Restaurants We Love
Our first-ever (and, we hope, first annual) tribute to the people, places and palates which make it all possible. We call it "Restaurants We Love," and why not? The sentiment couldn't be truer. Plus, it lets us name 10 honorees based not on four-star dining rooms, rare ingredients and pedigreed chefs, but on passion, dedication, creativity and perserverance.
By Nancy Ross Ryan
Portraits by Bob Stefko - Food Photography by Laurie Proffitt
Arun's
Spiaggia
Shallots
RL
Others
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Charlie Trotter's
Charlie Trotter with Amado Lopez, a scholarship recipient in the restaurant's culinary education foundation program.
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Charlie Trotter's:
The New-Generation Chef's Training Ground
Waiting for Charlie Trotter in his office above the restaurant opens an opportunistic window on the personal life of this famous chef-restaurateur, whose name on any resume is considered culinary gold, the passport to professional placement, and the open sesame to any restaurant kitchen in the world.
From where I am sitting, I can read his calendar. In April he will be in Hong Kong, in Spain, in Montreal. Clearly, he travels a lot, but nevertheless maintains a very strong presence at Charlie Trotter's. I scan the floor-to-ceiling wall of cookbooks on my left, and the shelves with non-culinary reading -- jazz, poetry, adventure -- on my right. I stare at the pictures of his family propped up along the shelves, and the pictures he has chosen to hang on the wall. Highest among these is a photograph of the Dalai Lama. I believe it is autographed, but to get up and walk closer would be to break the cardinal rule of the accidental voyeur: Thou Shalt Not Leave Thy Seat. So I stay put.
Walking in from the multi-course luncheon he has just hosted to honor visiting London Chef Gordon Ramsay and his new cookbook. He sits down and looks at me with that intense, direct, unwavering -- and by now familiar -- gaze. I have been interviewing him periodically for about 13 years and suggest that his intensity has not changed, if anything it has gotten worse.
"You mean," he says, "It's gotten better. I'm more intense now."
In the past 13 years he has trained (he hates the word and the concept) about 50 chef apprentices (from professional culinary schools), and 250 professional chefs (who come at their own request for a week or a month), 3,000 non-professional guest chefs ( part of the Chef for a Day program, who purchase certificates at charity auctions or else agree to make a donation to Charlie Trotter's Culinary Education Foundation), and 24 high school students. "Twenty-four so far," says Trotter. "Ask me that a couple of years from now, and that figure will be up quite a bit." In short, on any given day in Trotter's restaurant kitchen there are at least two non-professional chefs for a day, a couple of high school students, a culinary school apprentice or two, and the odd professional chef who petitioned to work there. Often these chefs work without pay; often they pay to work there. At the time of this interview, one of the professional chefs training in his kitchen was "a guy who is going to be a chef-instructor at the Culinary Institute of America, but wanted to come here first," says Trotter.
"Has your style of teaching changed in 13 years, mellowed a little bit?" I ask.
"I don't consider myself a teacher. It's not my job to teach," he says.
"But you do train people, lots of them," I counter.
"We do," he says, "but that's a by-product of what we do. And I am delighted to train people, but indirectly. All I can do is to be the best that I can be, and improve what I do every day. And insofar as that motivates someone, inspires someone, or gives someone an idea about how to do something better -- all the better," he says.
He explains, "The way we try to teach here is to train people to be leaders, not to manage others. And leaders tend to be harder on themselves than I or any manager or sous chef would be. They have to be their own toughest boss. We try to set an example, a tone, and create an environment where individuals really want to excel on their own, set their own high expectations."
He is invested, heart and soul, in Charlie Trotter's Culinary Education Foundation, which raises funds to provide culinary scholarships for local high school students. The program is less than two years old, and in its first 14 months raised $180,000 for scholarships. It not only raises scholarship funds but tries to inspire high school students to excel in whatever they do. Twice a week a yellow school bus pulls up to Charlie Trotter's and out pile 20 Chicago high school students and their teachers. They get a tour of the restaurant. Then they are seated in Trotter's studio kitchen (next door to the restaurant's main dining room), and are served a complete degustation menu, eight or nine courses, punctuated by comments from 10 to 12 members of Trotter's staff. "Then we make the kids ask questions. Every kid has to ask two questions. It can be anything they want, not directly culinary questions," he says. Once the students lose their embarrassment, they tend to ask about everything -- from how much money Trotter makes to what silverware to use when eating.
Students who stand out during these visiting days often wind up working at the restaurant on Saturdays. And those who really stand out, like Amato Lopez, wind up working full time after graduation. Lopez is now 18, and Trotter is grooming him for culinary school, on scholarship. In addition to work, Lopez has weekly tests to pass and a four-page paper to write. Last week's assignment was on the difference between a terrine and a pate, and he is learning how to figure out food and labor-cost, "So he will have a leg up by the time he gets to culinary school," says Trotter. I express interest, and Trotter calls for Lopez, who comes in, dressed in his professional "whites."
"What is your favorite thing? I ask.
"To learn," he says, "just to learn. You gotta' learn. From sweeping, to cooking to cleaning a plate."
"So your standards for yourself are pretty high?" I ask.
"Working around Chef Trotter, you never want to get comfortable," says Lopez with a smile.
After he leaves I ask Trotter if he has ever had a disappointment. "We had a guy who was going to be with us for three years and then we were going to send him to the Culinary Institute of America. Two and one-half years into it, he just lost it. He was from Cabrini Green and he started hanging out with the wrong kind of people, reverting to his old ways -- and he hasn't been seen or heart from since. That's a very sad story. But for the most part it's overwhelmingly positive, " he says.
"How do you recognize talent?" I ask.
"I can spot it a mile away," he says. "We can hire somebody to cook here and never have them touch a piece of food. I can talk to them for five minutes and determine a lot. I can have them wash pots and pans for five minutes or sweep and mop for 10 -- and tell exactly how they are going to work and touch and relate to food."
"Do you ever foresee a time when you will get tired of all these people in your kitchen, day in day out?" I ask in parting.
"Never," says Trotter. "This is what we live for -- visiting chefs, chefs for a day, and especially young people. It's not about the money. This is fun -- to help people and make a difference in their lives."
Culinary Vitae
The Restaurant:
Charlie Trotter's
816 W. Armitage Avenue
Chicago
Opened: 1987
Hours: Tuesday through Saturday from 6 p.m.
Cuisine: Highly personal, French techniques, Asian influences.
Reservations required 10 to 12 weeks in advance for weekends, 4 weeks for weekdays
Menus: Three Degustations,
The Grand Menu ($110),
Vegetarian Menu ($91), Kitchen Table ($150)
Among Awards: James Beard "Outstanding Chef of 1999", Best National Television Cooking Show, 2000, Outstanding Wine Service, 1993, Best Chef, Midwest, 1992; Relais Gourmand, since 1995; Mobil Travel Guide 5 stars since 1996; AAA 5 diamonds since 1993; Wine Spectator Best Restaurant in the World for Wine and Food, 1998; Best Restaurant in the United States, 2000; The Grand Award since 1993; Chicago Tribune 4 stars (highest rating), Crain's Chicago Business 4 forks (highest rating)
The Chef:
Charlie Trotter
Age: 41
Married 10 years, one son
Training: No formal culinary training, political science degree, University of Wisconsin
Mentors: Carrie Nahabedian, Norman Van Aken, Gordon Sinclair, Bradley Ogden
Cookbooks: Seven; Charlie Trotter's Meat and Game will be published in Spring 2001; The Kitchen Session videos
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What's new:
Trotter's To Go! a new prepared foods market recently opened in Lincoln Park at 1337 West Fullerton, offering restaurant-quality take out, products (such as sauces) developed by Charlie Trotter and chef friends of Charlie, wines from around the world, and pantry items such as olive oils, vinegars, unique packaged goods and limited seasonal produce.
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Arun's: In A Class by Himself
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Arun's
Arun Sampanthavivat
chef-proprietor
With his mother and brother,
Kanda and Akamit |
"The Great Chefs Go to Him to Be Dazzled,"
are some superlatives used to describe Chef Arun Sampanthavivat in a New York Times story of last year. Arun's friend, Charlie Trotter, trots his visiting chefs (among the world's most famous) over to Arun's to dine. The interior of Arun's is gallery-like: Asian antiques, original paintings of Classical Thai subjects (done by Arun and his brother), deep mahogany panels, vibrant walls, Thai silks. The spacious tables and generous chairs for diners, many in alcoves, seem incidental.
But when Sampanthavivat opened his first version of Arun's 15 years ago -- a six-table storefront with no liquor license on West Irving Park -- he had no restaurant or cooking experience at all. As the eldest son of a well-to-do Thai family he was groomed for the professional life and had spent his years as a student (always at the top of his class). But, suddenly, for the next two years, he was the chef, the reservations-taker, the server, the busboy, the cleanup crew, and bought and carried the groceries. He did, however, have two masters' degrees (one in international relations and one in political science), and was finishing up work at the University of Chicago on his Ph.D., when three would-be partners urged him to join them in a restaurant venture, just at the point where he was ready to take a break from school. He agreed on one condition, that it would be fine dining, not a run-of-the-mill Thai restaurant. "I am very proud of Thai cuisine. It has so much potential, so much complexity, so much future to refine and explore," he says. But when his partners realized that he meant startlingly fine-dining, never-before-seen Thai dining, "They chickened out. Since I was the one loaning them the money, I could have backed out, too. But I thought, 'Well, I was ready to take a break from school'...I had no idea what a long break."
Two months after he was open the Chicago Tribune gave Arun's storefront three stars, and a month thereafter the Chicago Sun-Times gave him three and a half. Two and a half years later he bought the building which now houses the present Arun's. He designed the second restaurant (erected on the site of a burnout), worked alongside the construction crew, and did all the interior woodwork and carpentry. In his spare time (all the while operating his original restaurant) he worked at Eurasia (a former Levy restaurant) so he could learn how big corporations work. "To get five hours sleep a night was quite a luxury in those days."
Today Arun's is famous worldwide and that includes his native Thailand. I first interviewed Arun five years ago (although I had been a fan and diner long before), and today, at 53, his face is unlined and serene as I remember. And his spirit is as independent and selfless as ever -- a combination that challenges Western, especially American, norms. He has absolutely no desire for fame, he avoids public appearances ("Even in my own restaurant I would rather be in the kitchen than in the dining room"), turns down offers of lucrative consulting contracts ("Except for friends; it has never been about the money."), and he competes "only against myself. I have absolutely no wish to establish myself as better, or best than any other chef."
He reluctantly admits -- when pressed -- that he has no mentors or culinary heroes -- although he very much likes Charlie Trotter and considers him a good friend.
So where, I wonder, did this culinary Mozart, get his palate?
"Maybe from my grandfather," he says. "As the eldest son in a traditional Thai family, I was the only one privileged to eat meals with my grandfather. He was really keen about ea ting well. He would find rare ingredients. I didn't realize it at the time but he was educating me -- about the palate, about ingredients, about etiquette." And, he says, his mother was an absolutely wonderful cook.
In 1995 Sampanthavivat's mother came to join him in the restaurant. "People told her how I was working and she was shocked," he said. "There is a saying in Thailand about cooking rice and curry. In my case it would be, 'You went for an advanced degree and you wind up cooking rice and curry?'" But when she arrived, she developed another concern: the dumplings. "We were doing well, but not quite right with the dumplings," he said. His mother showed everyone how to do it right. In 1997 his kitchen was enriched by his sister and also one of his brothers whom he has sent for two years to work in a Thai restaurant in Venezuela "so he would understand what working in a kitchen was really like."
About two years ago, Sampanthavivat took his greatest risk to date. "I decided that the Chef's Design Menu, at least 12 courses, different every day, would be the best experience for both sides -- the kitchen and the diner -- because I like to do things 100%. Matching flavor to flavor, that is exciting There was some resentment at first, but I expected that." "Some resentment" includes threatening phone calls and letters, "I will never eat at your restaurant a gain," not to mention the bursts of outrage when the reservations-taker asked for a credit-card guarantee for the reservation. (The kitchen will honor all food allergies and regularly creates vegetarian and vegan menus for diners.)
But in the long run, Sampanthavivat has weathered the storm and the restaurant is doing better than ever before. I ask the chef if, looking back on his "break" from school and those first unrelenting years, would he do it a gain?
"Never," says Sampanthavivat. "But I am not sorry I did. My karma could be described by that Chinese saying, 'He who rides a tiger can never descend.' Once you get up on that tiger's back, you can't get off again." (Obviously, if you do, the tiger will eat you.)
His questionable karma has created unquestionably fortunate karma for Chicago diners, who are eating such once-in-a-lifetime appetizers as Golden fried oyster pancake with bean sprouts and garlic chives, drizzled with spicy chili-garlic sauce, or entrees -- which may never come again -- such as Roast duck medallions with scallion pancake rolls and fresh fruit chutney.
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Roast duck in peach curry sauce with fresh fruit chutney and avocado-filled wonton.
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Culinary Vitae
The Restaurant:
Arun's
4156 N. Kedzie Avenue
Chicago
Opened: 1985
Hours: Tuesday through Sunday, from 5 p.m.
Cuisine: Original creations based on regional and Royal Thai cuisine, elevated and refined.
Menu: Chef's Design Menu, 12 courses (sometimes more), changes nightly ($75)
Among Awards: 1995 Ivy Award, R&I magazine; 1996 Fine Dining Hall of Fame, Nation's Restaurant news; Best Chef in the Midwest, the James Beard Foundation, 2000; DiRoNa Award of Excellence in 1998 and 1999; 4-stars, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun Times, Mobil Guide.
The Chef:
Arun Sampanthavivat
Age: 53
Training: No formal culinary training; degree in art from Thailand's top university, Master's degree in international relations from the University of Tokyo; Master's degree in political science from the university of Chicago.
Avocations: Writing Thai and English poetry, painting.
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What's new: Chef's Design Menu only, (for carnivores and vegetarians) changes nightly. A cookbook in the works.
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Spiaggia:
Starring Tony Mantuano as "The Comeback Kid"
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Tony Mantuano
Executive Chef
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"You can't go home again," is a truism embedded in our everyday language. We use it often, and it's universally understood -- as a warning or a sad summation -- that once you have left (a place, an occupation, a relationship) it's impossible to successfully return. (The phrase comes from the title of Thomas Wolfe's last novel, "You Can't Go Home Again.")
This year Tony Mantuano broke the rule with his triumphant return to Spiaggia restaurant, where he was hired 16 years ago by Spiaggia's owner, Larry Levy, to be the opening chef. During Mantuano's tenure, from 1984 to 1990, Spiaggia received four stars (highest rating) from Chicago magazine, a rating that Paul Bartolotta, chef from 1990 on, maintained. When Paul Bartolotta announced he was leaving, Mantuano and Larry Levy met for lunch. "He asked if I would take this position, and I said that I wanted to do it, but that, in addition, I wanted to do some new things, and I had to make that clear," says Mantuano. "Larry replied, 'That's great, but first retain those four stars!"
Since his return, Chicago magazine reviewed the restaurant, and Spiaggia kept its four stars. "I can sleep at night again," he says.
"But why," I ask, did you leave in the first place and why did Paul Bartolotta just leave?" "Because," Mantuano answers with a smile, "What Larry Levy says is true: all chefs have this extra gene that makes them go off periodically to do their own thing."
Now he is "Happy to be here, happy to come to work. This is a great time to be a chef because ingredients from everywhere arrive at your door within hours. Last night I served fresh sardines that were swimming yesterday off the coast of Italy."
When Larry Levy approached Mantuano in 1983, he announced "We're going to build the best Italian restaurant in the city." Mantuano had been cooking since he was 22. First he apprenticed in Milwaukee with Chef Kurt Weber for five years, and had been the chef in 1980 of Pronto restaurant in Chicago. "It was way ahead of its time," he says, describing the fresh pasta being made to order and other preparations new, too new, to Chicago diners used to red sauce.
To get the job, Mantuano cooked for Larry Levy and his brother, and Larry was sufficiently impressed to send Mantuano and his wife Cathy to Italy to learn the Italian Alta Cucina (cooking of the upper classes, comparable to the French haute cuisine) at its source. "I was the first American to come to Italy to learn the cuisine. About halfway through this first year I met Paul Bartolotta, who had just come over to learn as well. Italian cuisine was a real eye-opener. The restaurants were regional, and the recipes were 500 years old. The chefs had updated and elevated these traditional recipes, but not by drastically changing them. The cuisine had a soul and you would never be served 'seven countries' on one plate."
When Mantuano opened Spiaggia with this totally new-to-Chicago Italian cuisine, "We got great reviews from the critics, but some well-known restaurateurs, who came to eat, made it a point to warn me, 'This is great, but you are never going to make it if you don't put on some tomato sauce.' Well, it's 16 years later and we're still not putting on the tomato sauce."
After six successful years, Mantuano's chef-errant gene kicked in and he left Spiaggia to help his brother expand his Kenosha, Wisconsin restaurant. "It's still there today, doing better than ever." Then he returned to Chicago and four five years owned and operated the highly successful Tutto Posto restaurant at Franklin and Erie. "It got great reviews, but the rent was awful -- stifling the business. When the lease came up and the landlord wouldn't renegotiate, I was approached by a group of people who wanted to open Mantuano's Mediterranean Table." The partnership not only didn't work out ("They wanted the food to be more Italian-American, which I just couldn't do."), but when Manutano left in 1999 they wanted to keep his name. The court decided in Mantuano's favor, but "After spending December in a courtroom, Cathy, my wife, and my son and I went to Europe for a couple months to visit old friends, research for a consulting project I was doing, and generally clear our heads."
In March, when they returned, he accepted the new position, his old job, at Spiaggia. When asked what the "other things, the new projects" are, Mantuano replies, "I've been in this business long enough to know not to discuss something until it actually happens." But he was willing to discuss changes at Spiaggia: "Slightly smaller portions, more modern Italian food, a little lighter. I like different textures and flavors on a plate: some crunch, some smoke, some citrus, some herbs." He also likes to match regional Italian products with food, for example, Ligurian mullet with Ligurian olives. He would also like to see more multi-course dining. And he'd like to bring back Cafe Spiaggia to its original fun and informality ("It has become a miniature dining room.") with a new menu and perhaps bring back the food bar.
To get that all-important day off to spend with his family, he relies on his Chef de Cuisine, Beth Partridge, with whom he has worked for seven years. "We think alike." Part of their shared philosophy about Italian food, Mantuano sums up as, "Simplicity. You rarely find more than a few ingredients on one plate. On the one hand, that means less is more. But on the other hand, that 'less' better be incredible."
Culinary Vitae
The Restaurants:
Spiaggia
Cafe Spiaggia
980 N. Michigan Avenue
Opened: 1984
Spiaggia hours: lunch, Tuesday through Saturday, 11:30 - 2:30; dinner every day from 5:30
Cafe hours: lunch daily from 11:30-2:30, except brunch on Sunday at noon; dinner daily from 5:30 to 9:30 Sunday through Thursday, and until 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday
Cuisine: Contemporary Seasonal Italian Alta Cucina
Menus: Prix Fixe Lunch (Three courses$35); traditional a la carte dinner menu (antipasti, paste, pesci, le carni, dolci)
Awards: 4 stars (highest rating) Chicago magazine, 2000;
CS Restaurant Review of Spiaggia
The Chef:
Tony Mantuano
Age: 46
Married, one son
Training: No formal culinary training, majored in music in college Mentors: Chef Kurt Weber, Milwaukee; Eugenio Medagliani, Italy
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What's new:
New menus for private dining
New menu and new spirit for Cafe Spiaggia
Spiaggia Cookbook being written by Cathy Mantuano
Undisclosed projects with Larry Levy
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Shallots: The Best (okay, only) Kosher Fine Dining in Town
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Laura Frankel
chef-owner
Roasted duck breast with pumpkin risotto and duck confit
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Chef Laura Frankel graduated from the Cooking and Hospitality Institute of Chicago (CHIC) (where she met her executive sous chef Dennis Wasko) and cooked for 10 years in some of of Chicago's top restaurants. "Then one day, I had an epiphany," she says. "I could no longer cook food I was not tasting." Frankel keeps a kosher home, and some of the conditions of Kashrut (keeping kosher) are: no dairy and meat in the same meal; no pork of any kind, no shellfish of any kind. Beef is kosher as long as it comes from the forequarter of the cow -- ribs and above. So beef, lamb, veal, venison, bison, duck, chicken, goose, quail -- even foie gras -- are kosher as long as they are killed humanely by the shochet, or a rabbinical official. (Even foie gras, she says, is hard to get and somewhat controversial. Some rabbis approve, some disapprove because of the manner in which the geese are raised and force fed.)
Considering these conditions, most of the food Frankel was cooking in restaurant kitchens was not food that would ever pass her lips. "I realized that in Chicago there is a large population that keeps kosher 365 days a year -- and no fine-dining restaurant for them. There are decent kosher restaurants, but that's eating, not fine dining. So this entire group of people had nowhere to go to celebrate anniversaries, nowhere to take their mother for a special birthday, nowhere professional men and women could entertain colleagues."
So she opened Shallots in the bi-level space on Clark Street formerly occupied by a risotto restaurant, financing the venture with her own funds. "I gave the dining rooms a nice facelift and installed some new equipment in the kitchen," she says. Shallots is strictly a kosher non-dairy restaurant, so a rabbinical supervisor, or Moshgiach, is present at all times.
Part of the opening remodeling included creating an office and space for Robert Solomon, the pastry chef, in the basement. "So how does a pastry chef cook without butter, cream, milk or cheese," I asked. "It was a little mind-bending for the first few months," she says, "But remember he has eggs, the best Belgian chocolate, the finest fruit purees, nut pastes, and flours of all kinds -- such as chestnut flour which he uses to make chestnut crepes. Instead of milk in the crepes he uses beer or champagne. They're delicious! And our espresso sorbet, for example, is frozen at a constant 32 degrees using freshly brewed espresso and a combination of three forms of sugar -- it comes out so creamy that it's hard to believe we haven't used milk."
Frankel is the mother of three children, one teenager, one pre-teen and one in first grade. "They come here all the time and it's a big source of pride for them that our family has the best kosher restaurant in the country, if not the world. They have all assumed kitchen responsibilities here and at home. The world is a tempting place, and I believe this helps them when they are wandering through Northbrook Court and the McDonald's beckons."
If being a mother, career woman and parent has been no problem, being a woman in business has not always run as smoothly. "When I was a week away from opening, a piece of new equipment central to the kitchen did not work. I told the supplier in no uncertain terms that it had to be fixed in time -- and he looked at me as if I were flying around the kitchen on a broomstick. And when I do a demo of a recipe for the staff, it has my name on it and I want it prepared exactly that way. If a staff member takes liberties and I call them up short, they frequently roll their eyes. If I were a male French chef, it would be, 'Oui, Chef!'"
For that reason, Frankel often works the hot line in both Chicago and New York kitchens -- to show that she can.
Kashrut applies to wines as well as foods. The wines are mevushal, or pasteurized so that they are non-sacramental. "Fortunately, there are some very good kosher wines these days," says Frankel who especially favors Herzog wines. These wines from the Napa and Alexander Valley in California have been praised by the Wine Spectator.
Reading Shallots' menu offers no clue that this is a kosher restaurant. But it is clearly fine-dining and highly individual cuisine. Consider for example, a first course of either Tuna Tartare with celeriac-horseradish remoulade, or Crispy Polenta with ratatouille and portobello mushrooms. Then perhaps one might order Eye of the Rib Filet with potato cake, caramelized wild onions and poivrade sauce, or choose instead Roast Duck Breast with pumpkin risotto, roasted squash and duck confit. However, the Anise Seed Crusted Wild Salmon with melted spinach, leeks, fennel, scallion fumet and oyster mushrooms does sound tempting. For dessert, will it be The Black Hat of Warm Belgian chocolate cake with Champagne sabayon, or the Baked Alaska with vanilla biscuit, coconut rum and pineapple sorbets? I'm not kosher, but I am welcome -- as is everyone -- to dine at Shallots.
Culinary Vitae
The Restaurant:
Shallots
2324 N. Clark Street
Chicago
Opened: June 1999
Hours: Lunch, Monday through Thursday, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.; Sunday brunch, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Dinner Sunday, 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.; Monday through Thursday, 5:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. Closed Friday and Saturday. Open Saturday night, 1 hour after sundown until 11:30 p.m. for Grill Menu only. Cuisine: Kosher Mediterranean
The Chef:
Laura Frankel
Three children
Training: Graduated CHIC
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What's New:
Shallots Restaurant in New York, opened July 2000
Researching opening Shallots on West Coast
Cookbook in the works
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RL: Haute Haven for Hoi Polloi
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Giancarlo Gottardo
Chef de Cuisine
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Whoever first observed that, "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts," provided not only a description but an explanation of RL. The parts themselves are great: RL is internationally known design mogul Ralph Lauren's first venture into restaurants and is located next door to the largest Polo store in the world. The small bar with its black marble fireplace, mahogany paneling, and brass-and-ebony cocktail tables unmistakably announces private club: very British, very swanky, very posh. The restaurant beyond completes the image: Dining Room for Members only. Every inch of the navy blue walls is plastered with Ralph Lauren's private collection of photography, paintings and drawings. On one wall a photograph of Mick Jaeger hangs cheek by jowl with an oil painting of a very proper Victorian gentleman. Burgundy leather upholstered chairs and banquettes cushion and cosset the human body, mahogany paneling lends a sedate luster (nothing too flashy) to walls and ceiling, and herringbone hardwood floors discreetly echo customers' footsteps as they follow the host to their table. To be escorted to table by general manager and sommelier Scott Dahlin, is special. However short the distance, it is long on style.
But now the fun begins. This isn't a private club; John Q. Public is welcome (with wallet, it's pricey), and the food is not roast beef, Yorkshire Pudding and soggy trifle. Instead, plates bear the inspired, entirely contemporary, Italian cuisine of the gifted, passionate, and outspoken Chef de Cuisine, Giancarlo Gottardo.
"My goal in design is to achieve the ultimate dream -- the best reality imaginable," says Ralph Lauren, chairman and chief executive officer of Polo Ralph Lauren. His designs -- clothing for men, women and children, linens, furniture, paint, fragrances and fitness products -- are famous for that signature blend of romance and tradition: English aristocracy and African safaris, Prep schools and competitive athletics, Parisian cafe society and the Old West. Clearly, for R.L. restaurant he chose to flesh out what many of us dream of -- a club of our own.
The idea began in New York. Lauren, a frequent customer of Nino Esposito and Chef Gennaro Vertucci (partners in New York restaurants Vico, Sette Mezzo and Sette MoMA in the Museum of Modern Art), had been a regular at Vico for years. His parting shot to Esposito, when leaving the restaurant, was "One day we will open a restaurant together." One day in 1997 the partnership between the three was formed. Esposito and Gennaro spotted Giancarlo Gottardo at Bice Chicago, where he was cooking his heart out and raising the bar on cuisine there. They made him an offer he couldn't refuse and in 1999 he was chef de cuisine at RL.
What is a nice Italian chef who was born in Sicily, raised in Milan, and trained in some of the finest restaurants in the world, doing in Chicago?
"I was in New York at Bice," Gottardo says sketching Manhattan in mid-air with his hands, and I was ready to move someplace else in America. Bice's owner said to me, 'where do you want to move?' I said, 'I want to find a town like Lake Como.'" He explains that he spent 14 years in Lake Como in Italy, a beautiful area with a lake, mountains and trails where he would ride his bicycle. When Gottardo saw Chicago, he says, "It's very much like Lake Como. You have a lake -- a very big one, but a lake -- and the high rises, they are like my mountains. And whenever I need to get away, to work on a problem, I simply take my bicycle and ride along the lake."
Gottardo went to college initially for graphic design. "I love computers! And I am an artist!" But something was missing. "So I called my mother f from school and said, 'I want to go to Milan.'" It was not the first such call his mother was to receive over the years until he found his true mentor and his true calling. His mentor was his uncle Stefano Giuffrida, then Executive Chef at the Excelsior Hotel in Venice. Gottardo arrived in Milan at 21 years of age, and called his uncle Stefano and asked if he would get him a job in a restaurant while he sorted out his future. "Don't use my name if you are not serious. This is not playing." his uncle warned him sternly. Nevertheless, he got his nephew a job at the very fine-dining Golden Restaurant in Milan. Gottardo remembers, "I stepped into that kitchen and I saw only white -- big white hats! The atmosphere was so intense, so focused." He was hooked -- even though he called his uncle and expressed doubts that he was equal to this challenge. He changed from college to culinary school -- the best one in Italy -- and started a long, serious apprenticeship in the culinary profession. At one point his Uncle Stefano insisted he work for a month apiece in a butcher's shop, a grocery store, a pastry shop, even a gelateria, "Just so I could learn how to work with people while learning these specialties." After this experience his uncle said, "O.K., now you are ready to work with me." He worked with his uncle for two years -- as a busboy, a waiter, a host. "He showed me the most important things in this life, step by step," says Gottardo. From there his apprenticeship took him to some of Italy's finest restaurants and hotels.After that Gottardo worked at upscale properties and each time he moved,his position and the caliber of the property went up a notch, but his bank account didn't. "In Europe," he says, "you work for almost nothing at the great restaurants just to learn." In 1991 he wound up at the Principe di Savoia, among the best 20 hotels in the world, applying for a job under Executive Chef Romano Resen. "He asked me, 'Do you really want to work with me'? I said, 'Yes, but not for free. I have paid my dues. Please call me.'" He got the position and worked with 60 chefs in the kitchen and Chef Resen never spoke to him until one day he was summoned into the great chef's presence. "Congratulations and welcome to my team," Chef Resen announced.
Gottardo moved to other kitchens. He cooked on the lines, cooked for banquets, did giant food sculptures at the drop of a hat, and even cooked for more than a year on the Love Boat, as well as at the still-famous Le Cirque in New York.
By the time owner of Bice first spotted him, he remarked, "You have a style." Gotardo now brings his style to RL. "Chicago is the best!," he says. "The people are most intelligent, most well traveled, most friendly. And R.L. is a inspiration to me. Just as Mr. Lauren forms designs in his head, to create the ideal lifestyle, I also form a concept in my head and my heart bring that design to each dish. I paint the plate."
Culinary Vitae
The Restaurant:
RL
115 East Chicago Avenue
Chicago
Opened: March 1999
Hours: Lunch, Monday through Saturday, 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.; dinner, Monday through Thursday, 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., and Friday and Saturday, 5 p.m. to 11 p.m; Sunday hours 1 p.m. to 8 p.m. Capacity: dining room seats 88; bar seats 20; outdoor seating weather permitting.
The Chef:
Giancarlo Gottardo
Age: 33
Culinary training: Graduated from the Culinary Institute of Milan, Italy; trained at The Four Seasons, The Sheraton, The Palace hotels in Milan, and was executive chef at the Orient Express in Milan; chef at Bice in New York and Chicago. Mentors: His uncle, Stefano Giuffrida
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What's new:
A cookbook in the works
Will add vegetarian dishes and a new sandwich to menu
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