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Eater
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- Eater
Make Gjelina's Famous Pizza, Now in 2 Hours Instead of 27
I once skipped several sessions of an expensive culinary conference in Los Angeles just so I could sit in a cab for something like two hours in heavy traffic to make it to Gjelina. In 2016, Gjelina was all anyone at the conference would talk about, so I played hooky to experience the low-key Venice restaurant with all the hype and man, I was glad I did. My fellow colleagues/truants and I dove into the hyper-seasonal, vegetable-driven menu with the zeal of sun-starved non-Californians, ordering nearly everything and eating like it was our job, because it is. There were some very lovely salads done with the sort of insouciant minimalism that put California cuisine on the map, a few astonishingly delicate handmade pastas, and the star of the show, Gjelina's famous Neapolitan-style pizzas. All floofy, charred edges, they were topped with things that made me, a former pizzaiola, swoon. The bold anchovy, roasted tomatoes, and smoked mozzarella pie was so impressive that I picked up a copy of then chef Travis Lett's 2015 Gjelina cookbook on my way out the door. I've used that book a lot in the intervening 10 years. While the restaurant's street cred has perhaps waned a little since Lett's departure, the pies are still flying off the menu and the book holds some solid lessons in how to cook. But… (you knew there was a but) the recipes are kind of a lot. Lett chose to write the book in a way that tells readers exactly how they do things in the restaurant, where a dedicated kitchen staff spends hours prepping the pickles, confit vegetables, sauces, and infused oils that make Gjelina's food taste so distinctively delicious. While I admire the transparency and flavors the effort yields, all that prep work is a pain in the patoot to create at home. Take the pizza chapter, for instance. The dough alone requires at least 27 hours to make. Lett writes in the headnote that the recipe is among the simplest he's ever worked with. Good Lord above, where was he making pizza before, the French Laundry? He starts with fresh yeast, which is only available at restaurant supply stores (in large bricks, no less) and doesn't explain why you would need to use that versus active dry yeast, which is much easier to find. Just a quick calculation and he could have converted the recipe so it was easier to use for home cooks. A cookbook is meant for home cooks, right? The recipe calls for two types of flour — low-gluten, fine-milled imported Italian Antimo Caputo 00 flour and higher-gluten King Arthur's Sir Galahad bread flour. That's fine if you have both flours knocking around in your cupboards (hint: neither will be at your local grocery store). I have found that using 00 fine-milled flour from a domestic source (Bob's Red Mill #FTW) makes for a lovely pizza crust with nice bubbly pockets, a crispy bottom, and perhaps not quite the chew of Lett's recipe, but close enough to get the Neapolitan pizza idea across. Restaurants use a low-yeast, slow-fermented dough not just because it helps the flavor and texture of a finished crust, but also because they are making large batches ahead of time and can let the dough rise over a day or two in the fridge until it's needed. Lett's recipe requires two fermentations, the first of which is at warm room temperature until the dough has risen to 50 to 75 percent of its original volume, about three hours. It's a hell of an ask for a home cook to suss out the volume in such terms. I stared at the dough for so long trying to figure out what 75 percent relative volume was that I had a very unpleasant algebra class flashback. Also, Lett writes that the temperature of the room should be 80 degrees during this initial bulk rise, but unless you live in Southern California or are making this pizza in August without AC, you are apparently f**ked. Next, the dough is risen slowly for one to two and a half days in the refrigerator. The recipe then goes on for a page about how to divide the dough and form it into taut balls, only to rise it again for a bafflingly wide time window (one and a half to three hours). After that, the dough balls are dunked in another blend of semolina and all-purpose flours, stretched by hand (NEVER with a rolling pin, but Lett doesn't say why). And at the end of all this dense and confusing prose comes this tidbit about the dough: 'If it is superelastic [ sic ], then the dough probably has not proofed enough. If the dough is supersoft [ sic ] and tears easily, it has proofed too much.' That didn't inspire much confidence. It also doesn't guide you on what to do in either of these scenarios. All of this is to say that I found the dough recipe to be excessively fiddly and time-consuming, and that the dough it yields is sticky and hard to handle. It also tastes pretty good but looks nothing like the photo in the book. Eventually I gave up on Lett's method and came up with a single-rise, single-flour dough that is ready in just under two hours. As for the toppings, the base of my favorite Gjelina pie is not tomato sauce but tomato confit, a sub recipe wherein you roast 3 pounds of blanched and peeled Roma tomatoes for four hours with garlic, herbs, and 2 cups of olive oil. For one pizza, you'll need ⅓ cup of said confit tomatoes and all that oil is collateral damage. They're delicious, and you should make the recipe sometime when you've got a ton of tomatoes and even more time, but do you know what else works? Roasting just 1 pound of smaller Campari tomatoes with garlic, herbs, and just ½ cup of oil in the oven as you are heating up the pizza stone. In just 45 minutes to an hour, the tomatoes will let go of their juices, intensify to a lovely sweetness, and their skins will crinkle and come away from the flesh as easy as plucking daisy petals. Ditto for the roasted red bell peppers. The cookbook has you flip to another sub recipe and grill the peppers over a charcoal fire, gas fire, or in a cast-iron grill pan indoors (which takes a very long time and is not recommended by yours truly). You're better off setting the peppers over a gas flame on the stove or baking halved peppers skin-side up for 30 minutes in a 400-degree oven. You could also just open a jar of roasted peppers, but if you do I recommend the meaty intensity of roasted piquillo peppers. Thankfully they're getting easier to find in grocery stores. So that leaves us with the cheese. The recipe calls for fresh, smoked mozzarella. Sadly, the only version I could find melts to the consistency of hot snot in a milky puddle and tastes like a campfire. I now use plain fresh mozzarella (blotted thoroughly with paper towels to remove excess moisture) along with a sprinkle of grated scamorza, a lightly smoked semi-firm cow's milk, for a subtle, smoky twang. As for the anchovies, I suspect that people who don't like them may only be familiar with the skinny inferior canned fishies that are thrown on lesser Caesar salads as an afterthought. I'm not sure why the book's recipe recommends salt-packed anchovies —maybe they taste better — but after leaving four different gourmet shops empty-handed, I couldn't tell you. I use Ortiz Spanish anchovies that come in a small glass jar affixed with a tiny bonus fork. They are meaty, firm, and have a buttery flavor that makes anchovy pizza well worth the fish breath. Finally, Lett instructs you to sprinkle the finished pizza with Sicilian dried oregano, because oregano with fewer food miles simply would not do. I can't say I could really taste the difference, so now I just use what I've got on hand. In the end, I've developed a recipe that is admittedly a distant homage to the stellar pie I had at Gjelina. That's because even when I followed the Gjelina recipe to the letter, I never got a pizza like the one in the book's photo with the bubbly charred crust, perhaps because my oven can't get up to 800 degrees like the restaurant's purpose-built pizza oven. So I opted to create a doable pizza recipe with a crisp crust and bold, savory toppings that takes a little less than two hours. It's a pie I make frequently. With the 25 ½ hours I save, I have time to hold down a job and make the velvety butterscotch pot de crème with salted caramel recipe in the back of the Gjelina cookbook, which never fails to make my life instantly better. Two-Hour Anchovy and Roasted Pepper Pizza Recipe Adapted from Gjelina: Cooking From Venice, California Makes 2 (10-inch) pizzas, serves 2 to 4 Ingredients: 2 teaspoons active dry yeast1 cup warm water (70-75 degrees)2 tablespoons plus 1 ½ teaspoons olive oil, divided3 cups (384 grams) Bob's Red Mill 00 flour, plus more for dusting1 ½ teaspoons salt1 teaspoon sugar2 to 3 tablespoons polenta or semolina flour6 ounces fresh mozzarella, torn into pieces (⅔ cup) and patted dry with paper towels½ cup grated scamorza cheese or low-moisture smoked mozzarella cheese1 cup Quick Roasted Tomatoes (see recipe below), skins discarded, flesh torn into ½-inch chunks½ cup jarred, sliced roasted piquillo peppers or roasted red bell peppers, patted dry with paper towels10 good-quality oil packed anchovies ½ to 1 teaspoon dried oregano Instructions: Step 1: Put a pizza stone on a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Bake the tomatoes (if using) as the oven heats up (see sub recipe below). Step 2: Make the pizza dough. In a measuring cup, combine the yeast and water and set aside for 5 minutes until creamy and a little puffy looking. Add 1 tablespoon of the olive oil and stir to combine. Combine the flour, salt, and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer or in a large bowl (if kneading by hand). Add the yeast-water mixture and mix on low speed (2) with the dough hook until the dough comes together into a smooth, stretchy dough, 4 to 5 minutes. To test if it's got enough gluten development, try the window pane test; if the dough is developed, you should be able to stretch a small amount of dough between your fingers until it is almost see-through at the thinnest point without tearing. If kneading by hand, dust a work surface with as little flour as possible and knead until smooth and stretchy, 5 to 8 minutes. The wetter the dough, the crisper the crust will be. Step 3: Let the dough rise. Rub the remaining 2 teaspoons of oil in a large bowl, add the dough, cover, and set aside next to the oven until the dough is puffy and nearly doubled in size, 1 to 1 ½ hours, depending on the temperature in your kitchen. If you're not sure if it's ready, try the poke test. Step 4: Stretch the pizza dough using the steering wheel method. Divide the dough in half. Leave one piece in the bowl, covered. Put the other on a lightly floured surface and gently press down the center of the dough to create a fat disc. Gently stretch the dough into a small round with your fingers, leaving ½ inch of the edges untouched to create a puffy edge. Pick up the dough near the edge, letting the rest hang down and continuing to leave a half-inch of the edge untouched. Gently pinch the dough while rotating it until it is stretched to about 10 to 12 inches in diameter. Gravity will help stretch the dough and rotating it while you work ensures you get a round-ish shape. Step 5: Sprinkle a pizza peel or the back of a baking sheet with a four-finger pinch of polenta or semolina; the coarseness will act like ball bearings and make it extra easy to slide the dough from the peel onto the pizza stone in the oven. Transfer the dough to the pizza peel, making sure it isn't sticking anywhere. Carefully arrange half of the tomatoes over the dough, followed by half the cheese, peppers, and anchovies Don't let any toppings get on the peel or the dough may stick. Step 6: Open the oven and transfer the pizza to the stone by putting the front edge of the peel very close to the stone. Using a decisive jerking motion, quickly slide the pizza onto the stone, almost as if you were pulling a tablecloth out from under a fully laid dining table. Bake, rotating the pizza once for even browning, until the crust is crisp underneath, the edges are deeply browned in places, and the cheese is bubbly, 10 to 12 minutes. Using the pizza peel, transfer the pizza to a large cutting board. Sprinkle with half of the oregano and drizzle with 1 ½ teaspoons of olive oil (or the oil used to bake the tomatoes), cut into wedges, and serve immediately. Step 7: Let the pizza stone heat up again for 15 minutes. Make the second pizza with the remaining dough and toppings. Quick Roasted Tomatoes Recipe Makes about 1 cup, enough for two pizzas Ingredients: 1 pound medium-size Campari tomatoes, halved2 large garlic cloves, sliced1 teaspoon oregano¼ teaspoon thyme½ teaspoon sea salt1 pinch chile flakes ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil Instructions: Step 1: Prepare the tomatoes. Poke the seeds out of the tomatoes and discard. Place the tomatoes cut side up in an 8-by-11-inch baking dish (or any other baking dish that can fit the tomatoes in an even layer). Tuck a slice of garlic into each tomato half. Sprinkle with the oregano, thyme, sea salt, and chile flakes. Pour the olive oil over the top. Step 2: Bake the tomatoes. Put a piece of foil loosely over the baking dish and place it on the center rack of a cold oven, on the rack above the pizza stone. (Do not put the baking dish on the pizza stone itself or it will prevent the stone from preheating properly.) Set the oven to 500 degrees and bake until the tomatoes are collapsed and smell amazing, 45 minutes to 1 hour. Remove from the oven, uncover, and let cool for 5 to 10 minutes. Remove the center rack from the oven to make it easier to slide the pizzas into the oven. Step 3: When the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, pull off their skins and discard. Place the tomatoes and garlic in a bowl and break them up with a spoon into large chunks, then set aside until you need them. Reserve the olive oil left over in the baking dish to drizzle on the pizzas. Any remaining oil can be kept in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to one week. Dina Ávila is a photographer living in Portland, Oregon. Prices taken at time of publishing. $25 at Amazon $35 at Bookshop
San Francisco Chronicle
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
The best places to eat in Napa before and after BottleRock this weekend
Napa's BottleRock Napa Valley is arguably more famous for its food than its musical acts. (It even has a star-studded culinary stage.) Nevertheless, festival food is expensive, often requires waiting in long lines and doesn't always live up to the hype. Luckily, some of Napa's best restaurants are within walking distance of the festival grounds. Here are the top casual food options — recommended by a longtime Napa local — for breakfast, lunch and late night if you're headed to BottleRock, which runs Friday-Sunday, May 23-25. Breakfast San Francisco Chronicle associate restaurant critic Cesar Hernandez crowned Contimo's fluffy, buttery biscuits the Bay Area's best. Try them with the Ham & Jam breakfast sandwich ($8.75) — add Pimento cheese for a surprising twist — or whatever the 'Baller Biscuit' special is on Friday, and pair with coffee or a mimosa. Napa Farmers Market Swing by the Napa Farmers Market on Saturday morning and piece together a robust breakfast spread consisting of Toasted's bagels, breakfast tacos from Ray Ray's, Frenchy Gourmet's insanely creamy yogurt and fresh fruit from a local farm. 1100 West St., Napa. 8 a.m.-noon Saturday. Croccante Find Napa's best hangover brunch in an unexpected location: Detroit-style pizza joint Croccante. Recover from the previous night's festivities with steak and eggs ($26), a massive stack of buttermilk pancakes ($18) and khachapuri ($18), a cheesy, egg-topped Georgian specialty. Rory's Bakehouse 2766 Old Sonoma Rd., Napa. 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Friday; 9 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday. Lunch One of downtown Napa's longest-running eateries, Small World serves criminally underrated Mediterranean fare. Get the lamb salad ($18); it should keep you full until dinner. Armistice Brewing This chill Napa brewery offers a two-for-one: Pre-game with a pint or two while you scarf down a filling, juicy burger made by French Laundry alum Christopher Ruiz of Butter's Burgers. If you're feeling especially hangry, opt for the incredibly messy pastrami burger ($17). The brewery will also stay open until 1 a.m. on Friday and Saturday for BottleRock. Joella's Deli The fried chicken sandwich ($18) stuffed with a spicy ranch slaw at Joella's Deli food truck — founded by another French Laundry alum — ranks among the best fried chicken sandwiches in the Bay Area, according to the Chronicle's Hernandez. If you're in an empty industrial park, you're in the right place. 2410 Second St., Napa. 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Friday-Saturday; 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday. Rutherford Pizza at Frankie's Deli Napa's first New York City-inspired slice shop opened just in time for BottleRock, and it's the best deal in town. This satellite location of Napa's Rutherford Family Pizza slings $5 slices, including pepperoni, chicken alfredo and Hawaiian, until 3 a.m. (yes, seriously) on Friday and Saturday. 1331 First St., Napa. 4 p.m.-3 a.m. Friday-Saturday. The Fink The Fink has the most extensive and inventive cocktail menu in Napa, but don't sleep on its bar food, like the Japanese-inspired egg sandwich ($15), Korean-style fried chicken ($15) and Maine lobster roll ($26). 530 Main St., Napa. 4 p.m.-12 a.m. Friday-Saturday, 4 p.m.-11 p.m. Sunday. Oxbow Public Market One block from the festival grounds, the Oxbow Public Market is throwing a cover-free, after-party on Saturday featuring a D.J. and food from its vendors, including Hog Island Oyster Co. and Loveski Deli. 61 First. St., Napa. 10 p.m.-12 a.m. Saturday.
San Francisco Chronicle
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Thomas Keller asked me to leave the French Laundry. It turned into my most extraordinary night as a critic
Thomas Keller is fidgeting on the bench next to mine in the empty courtyard of the French Laundry. There's a slight quaver in the chef's voice, and he tells me he is nervous. This is not something he is accustomed to doing, he says — asking a critic to leave. He's sure I'm a nice person, he tells me, but he doesn't know my intentions, and he doesn't want me in his restaurant. I had pulled into Yountville 45 minutes earlier to visit the favorite child in the Keller family of restaurants. My party of four was held outside the charming stone building nursing sparkling wine while we waited for our table, and though the sun had mostly faded, I'd kept on my extra-large, celeb-off-duty sunglasses. To ensure something resembling an ordinary diner's experience, some of my restaurant critic peers wear disguises. I am not an anonymous critic. When I assumed this role a little over a year ago, I chose to publish an updated headshot rather than try in vain to scrub my photos online. But I use aliases to make reservations so a restaurant can't prepare for my visit in advance. Sometimes, to delay being identified as long as possible, I'll arrive in an N95 mask or these sunglasses. The captain refilling our wine introduces himself as Patrick. Tonight, I am Margaret. Thirty minutes after our reservation time, we are ushered through the restaurant's iconic blue door and up a narrow staircase to an intimate room with three tables. The opening salvo of truffle vichyssoise is served, and then a general manager walks up to the table and directs me to follow him. 'If I'm not back in 10, send a search party,' I say breezily to my dining companions. We laugh. I don't bring a jacket. The manager leads me to a bench in the courtyard by the kitchen, under the branches of a sprawling tree. I wait but a few moments, and then before me is Thomas Keller, lanky in his chef's whites. 'Thomas,' he says. 'MacKenzie,' I reply, shaking his hand. 'I thought you said your name was Margaret,' he says with a sardonic edge. Keller does not know what I want from him, he says, or what I am doing at his restaurant. I'm not here to write a review, I tell him honestly. My predecessor, Soleil Ho, weighed in 2½ years ago, and it's not customary to reassess so soon after. But I eat at restaurants I'm not planning on reviewing all the time, and my credibility demands that I visit one of the most celebrated and enduringly popular restaurants in the country — helmed by one of the most powerful chefs in the world. Thirty-one years after Keller took over this two-story former saloon in Napa Valley, the lore of the French Laundry is as deep as its wine cellar. Look no further than Keller's recently released episode of 'Chef's Table: Legends.' I'll give you the condensed version here; for the full experience, imagine B-roll of Keller hoisting an American flag over his culinary garden or zipping around Napa Valley in a sporty vintage BMW as you read. After working at various Michelin-starred restaurants in France, Keller returned to New York in the late '80s and opened a fine dining restaurant for the boom times. The market tanked, and Keller decamped for a job at a hotel restaurant in Los Angeles, from which he was fired a year later. In the 'Chef's Table' formula, this was his rock bottom, the moment when he realized something had to change. He bought the French Laundry, a rustic farm-to-table pioneer, and remade it in his own image. Three years later came Ruth Reichl's 1997 New York Times review, which anointed the French Laundry 'the most exciting place to eat in the United States.' Keller enjoyed nearly two decades of accolades, both for the French Laundry and for Per Se, which he opened in Manhattan in 2004 and which quickly became New York's most exclusive restaurant, frequented by the strata of diners who own islands. When the Michelin Guide came to the United States, each received three stars. Keller was everywhere — winning awards for his coffee-table cookbooks, selling his own line of Limoges porcelain, consulting for Pixar's 'Ratatouille.' For mere mortals, dinner at the French Laundry became a bucket list item, an anniversary splurge worth staying in a relationship for. Then, in 2016, a bomb dropped: a scathing review of Per Se by New York Times critic Pete Wells. An alphabetical list of adjectives that appeared: 'dismal,' 'gluey,' 'grainy,' 'mangled,' 'rubbery,' 'swampy,' 'terrible.' But of all the barbs, the one heard 'round the world was a line describing a mushroom soup 'as murky and appealing as bong water.' Keller appeared to take the review in stride, writing in a public apology, 'When we fall short, we work even harder.' He even seemed to have a sense of humor about it. In 2019, when Keller recognized Ho at the French Laundry, he sent over a glass bong — 'the kind you use to smoke drugs,' Ho wrote — filled with mushroom soup. The French Laundry made the Chronicle's list of the Top 100 restaurants in the Bay Area that year. But after two more visits, Ho decreed it no longer worth the splurge in a 2022 review. A Norwegian king crab galette had 'the pasty hybrid texture of a cheap fish ball and a Starbucks egg bite.' The desserts, once exhilarating, were 'beige, repetitive and one-note.' The restaurant does not appear on the Chronicle's 2025 Top 100 list, which I co-authored with my colleague Cesar Hernandez. But tonight, the criticism that is fresh in Keller's mind is the Times' double-barrel review of Per Se and the French Laundry, which ran in November on the occasion of their respective 20th and 30th anniversaries. Melissa Clark, filling in as a critic after Wells' departure, described Keller's restaurants as 'stuck in a bubble of complacency' and 'tediously, if inconsistently, fine.' While Clark once found Keller's culinary sense of humor fresh, a de-stuffification of the hallowed halls of fine dining, his dishes now read as tired. 'Mr. Keller's food is no longer exceptional in a dining landscape that he is largely responsible for creating,' she wrote. Now Keller wants to talk about her with me, but her name escapes him. 'Melissa?' I volunteer. 'She lied,' Keller tells me, with visible pique. 'She lied until the very last minute.' I had heard whispers about Clark's visit to the French Laundry, the details of which were not included in her review. Keller wouldn't leave her alone, food world insiders murmured, and he made sure to inform her that his new chef de cuisine was a woman — a first for the French Laundry under Keller. Clark, a cookbook author and recipe developer who appears in New York Times videos, is a recognizable figure, with her glossy red hair and angular jaw. When she dined at Per Se, she was spotted. So for Yountville, she donned a blond wig and aviators and assumed the cover story of a yoga instructor named Emma. When Keller approached her in the courtyard, he asked if he knew her from New York. Clark, who later confirmed the details of this story to me but declined to comment on the record, believed Keller was not certain of her identity and decided to stick to her role. No, she replied, he must be mistaken. She lived in Santa Monica. After a lengthy tour of the grounds, Clark's party finally sat down, and it was then that she realized Keller and his team had seen through the wig. Servers began to toy with her. Where did she like to hang out in Santa Monica? What were her favorite restaurants in Los Angeles? The first course arrived. Her companions received soup in espresso cups, but for Clark? She got the bong. Keller's publicist, Pierre Rougier, told the Chronicle in an email after my visit that 'it was insulting, an awkward charade, and odd that (Clark) remained in disguise.' Past critics, he said, were recognized over the years, and when 'greeted by name, they acknowledged it and went about their job.' The day after Clark's piece ran, Keller clapped back on Instagram, posting a quote by the pompous, pointy-headed critic from 'Ratatouille: ' 'The bitter truth we critics must face is that, in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is more meaningful than our criticism designating it so.' Through the kitchen windows I can see Keller's brigade, heads down, preparing the food I thought I was here to eat. He gestures toward them. The young chefs working for him don't deserve to have their work slighted, he tells me. He personally does not care about the reviews, he insists, but his staff? It gets to them. And for that reason, even though he doesn't know me, even though he's sure I'm a nice person, he does not want me here. Mortifyingly, I want to cry. I can feel tears welling along my lower lashes. Partially this is because Keller's vulnerability is arresting, like hearing your dad tell you he's scared. But, straight-A student that I am, I'm also unaccustomed to being reprimanded, and this feels unfair. I have never met Keller before. I haven't written a single word about him, positive or negative. Very much wishing I still had those sunglasses on, I tell him I'll respect his decision if ultimately he wants me to leave, but first, may I tell him a bit about myself? The French Laundry, I say, is quite meaningful to me. When my parents came to New York for my college graduation, they offered to take me to a celebratory dinner. Instead, I suggested we wait until I was back in the Bay Area and go to the French Laundry. I had worked as a server throughout college and took it seriously, a student among professionals who departed for Danny Meyer restaurants and the recently opened Per Se. Only the best of us could work for Keller, and I wanted to experience his famed hospitality, back at the mother ship. I remember what I wore that evening. I remember my delight at the salmon tartare cornets, the oysters and pearls, the coffee and doughnuts, all of which I'd pored over in the French Laundry cookbook. Eating those seminal dishes was like meeting a movie star; they were everything I had hoped for, if somewhat smaller in person. We took photos. My dad feigned a heart attack for the camera when the bill arrived while I looked on, grinning. I took the menu and that old-timey clothespin affixed to the napkins back to New York. Both moved with me to seven apartments, rattling around in a box with concert ticket stubs and old love letters. I tell Keller that I come from a restaurant family. My mother's parents opened Henry's Hunan on Kearny Street in San Francisco in 1974, and my cousins carry on their legacy today. Like Keller, my grandparents served a good meal to an open-minded critic on a charmed day, and that review changed their lives. How strange it is to now be on the other side, to hear this famous man's voice catch as he tries to find a polite way to ask me to leave. I feel the Napa Valley spring chill through my silk shirt, despite the heat lamp over my shoulder. A server brings us glasses of water, and I am grateful. Keller asks me if I know of his friend Michel Richard. After winning over Los Angeles with Citrus in the '80s and Washington, D.C., with Citronelle in the '90s, Richard trained his sights on New York. In 2013, he opened Villard Michel Richard. The New York Times savaged him, Keller tells me, and two years later, Richard was dead. Keller promises that when the time comes to pen his memoir, he will write about how that review led to the death of a good man. Keller mourns an earlier era when, in his words, critics and chefs were on the same team. He references Michael Bauer, the Chronicle's restaurant critic from 1986 to 2018, and describes him as a friend. (I reached out to Bauer to see what he thought of this characterization. 'I have nothing but respect and admiration for what he's achieved,' he wrote by email. 'At this point if he wants to call me a friend I'm honored.') As a young chef, Keller says, he would rush to the newsstand at midnight, eager to read what the Times' critic had to say. No longer. He gets it, he says. Newspapers must drum up controversy. What other reason could the Times have for hyperlinking to Wells' eight-year-old review every time Per Se is mentioned in an article? Keller then brings up Ho's review of La Calenda, his Mexican restaurant that closed at the end of last year. It was one of Ho's first reviews for the Chronicle and was exceedingly positive. But what Keller remembers is the headline — that La Calenda is 'cultural appropriation done right.' He twists Ho's favorable review into a slight. What does that even mean, he asks, saying that culinary cultural appropriation doesn't exist in America, a nation of immigrants. In a melting pot, cultural appropriation isn't a thing. After 30 minutes in the courtyard, Keller decides it's time to wrap up. OK, he says, that's enough, let me walk you back inside. He tells me that he'll feed me a little something before I go. I ask for clarity; if he still does not want me at his restaurant, I would rather get a jump on the long drive home. No, no, he says, that would be rude. As he escorts me to the door, I detect a shift. The nerves are gone. He's decided to cook for me, and he's now telling his origin story, one you can hear on 'Chef's Table' or his episode of 'The Bear' or his MasterClass or his ads for Hestan cookware. As a young cook, he worked under a French chef, Roland Henin, at a beach club in Rhode Island. One day, Henin asked, 'Thomas, do you know why cooks cook?' Keller's hand is firmly gripping my elbow, urging me forward a few steps, then stopping me whenever he has a particularly important point to make, as he does now. 'To nurture people.' As I walk back into the restaurant and ascend the stairs to my table, I am cold and hungry, my mind is racing, and my body is vibrating. A man whose books and cookware I own, whose restaurants I revered as a young person in hospitality, has let me know that, despite my new big job, I am a guest in his house, and he will decide how my evening will progress. In his email to the Chronicle, Keller's publicist said the chef found our conversation 'thoughtful and engaging, and MacKenzie did as well.' I return to my table rattled. My dining companions have asked after my whereabouts twice; the staff told them Chef and I were having a 'heart-to-heart.' There has been no additional food. Our reservation was for 7:45, and now it's past 9 p.m. I whisper to my companions that I think we're getting a grilled cheese sandwich and being sent on our way. A server informs us that Chef Keller would like to cook for us, and a sommelier says he's been asked to select our wines. Keller ends up sending an entire tasting menu. We make the best of it. There are the cornets, the oysters and pearls, the 'mac and cheese.' We get exactly the type of special treatment I had been hoping to avoid by calling myself Margaret. He makes truffles rain — 'apology truffles,' one of my dining companions remarks — and sends out a magnificent bottle of 2011 Ridge Zinfandel. Between courses, a waiter sets our table with fresh silverware, and I notice my butter knife is placed the wrong way, blade out. My brain reels with paranoia. What does it mean? At a place like the French Laundry, such mistakes are not made. It sounds silly now. It's not like I thought Keller was going to fill my pockets with pie weights and drop me in the Napa River, and I presume that Clark didn't think her mushroom soup was poisoned with anything other than rancor. But at a restaurant of this ilk, you pay for the privilege of submitting yourself wholly to Chef's genius and his staff's omniscient hospitality. You give yourself over to culinary surprise and delight. But what if that chef has decided you're the enemy? If I had been in Clark's position, I might have dug in as well, just to hold onto a shred of agency. At 10:30 p.m., before the meat courses have even arrived, Keller whisks us away for a tour of the property, showing off his geothermal system (very cool), his china collection (massive) and his trophy case of plates signed by celebrities, including Woody Allen (hmm). Back in the courtyard, he motions to a stately tree to the right of the blue door, its branches growing up and around the second-story deck, intertwined with the restaurant. 'She's in the autumn or maybe even winter of her life,' Keller tells us with a wistful note in his voice. He had been trying to figure out what to do when she dies. What replacement tree could ever be as magnificent as this one? He's alighted on a solution. Keller is having a replica made by the people who do fake trees for Disneyland and Las Vegas. When the tree dies, the duplicate will arrive, and it will be as if nothing has changed. We retake our seats for duck, beef and cheese courses and so, so much dessert. Finally, at 12:30 a.m., our server hands over a check presenter. 'Dinner is compliments of Chef Keller,' the bill reads, with a big fat zero perching on the 'total' line. It's the ultimate display of power, Keller's refunding of our prepayment of $1,831.75, tip included, and I drop my head into my hands. This is bad. Chronicle journalists are prohibited from accepting free meals from people we cover, but our server insists the refund has already gone through, there's nothing to be done, you're very welcome! I confer with my companions, and when our server returns, humble myself. Please, I say to him, you have to help me. I'm going to get in a lot of trouble. OK, he says. Let me see what I can do. When he returns, he brings a check for 93 cents. With tax, our total for the evening is one dollar. My friend, whom I'd previously Venmo'd for my portion, hands over his credit card, which our server runs for one dollar, and on the gratuity line, we add $1,830.75. Weeks later, after I had told Keller I was writing this piece, his publicist contended to my editor via email that the meal was 'free of charge.' I told Keller I wasn't going to write a review, and I meant it; I don't have much to add to Ho and Clark's recent critiques of the food. I will say that our servers put on the show of their lives, trying to save the evening, but all the cheerful professionalism in the world couldn't cut through what had transpired, the inhospitality of it all. Thirty years ago, critics lost their minds over Keller's innovations, his puckish fusion of French technique and American cuisine. If, Keller seems to insist, he and his team can execute those dishes with perfection, day after day, shouldn't the raves keep rolling in? And if they don't? Those critics can hit the road. A little before 1 a.m., I walk out of the blue door, pass under that majestic tree, get in my car and drive the hour and 15 minutes home. In a statement made through Rougier nearly a month after my visit, Keller said: 'Ultimately, it was my responsibility to feed and nurture them. I think we did that, and they had a wonderful time from what we could tell.'
San Francisco Chronicle
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
What other restaurant critics told me about their encounters with Thomas Keller
Yesterday, I published an account of my visit to the French Laundry, truly a night to remember. I hope that you'll read it, but the tl;dr is that, after I was spotted, Thomas Keller called me outside and said he wasn't comfortable having me in his restaurant. We then chatted for half an hour, largely about his opinions on the current state of restaurant criticism. During the course of our conversation, Keller mentioned four critics by name — Michael Bauer and Soleil Ho of the Chronicle and Pete Wells and Melissa Clark of the New York Times. When I initially set out to write about the encounter, I thought I would give each the opportunity to respond, in their own words. Ho and Wells agreed to speak with me on the record. Clark confirmed the details of her own French Laundry visit but declined to comment, and Bauer wrote via email that, six years after stepping down as critic, he would prefer to stay out of controversies. The edit went in a different direction, and much of what Ho and Wells had to say ended up on the cutting room floor. But I found our conversations fascinating, and maybe you will as well? Here are some highlights. Ho had met Keller before becoming the Chronicle's restaurant critic. As a young line cook working in New Orleans, Ho had participated in a culinary competition run by Ment'or, a nonprofit that trains American chefs to compete on the world stage. Keller is the president of the foundation, and he was on the panel of judges that assessed Ho's work. During Ho's first visit to the French Laundry, they were recognized immediately. 'Culinary, they threw the book at us,' Ho told me, describing it as an overwhelming experience. The visit was, they knew, a waste, the treatment they received — complete with the offer of cigars — so far outside what a normal diner could expect that it verged on the unusable. In Ho's review, they wrote that their first visit was like being 'in the club,' and they expanded on this comment in our conversation. 'In retrospect, it feels like a mild, civil…' Ho searched for the right word. 'Warning might be too strong.' The message, as Ho interpreted it: ''You can have all these things, if we're on the same page.'' Ho felt like Keller was welcoming them into the in-crowd. The subtext? You're a former cook yourself. You're going to be one of the good critics, right? Have a cigar. Ho went on to dine at the French Laundry twice more and, remarkably, was not recognized either time. (They were not in disguise.) These two incognito meals allowed Ho to gauge more accurately the state of the restaurant, which led ultimately to a negative review. 'Once you're in the club, you want to stay in it, which is why it's hard to admit when something doesn't work,' they wrote. When I spoke with Wells, I told him how Keller contrasted the praise he receives from pleased guests with the prickly barbs of critics; in his review of Per Se, Wells memorably compared a mushroom soup to murky bong water. 'Well that's great,' Wells responded. I chuckled. 'No, I mean that sincerely,' he clarified. 'If you're pleasing people and they keep coming back, that's great.' Wells argued that, particularly in the case of a once-in-a-lifetime restaurant like the French Laundry or Per Se, you can't discount the different contexts of a critic and an average patron. A couple visiting the French Laundry might be spending the whole weekend in Napa in celebration of a 25th wedding anniversary. They're attending the magic show wanting to believe, not searching for the invisible wires. But, Wells said, 'As a critic, when you're going through the review process, especially at a really elaborate restaurant, you're looking for things that the average customer isn't looking for.' That's not to say we're approaching our restaurant meals as skeptics and meanies, searching for flaws. But we are at work, and it's our job to be observant. Maybe that couple celebrating their anniversary won't care about an unfilled water glass or a long pause between courses — but maybe they will. Since Wells' quip about bong water, whenever Keller has spotted critics like Ho and Clark at the French Laundry, he's sent them a glass bong filled with mushroom soup. What, he seems to be asking with tongue in cheek, are his critics smoking? I asked Wells how it felt to know that line must live rent free in Keller's head. 'It's always nice to be remembered,' he said.
Time Business News
25-04-2025
- Lifestyle
- Time Business News
Homes for Sale in Yountville, CA: Napa Valley's Sophisticated Wine Country Haven
Yountville, California, is a picturesque and sophisticated town located in the heart of Napa Valley, renowned for its world-class wineries, Michelin-starred restaurants, and charming atmosphere. Known as a hub for fine dining and luxury living, Yountville offers a perfect blend of relaxed wine country living with access to some of the best culinary and wine experiences in the world. Whether you're looking for a luxurious estate, a charming cottage, or a stylish townhouse, Yountville CA homes for sale provide an exceptional opportunity to live in one of Napa Valley's most coveted locations. Why Choose Yountville, CA? Yountville is an exceptional destination for those who appreciate fine wine, gourmet cuisine, and the tranquility of Napa Valley. 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