Recipes Cabbage Velouté with Poached Pears and Croutons 4.0 (3,174) Add your rating & review Christopher Kostow is a big fan of cabbage; when he makes this soup, he uses cabbage juice to amplify the flavor, but it's also great made with vegetable stock. Slideshow: Warming Soups By Christopher Kostow Christopher Kostow F&W Star Chef » See All F&W Chef Superstars (Best New Chef 2009) Restaurant: The Restaurant at Meadowood (Napa, CA) Background: Georges at the Cove (La Jolla, CA); Chez Georges (Paris); La Terrasse, Côte d’Azur; Elisabeth Daniel, Campton Place (San Francisco) Education: BA in Philosophy, Hamilton College Who taught you to cook? What is the most important thing you learned from them? Trey Foshee. He taught me how to make things good. What was the first dish you ever cooked yourself?I think Trey let me make a beet soup. And what is the best dish for a neophyte home cook to try?A seasonal soup. It teaches you certain basics like sweating vegetables, dealing with textures and consistency that are pretty applicable to everything else. What's a dish that defines your cooking style?For us, it’s about the little things we find, like yesterday we found some okra that had flowered. They have these beautiful yellow blossoms. We set them in a vase, put a raw oyster inside the flower and made a succulent, awesome little canapé. Now there are only four okra flowers left, so we’ll have to wait until next year. But in a week or two, we might find something else. That’s the fun part. Name a dish that defines who you are.There’s one dish that I do on occasion that stems from my grandmother’s brisket dish. We’ve done it using bavette, cheek, short ribs, really aged beef—the flavors are some sort of mustard elements, onion elements and strongly flavored beef. It’s based on brisket with Lipton soup mix and mustard, braised in water. My family doesn’t have quite as fond memories of it as I do. But we always seem to use those flavor memories as a jumping-off point. What's the most important skill you need to be a great cook?You just need to enjoy it. One technique everyone should know.Seasoning properly. Just being aware of the seasoning level is an important first step. The biggest thing you find when you get to someone’s house—it’s not that they don’t know, it’s that they don’t even think about it. If people were aware of salt levels, everyone’s cooking would be a lot better. Is there a culinary skill or type of dish that you wish you were better at?I’m a million miles from mastery on anything. I think Eastern European cuisine is something I’d like to explore, from my roots being there. My ancestors are Polish and Russian. My father was born in Germany after the war. I just think there are interesting flavors there, and I don’t know if they’ve been super well-explored. I think Bar Tartine does it well. And those flavors resonate with me quite a bit. What is the best bang-for-the-buck ingredient and how would you use it?Cheaper cuts of meat are great. We love skirt steak and hangar steak. And what’s a better bang for your buck than a good vegetable? That’s why I never understand—people talk about how food is getting too expensive. You can go to the store and get nice rice, beans and veg and live well. What ingredient will people be talking about in five years? Why?Whatever David Chang is using. What's the best house cocktail, wine, beer and why?We do a really good eau de vie here that we make with apples from the garden. Straight-up, really cold—that’s pretty good drinkin’. Like Napa Valley moonshine. If you were facing an emergency and could only take one backpack of supplies, what would you bring, what would you make and why?I’d bring an inflatable raft, some beef jerky, some element of dried fruit, and a bow and arrow. Favorite snack?I eat a lot of cereal. I mix it up. I wander the cereal aisle for like 40 minutes at a time because I can’t make a decision. Nothing too sugary, but all sorts of different stuff. Recently I bought Frosted Mini Wheats with berries on the inside, and Quaker Oats Squares. I ate them both with almond milk; it was all good. (I don’t drink a lot of milk-milk.) Best bang-for-the-buck food trip—where would you go and why?Koi Palace in Daly City. You spend like $9 and eat very cheaply and very well. What is the most cherished souvenir you've brought back from a trip?My wife. I found her at Pebble Beach Food & Wine. Thanks, Food & Wine! If you could invent a restaurant for your next (imaginary) project, what would it be?It would be called Cabbage and Porridge, or More, Please. We’d do an orphan cuisine restaurant where all it is is cabbage and porridge; everyone treats you like sh*t; it’s BYOB (bring your own bowl); and everyone serves you gruel out of a ladle. You can’t get seconds and you have to wash the floor when you’re done. I think Danny Bowien’s going to get on board and everyone’s going to love it. Food & Wine's Editorial Guidelines Updated on September 25, 2018 Print Rate It Share Share Tweet Pin Email Photo: © Chris Court Active Time: 1 hrs 30 mins Total Time: 2 hrs Yield: 6 Ingredients One 375-milliliter bottle Sauternes 1 1/4 cups sugar 1 small cinnamon stick 1 1/2 teaspoons caraway seeds Kosher salt 2 Asian pears, peeled and halved lengthwise Two 1/2-inch-thick slices of pumpernickel bread, cut into 1/2-inch cubes 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil 6 tablespoons unsalted butter 2 pounds napa cabbage—halved, cored and thinly sliced 1 cup vegetable stock 1 cup crème fraîche Julienned savoy or napa cabbage, finely diced Gruyère cheese and mustard-seed oil (see Note), for garnish Directions Preheat the oven to 350°. In a medium saucepan, combine the Sauternes, sugar, cinnamon stick, caraway, a pinch of salt and 2 3/4 cups of water. Bring just to a boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Add the Asian pear halves, cover and poach over moderately low heat, turning occasionally, until barely tender, 25 to 30 minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool completely. Core the pears and cut them into 12 wedges each. Return the pear wedges to the poaching liquid. Meanwhile, on a rimmed baking sheet, toss the bread cubes with the olive oil and season with salt. Bake for about 10 minutes, until just crisp; let cool. In a large saucepan, melt the butter. Add the napa cabbage and a generous pinch of salt and cook over moderately high heat, stirring occasionally, until wilted, 12 minutes. Add the vegetable stock and 6 cups of water and bring to a boil. Simmer over moderately high heat, stirring occasionally, until the cabbage is very tender, 10 to 12 minutes. Working in batches, puree the cabbage soup with the crème fraîche in a blender until smooth. Strain the soup through a fine sieve into a clean saucepan. Bring the soup just to a boil and simmer over moderate heat, stirring often, until reduced to 8 cups, about 7 minutes. Season the soup with salt. Ladle the soup into shallow bowls. Using a slotted spoon, add the poached pears to the bowls. (The poached pear liquid can be served with sparkling water as a spritzer.) Garnish with the pumpernickel croutons, julienned cabbage and diced Gruyère, drizzle with mustard-seed oil and serve. Make Ahead The poached pears and pureed soup can be refrigerated separately overnight. Let the pears return to room temperature and reheat the soup gently before serving. Notes Pungent mustard-seed oil, such as the Australian-made one from Naturally from Nature, is available at specialty food stores and from farawayfoods.com. Suggested Pairing Vibrant, full-bodied white Burgundy. Rate it Print