The chefs that run New York City

[Music] lucky you know we we arriving again mid-80s yeah I think in my America was changing you were in charge of that revolution no no yeah no no but yeah the 80s absolutely we were all sort of student of the nouvelle cuisine in France and we came here and say well it's time to change everything New York in the 80s I really feel the food thing was amazing they were the beginning of a divide between the past generation of chef and this young chef like me like John Shaw who came and started to transform into a new vision for the culinary landscape I mean I met Danielle when I arrived in New York was in Boston in 85 arrived in New York in July 86 you live for a while 67 I lived on 66 so we could see each other from the window samih to first month early years ago yeah the first month mm-hmm Danya is probably the first person I talked to when I arrived in New York in 86 she was here couple years before me so we became friends immediately and he gave me some tips where to buy things how to go around New York I'm a country boy Union I was scared to take the subway or scared of a big city the next day I went to Chinatown I was like this is my town I feel like in Hong Kong I was like seven years in France five years in Asia the whole combination was actually was perfect for the moment John's Roshan and Daniele inspired me a lot because when I was much younger they were already known as chefs and I was not there yet I was working as a sous-chef you in 1986 I was here for 10 days invited like boule that's right and then when I was in 1989 at John we are the Warriors yeah you came for dinner all my life I wanted to be the chef of a beautiful restaurant with a lot of cooks in the kitchen doing amazing food and having great service creating an experience that is very special to the client and the dream came true 91 I am in New York it's June 10 7:40 a.m. I'm walking the door of Libya now then I look at my watch and I know I'm gonna spend my life here then Jacques when I came to the surkhi yeah working with Danielle 1986 I was starting here at this year I needed an amazing pastry chef and I found Jack Torres who was in Atlanta at the ritz-carlton another cast came and I say along I need a pastry chef but I need to find a French guy here in maybe in America and Nana you can say get out of Atlanta and come to New York to work for Danielle because you know it shows her from nice I remember when I arrived I was maybe only to be to classic and having a discussion with you Danielle yeah and you tell me I say be very playful just play with I know exactly where always and and then that was the beginning of the desert you know a little bit crazy dessert that I was doing so basically yeah 30 years of friendship I think Danielle is the papa Danielle is high energy is the godfather of the new French cuisine in here you know when he's in the kitchen even if you don't see him you can feel the energy in the air I will call him the Tasmanian Devil and you never change I mean like I'm always so impressed with you that you have a level of energy that is now passed the energy to my son so but you deliver you the level of the party about the I energy I think about it at 10 o clock I start to look at my wardrobe like oh my gosh Eric you know he's a monk in the kitchen Nicky's mr. Zen very spiritual I think that Eric is the king of fishes food is my pristine clean is a minimalist in his cooking I think it goes well with his character Eric is the youngster the last one who came aboard ah Club Jung is jg he's very Asian in his influence we go in a lot of places anni succeed and you come back and keep succeeding I mean it's unbelievable when I think of round robin always think of like fresh ingredients cooked very quickly and Rosie is the magician of pulling all those creatures together so Jack I will call him Willy Wonka this is a chocolate master grid pastry chef recording the Sweetman is the wizard Zac always think very playfully all chocolates all the time everywhere [Music] this was here Danielle almost like close to to where we are now I studied a little beyond all day 91 has to has to be 90 to 91 okay leg was so young and we were already like super famous the three of you yeah and I was the young kid in the block jean-georges influenced me to create these that are very straightforward with very few flavors very light when he was the chef at Lafayette he was doing a lot of juice with vegetables and they were replacing those edgy sauce my technique was French but then my secret weapon were Asian flavor I was using French para with ginger mango I was using lemongrass in some soups I talked about 1986 so I mean blending it was revolutionary for me but as I was for the customer as well so my food was very well-received I think that's one of the openness of the people's mind in New York was totally totally open to try new things what kept us here is because we could do what we really wanted to do yeah Big Apple the via phones the Big Apple yeah and we all bite on it I think my first food memory was really my smell my bedroom was right above the kitchen that could smell in all of us it's a roast chicken who was a establish cooking or some sauerkraut going on I was born and raised on the farm and to me the kitchen was the most interesting part of the entire farm basically for me it's something that brings me back to the streets with Grandma the smell was so fragrant and so vivid I still remember today the smell of the first doe coming out of the refrigerator when you turn that dough on your marble and you press it this is a smell that I associate with early morning I love this this type of smell still today me at home was always a one pot meal most of the time alone a roast copper solids by the always family style when I grew up we still three generation on the same roof the grandparents were there the parents the kids 18 people 20 people for dinner so was like a mini restaurant at home we used to do a stew potato leeks and lamb but when you raise the chicken and when you roast that chicken in your home with all the vegetable you grow in your garden it take a nap foger bore dimension I grew up in in Dundalk and the neighbor was actually the fisherman who has his cat on the market so every day we had the fresh fish from the night so that was great and mom was cooking the fish relatively simply with potatoes in the oven we know the people who grow the vegetable we know the people who you know make wine I mean every product had a name on it so growing up like that I definitely develop a love for the good product the right product at the right season we had appetizer main course cheese dessert or different China in between lunch and dinner different tablecloth Wow and I thought every kid was eating like that at a very young age I had that kind of passion for the what we call in French La Jolla table which is sitting down at the table and having a meal in the proper China with nice silverware and so on I really had to decide at 15 years old that I will go to the kitchen Oh to a culinary school at least in France it's when you have to choose if you're gonna still go to high school and college or go to a vocational school I was not the best unions actually I want to be a chef I want to be a savory chef that was a good pastry shop so I was 15 when I work in and as the owner if I'm able to to try he say look if you come every Saturday every Sunday and you like it I might take you as an apprentice so for one year I did that and I completely loved it I fall in love with all that stickiness better the sugared something about it that just fall in love and I decide that that's what I going to do for the rest of my life my father took over the business from his father in the older brother I was destined to take over the business so the same into an engineer school when I was 16 I hated every minute of it for my 16th birthday they took me to a three-star Michelin restaurant the first time I went to fine dining restaurants on the ballet of the weather was the food and everything's like this is it actually I start cooking professionally at 14 until 17 I did an apprenticeship I was very lucky always remain within that sort of level of restaurant which was to star and three star Michelin and so coming here after ten eleven years of practice in France I almost felt responsible to transmit what I've learned it's a big advantage that we had a training like that yeah a classic training we have we have an understanding when something goes wrong we know because what are the basic and of course it's the base of the pyramid without that we will be able to create whatever we create it's been become a greater community amongst us and we've all immigrants on we all came on similar time I mean I took a look at a lot of risk as an ambigram because i said you know you take a little more risk I think when it's not your own we were born naively I thought I could come here without speaking English and therefore I spoke only French and I was lost coming to America we weren't immigrating because we needed to run away from our country we come we were coming to be able to bring something with us and we do appreciate to be here certainly I mean I love a lot to be in u.s. all of this country I think I might teach and I might bring something that I also love to be here this is a place where maybe enough to him for me to be I think the biggest other challenge was a I just think must have to lunch service you know when our faith the pace of the pace of New York was a little bit better in the beginning for me you know I go you said doing lunch and dinner it's brutal took me a little while to adjust I think the biggest obstacle for me was to change the habit of customer coming from Lucia which was very classic and jumping into my sort of my restaurant 25 years ago that was kind of an obstacle to be able to jump and say hey this is what I want to do now my fear was not just the name but financially you know I put my retirement money into into a business and and I went in and I remember to be really scared to hire my first employee I came to to America and I succeed in a restaurant and I make a name for myself walking atmosphere when I did that and I when I reach 40 but this is when I say you know what I'm going to run a business I don't think that I had all the knowledge to open a business of course I make a lot of mistake and an it work so I'm you know we're very fortunate to the biggest challenge from in my career probably what GTL because my my mentor at Leonarda was the chef/owner of lagana then passed away in 1994 I was 29 I was suddenly with the big team in the kitchen and I had to prove myself I used to be a young chef with the temper I was a screamer and I was abusive in the kitchen I was losing the best employees in the kitchen when I grew up as a chef you can have at the the crush mentality where they crush you and here we make sure we live today my role is to mentor of them to be inspired to be successful in their life we want them to succeed to be well prepared for their future one of my manager he came as a refugee from Kosovo and he started as a busboy to us is the reward there i think i'm between the four of us i think we know who we are we have trained an army we have some time like 20 30 different nationalities represented in the crew of staff or more yeah it's amazing it means it's a it's still a country of opportunity are very much an ied build 12 hours on new york we have 35 hours on worldwide would take me five generation fans to create weather i didn't you know it's great to have built what we have built for our industry and I think for New York we do help each other and exchange and this is why we are all here today a very healthy competition and the true friendship at the end of the day we call it the French Connection that's a great picture so we looked like we were working hard in the kitchen we don't look like so chilled out and relax no it's the quality of the picture are we going to do that again in 20 years [Music]

Channel: CNN Travel

Views: 28,240

Rating: 4.93994 out of 5

Keywords: chefs, best places to eat New York, best places to eat, Daniel Boulud, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Eric Ripert, Jacques Torres, New York, New York City, food

Id: vWz1rzsWUBQ

Length: 15min 7sec (907 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 13 2018