Studio Gourmet's FaceBook page

1300 Fillmore's chef David Lawrence at Studio Gourmet.

​Brad Lev founded Studio Gourmet while still living in Atlanta, Georgia. He owned a catering business, which was headquartered in a 5,000 square foot space, perfect for special events. He started hosting special evenings like "Swinging Sushi" (sushi class and swing dancing!), Tango and Tapas (guess!) and Studio Gourmet, a monthly culinary event that brought local chefs in front of a live audience for a cooking demo, interview, and tasting. So wildly popular that Lev brought it to San Francisco when he moved.

Since transplanting, he's hosted five Studio Gourmet shows, featuring the likes of Martin Brock from Gary Danko, Matthew Accarrino from SPQR, and Hoss Zare from Zare at Flytrap. Quite a line-up! Even with all those big names, Lev can't pick a favorite, "because they all have such different stories and experiences. They also have all brought amazing food to try!"

More >>

Daniel Patterson.

​Daniel Patterson, chef-owner of Coi, is freshly back from last week's MAD Foodcamp in Copenhagen, at which he presented a history of beets.

The two-day symposium was organized by René Redzepi, chef of Noma, which has been celebrated for its intricate experimentation of native Scandinavian foods. Heavily covered by the international food press, the event brought together some of the most interesting people cooking today: Michel Bras, Gaston Acurio, David Chang, Andoni Aduriz. (In rock terms, it'd be like the Pitchfork Music Festival distilled down to a 300-person gathering.) The theme of the event: plants. SFoodie talked to Patterson earlier this week about his experiences. Here are a few excerpts from our hour-long discussion:

More >>

Carina Ost

David Lawrence shares a laugh with Studio Gourmet host Brad Lev

​Inside the Actor's Studio meets the Food Network is how we would describe the new web-based show called Studio Gourmet SF. The concept is that a local chef with a good story will do a cooking demo, an in-depth interview with the host Brad Lev, and then the live audience can eat the signature dish from the chef.

On Sunday, we arrived at Circolo for the live taping and the chef of the month was David Lawrence from 1300 on Fillmore.

For the cooking demo we got to see how Lawrence's signature shrimp and grits are made. It was surprising to see a guy with a British accent cooking southern food; it turns out Lawrence is from the U.K., but his wife is from the U.S. south and when she first made grits he knew he could improve them. Grits with butter and water didn't cut it for David and he has now perfected the grits with cream and mushroom stock. Upgrade!

More >>

Jesse Hirsch

Yotam Ottolenghi

​Superstar Israeli chef Yotam Ottolenghi has been working for years to bridge the gap between vegetarians and the rest of us. He makes no secret about his own meat eating, but he made his culinary reputation in Britain by infusing veggie recipes with intense, Mediterranean-influenced flavors, served at his chain of British upscale delis.

Ottolenghi is visiting the Bay Area for a couple of days, promoting his near-universally praised cookbook Plenty, and SFoodie caught up with him for lunch yesterday. Over egg salad sandwiches at Il Cane Rosso and macarons from Miette (which the industrious Ottolenghi already blogged about!), we learned more about his love of the Bay Area, his veggie diplomacy, and his thoughts on Mission Chinese Food.

SFoodie: Have you spent much time in the Bay Area?
Yotam Ottolenghi: It has probably been nine years since I visited, but a lot of people don't know I used to live in Mill Valley in '77 and '78. I was only nine, but some of my strongest memories of food come from that time. Coming from Israel, where we didn't have much of that, I absolutely loved oysters, shrimp, fish ... I distinctly remember the taste of fried oysters at Fisherman's Wharf. Also, I had a teacher who would reward us for remembering our multiplication tables by driving us for big fluffy American ice cream. Never in my dreams did I imagine this could happen back home!

More >>

Alex Hochman

Dan Jablow of Jablow's Meats

​What does a Bronx raised, ex-finance professional who goes to cooking school but then figures out that he hates working in a restaurant kitchen do with his future? Well, if you're Dan Jablow you start a smoked meats pop-up of course. Jablow, who trained at the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts and had short stints at Boston's Evoo and as a prep chef at America's Test Kitchen, landed a spot at Fatted Calf upon returning to the Bay Area recently and had a "meat awakening." "My wife and I were so tired of the same old deli meats until we wandered into Fatted Calf one day and, since working there , I've wondered 'how can I put my stamp on meat?'", said Jablow.

Well, his "stamp" is Jablow's Meats, which debuted a few weeks ago at the New Taste Marketplace. Using a newly purchased charcoal smoker and a trusty Berkel slicer, Jablow is serving up bacon, pastrami and ham at local pop-up events and hopes to be selling to retail outlets soon. Sfoodie can vouch for the pastrami, which we tasted at the Underground Market last weekend. After fifteen hours over a pile of mesquite and cherry wood, it was moist, extra smoky, and, when paired with a healthy smear of grainy mustard and a few slices of Della Fattoria pan levain, made for an excellent sandwich. Jablow's next outing will be a return to the New Taste Marketplace on June 11th.

More >>

Ubuntu

James Beard Rising Star Chef finalist Aaron London.

​When Ubuntu opened in 2007, there was great fanfare across the land. Jeremy Fox was the undisputed king of vegetables, and the restaurant topped pretty much every Best Of list. Critics (literally?) crapped their pants over its amazingness ― they couldn't believe vegetarian food could taste this good. Well, more likely, they just hadn't eaten in a vegetarian restaurant until one opened that was shmancy enough to catch their eye, but that's another story.

Fox reigned supreme at Ubuntu until 2009. He left to take time off, before going to work for Tyler Florence and starting work on a book. His position was soon filled by Aaron London, a chef who ― with the exception of a brief hiatus working front-of-house at Bottega in Yountville ― has been with Ubuntu since the beginning.

London has worked in nearly every role in the Ubuntu kitchen (he joined as sous chef just weeks after the restaurant opened). London brought a new philosophy and passion to the 4-year-old restaurant in the post-Fox era, and his food is ridiculous. As in ridiculously delicious. It's so good that although the wine list is exceptional, you don't need alcohol to forget you're eating in a restaurant that's also a yoga studio. Normally we need to be one gin and tonic away from hospitalization for that to happen.

London's hard work ― he puts in over 100 hours a week! That's more hours than we're awake per week! ― was recognized with a nomination for a James Beard Rising Star Chef of the Year award. All that and he's barely 27. As someone who is jealous of her 5-year-old niece for not knowing what a shitfest life can be, we could really see hating this guy if he weren't so damn likable.

London's rule at Ubuntu has meant jettisoning the bulky-yet-popular strawberry pizzas and chickpea fries and introducing weirdly named experimental dishes that often focus on a whole fruit and/or vegetable. After working at fine-dining establishments around the world, London says the one thing he's most bummed about is the amount of food that's tossed out in our nation's fanciest kitchens. [When asked if our favorite dish-gone-by, the chickpea fries, would make a comeback, London says, "My God, I never want to see those things again!" He wants to focus on less bulky foods, and on more actual vegetables, "plus they're a signature dish of the previous chef." That's fair, but we have to give it up to Oprah for having the recipe. Ugh, where would be all be without Oprah? Probably still rubbing two sticks together.]

More >>

Kimberly Sandie

Plate Shop's Kim Alter, making monkey bread.

​I caught Kim Alter, Plate Shop's chef, on the phone for a quick interview last week as I was wrapping up my first draft of this week's review. After cooling her heels for more than a year while Plate Shop's opening kept being delayed ― working at Ubuntu with both Jeremy Fox and Aaron London, waiting tables at Acquerello ― she's now in full-tilt mode, working as head chef, butcher, gardener, and pastry chef. Here are a few excerpts from our interview:

SFoodie: How long ago did you start the back garden?

Alter: April 2009 was the first time I stepped into it. It didn't see any progress until August, though. We brought in two tons of dirt, got water tubs, and put drain rocks in. We took chain saws to the ivy, which had not been touched for 20 years ― it took me a long time to get the garden where it is now. I thought we were going to open in August 2010, so the garden was fully up and running. I had to give or sell produce to restaurants like Coi, Acquerello, and Citizen's Band because I didn't want to throw it away. We finally opened in February.

More >>

Britney's last-minute venue change isn't the only disappointment hanging heavy on the Castro these days. Late last month, the owners of Kasa Indian Eatery ― which opened in the Castro in 2008 ― shuttered its year-old second restaurant, on Fillmore Street in the Marina/Cow Hollow. Writing on the Kasa blog, owner Tim Volkema made reference to his partners Suresh and Anamika Khanna, in a goodbye wrapped in a very honest assessment of what went wrong:

Kasa Castro was the first restaurant venture Anamika, Suresh, and I have ever participated in, and honestly we took its success for granted. We thought: provide delicious and unique food and good service at a reasonable price, and you'll make a profit. And amazingly we were right! Until we weren't.

But while 2010 proved a tough year for Kasa's owners (Anamika Khanna says the closure felt like a "miscarriage"), 2011 has been crowded with new projects.

Kasa

Anamika Khanna.

​This month, Anamika Khanna ― who grew up in a Punjabi enclave in London ― began orchestrating a Wednesday-night $20 prix-fixe pop-up at the Corner ― all but one has been vegan. And three weeks ago, the Kasa partners joined dozens of other mobile vending hopefuls in a weekend camp-out to secure a good chance of getting permits to launch a food truck ― Kasa Indian: The Kati Roller ― in the Financial District. SFoodie had back-to-back phone conversations yesterday with Anamika Khanna and Tim Volkema about Kasa's present, past, and future.

SFoodie: Why go vegan for the pop-ups?

Anamika: I did vegan food for the first one, and for the second one I wanted to do authentic Punjabi food, with fish and so on. But after that, I just felt that for San Francisco, they could really benefit more from vegan than from Punjabi. It's really hard for vegans to go out and get an all-vegan meal somewhere. These are the first pop-ups that we've done, and the first night we were overwhelmed ― everybody just comes in at once! But we're trying to keep it casual. The first couple of pop-ups have been just Kasa fans following us, but over the last couple of weeks we've been picking up other customers, even chefs from other restaurants.

How long do you plan on doing them?

Anamika: We said we'd try it for the month of March, but they've been going so well the Corner suggested I keep going. So I don't know when we'll stop. The only problem is it's so much work!

And the Kati Roller truck? When do you think you'll have that up and running?

Anamika: The city is always up and down with their timing, so it's pretty hard to say. Do we start renting a truck, do we buy a truck ― we're literally going in circles. We've been looking at trucks for months now, but we already have the design, we have a menu.

What's the menu looking like?

Anamika: We'll have the kati rolls [we do at Kasa]. We won't do the thalis, but we'll probably have rice bowls, and definitely some Indian street food, like the little vegetable fritters ― pakoras ― and pav bhaji. We've done those here at the restaurant, they're a very authentic Indian street food, like an Indian sloppy Joe but vegetarian. Tim's been messing around with Sandwich Fridays in the Castro ― they've been happening every other Friday. We've done French baguettes with fillings inside.

More >>

sjsharktank/Flickr

Soul Cocina's Roger Feely (in cap) at Off the Grid.

​Ask anyone who follows San Francisco's street-food scene which vendor hustles hardest, and chances are they'll name Soul Cocina's Roger Feely.

The man is everywhere. Festivals, secret after-hour street-food parties, weekly pop-up dinners, Indian cooking classes ― you name it ― Feely has a wide variety of outlets for slinging what SFoodie editor John Birdsall once called "the most polished and straight-up delicious food."

But as one of the original folks from the 2009 Street Food Explosion (which included Magic Curry Kart and Adobo Hobo), Feely says he might be forced to leave S.F.'s streets for Chicago, where his family now lives.

"I'm really upset about leaving," Feely tells SFoodie, citing his work connections, clients, and street-food comrades as things he'll miss most. Feeley has given himself a deadline of April 1 to decide if there's enough business for him to stay in the city, or if he'll pack up for the Midwest.

More >>

Sonya Yu

Russell Jackson.

​Russell Jackson at Studio Gourmet

Where: Horatius, 350 Kansas (at 17th St.), 252-3500

When: Sun., Feb. 20, 2:30 p.m.

Cost: $45

The rundown: Occasionally mohawked ex-underground chef Russell Jackson of Lafitte is the draw for Studio Gourmet's latest cooking demo/interview at odd but beautiful event space Horatius. Expect a glass of sparkling wine and small bites (pork trotter crépinettes with sabayon and oyster; potato-kale gratin; cuttlefish and spring onion soubise; etc.), plus a cooking demonstration and interview. Jackson calls himself the "dissident chef," so things should skew at least a little oh-no-he-din't.

Tickets available via Studio Gourmet