee, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because the 29-year-old is a culinary wunderkind who has taken his formidable talents to a boutique hotel near Lake Tahoe.
Culinary School The California Culinary Academy (San Francisco)
Background La Folie (San Francisco); Big Water Grille, Fredrick’s Fusion Bistro (Incline Village, NV)
Quintessential Dish Curry-crusted rack of lamb, favas and salsify with spiced cashews, cilantro-lime yogurt and habanero honey
Why He Moved To Truckee, California “I grew up in the Sierra foothills near Lake Tahoe in a town called Cool, so I’d come up to Tahoe on vacation. I always wanted to live here.”
Influences “I remember watching my great-grandmother move effortlessly throughout the kitchen, making amazing meals well into her 80s. I’ve always been fascinated by the simple pleasure you can give with a well-prepared meal.”
Populist Philosophy Burton created the Free Culinary School Podcast in March 2008; it’s now part of the website stellaculinary.com. “I started the podcast to teach passionate cooks professional techniques.”
Justin Cogley
Restaurant Aubergine (Read a review)
Location Carmel, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because he combines ultra-seasonal ingredients with flavors from his world travels, creating a menu that changes nightly and that’s purely Northern California.
Culinary School The Western Culinary Institute (Portland, OR)
Background Charlie Trotter’s (Chicago)
Quintessential Dish Abalone and oyster with pickled sea beans and wild sea lettuce on a braised pig’s tail cake
Previous Career In his early 20s, Cogley toured the world as a professional figure skater with Disney on Ice. “We had so much downtime when the show was being transferred to different cities—it could take as long as a month. We’d eat out wherever we could.”
On His Transition From Skater To Chef “It was very natural. I was so used to working long hours. Restaurants were a natural fit for me.”
Takeaway From Charlie Trotter’s Precision And Spontaneity Precision and spontaneity: Cogley’s dishes look like tiny scenes from nature—seemingly unscripted but composed.
Jordan Kahn
Restaurant Red Medicine (Read a review)
Location Beverly Hills, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because he’s created a menu full of fantastic Vietnamese flavors—and has never been to Vietnam.
Culinary School Johnson & Wales University (Charleston, SC)
Background XIV Michael Mina (Los Angeles), Alinea (Chicago), Per Se, The French Laundry (Yountville, CA)
Quintessential Dish Cured amberjack in a pine-scented broth with baby root vegetables
Fast Track Kahn, who trained as a pastry chef, talked the dean at Johnson & Wales into letting him complete the two-year program in eight months.
Los Angeles Loyalist “The ingredients here are unbelievable. Everybody talks about northern California, but I’d put what we have here up against any other part of the country.”
On Working At Alinea “It was an intense, dense experience. One year there felt like five years anywhere else.”
Thomas McNaughton
Restaurant Flour + Water, Central Kitchen, Salumeria (Read a review)
Location San Francisco, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because he’s taking some of the world’s simplest foods—pasta and pizza—and elevating them with perfect technique and stellar ingredients.
Culinary School The Culinary Institute of America (Hyde Park, NY)
Background La Folie, Gary Danko, Quince (San Francisco)
Quintessential Dish Pizza topped with bone marrow, Fontina cheese, broccoli rabe and fresh horseradish
On Flour + Water’s Style “We make the kind of food that chefs like to eat.”
Home Base “We built a massive test kitchen above Flour + Water, which has a library for all the cooks,” says McNaughton. “There are also two apartments—one I live in, and the other one is for our offices.”
Nonna in Training Before working at Flour + Water, McNaughton apprenticed at a pasta factory in Bologna, Italy. “It was basically Tom and a bunch of old ladies with rolling pins,” says Flour + Water partner David White.
Evan & Sarah Rich
Restaurant Rich Table (Read a review)
Location San Francisco, CA
Why They’re Amazing Because the husband-and-wife team combines incongruous ingredients in unexpectedly delicious ways. Case in point: headcheese with coffee mustard.
Culinary School Evan: The Culinary Institute of America (Hyde Park, NY); Sarah: the French Culinary Institute (New York City)
Background Evan: Bouley (New York City); Quince, Coi (San Francisco); Sarah: Bouley, (New York City); Michael Mina, Coi (San Francisco)
Quintessential Dish Chicken-liver mousse with pole beans and dill, topped with a pain de mie cracker. “It’s a riff on the green bean casserole I had as a kid,” says Evan.
Roots She’s from Texas; he grew up in New Jersey.
On Rich Table’s Design The open kitchen sold the Riches on their new restaurant space.
Current Local-Food Obsession Fermented black garlic, made by pastry chef Bill Corbett, of Absinthe in San Francisco.
Ari Taymor
Restaurant Alma (Read a review)
Location Los Angeles, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because less than six months after launching Alma as a pop-up restaurant, he’s attracted a die-hard following and a permanent space for his fresh, farm-driven cooking.
Culinary School Self-taught
Background Internship at La Chassagnette (Arles, France); Flour + Water, Bar Tartine (San Francisco); Plate Shop (Sausalito, CA)
Quintessential Dish Salted cantaloupe, raw zucchini curls, wax beans and wild arugula over crème fraîche, sorrel puree and crushed hazelnuts
Heroes Chef Jeremy Fox, formerly of Ubuntu restaurant in Napa: “He’s a mentor of mine. I spent some time staging with him, just admiring his approach to vegetable cooking.” Paris-based chef Iñaki Aizpitarte of Le Chateaubriand: “What he’s able to do... It’s avant-garde food without pretension.”
On Sourcing Ingredients “A lot of Asian farmers in L.A. are growing unique varieties of herbs and vegetables—kaffir lime, bay laurel, wild watercress, chickweed, oxalis...”
Worthy Causes Taymor is interested in food deserts (urban areas with limited access to stores that offer fresh food). “I’d like to model something on Alice Waters’s [the] Edible Schoolyard.”
Famous Surname His aunt is the theatrical genius Julie Taymor.
Michael Voltaggio
Restaurant ink. (Read a review)
Location Los Angeles, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because his modernist cuisine pushes boundaries—he’ll serve octopus over buttered-popcorn puree—but it is still delicious.
Culinary School Self-taught
Background The Dining Room at the Langham Huntington (Pasadena, CA), The Bazaar by José Andrés (Los Angeles), Hemisphere at the Greenbrier (White Sulphur Springs, WV)
Quintessential Dish Baby turnips and radishes in a coffee-cardamom “soil”
How He Got Into The Food Business “My first job was busing tables at the local Holiday Inn where my brother (chef Bryan Voltaggio) was a sous-chef. I spent some time chopping vegetables, and one day my brother told me to come in the next day in a chef uniform. When I came in the executive chef started yelling at me, ‘What is this, Halloween?’ But in the end I got to cook.”
On The Aftermath Of Winning Top Chef in 2009 “I wanted to go back to work at The Bazaar but I’d be a distraction in the open kitchen, with people taking pictures of me. I wanted to say to guests, ‘What do you want, to hang out with me or to have me make your food? You can’t have both.’”
Insider Tip If you can’t get into ink., down the street in a former churro bakery is Voltaggio’s ink.sack, serving playful sandwiches like a corned beef tongue Reuben and a CLT: chicken liver mousse, curried chicken skin, lettuce and tomato.
Kris Yenbamroong
Restaurant Night+Market at Talésai (Read a review)
Location West Hollywood, CA
Why He’s Amazing Because he created a terrific, innovative pork-centric northern Thai street food spot adjacent to his parents’ well-respected but aging Thai restaurant on Sunset Boulevard.
Culinary School Self-taught
Background Talésai (Los Angeles)
Quintessential Dish Kor moo yang (grilled pork collar)
Night+Market’s Philosophy “I love my family’s restaurant [Talésai] but people come in and do the stereotypical L.A. thing and ask for modifications [to the dishes they order]. Night+Market food is uncompromising, unmessed with.”
Food Style “In Thai, it’s called aharn klam lao, which roughly translates to ‘food to facilitate drinking’ or ‘booze food.’ That’s at the heart of what we do. We make food for drunkards.”
Alternative Career Yenbamroong studied film at New York University. He silently projects his favorite films on the walls at Night+Market.
DIY Ethic “We make our sausage completely by hand, on the premises. For the first few months, we used a Chinese soup spoon to stuff them because we didn’t have a stuffer.”
*NOTE: Many chefs change their menus frequently; “quintessential dishes” may not always be available.
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