I’m nervous.

I’ll find that sweet spot though and give it everything I got.

See you in Hollywood!

You see, I had to leave LA for a long period of my life. I grew up here but there was a time where I couldn’t live here anymore. I was ending up nowhere fast. I needed to gain new perspectives and venture. That started a ten year career that led me across both coasts, but I’d always be back for her bread.

Nancy Silverton has been a part of my life even though she never knew it. As a young punk, I fell in love with her breads on La Brea. My car smelled like a bakery at all times, never needed an air freshener.

Then as this whole thing started blowing up with Kogi, Nancy was the first chef that stuck out her hand and said let me show you around. “Who are you? What’s your food all about? Welcome.” She didn’t know me. We spoke on a panel together with Jonathan Gold, and she just started treating me like gold.

I got her digits.

She invited me to dinner.

She set up the first date between David Chang and myself at Jitlada while Jazz pummeled us with chilies. I just buckled up and didn’t fight the current for once in my life. She showed me her heart before we even shook hands.

But way before this you’d find me at this bar.

To be honest, there weren’t THAT many Asians eating out as there are today. The blogger wave was just taking foot, so I’d be like one of the only Asian dudes grinding like I didn’t know any better. I asked Bryant from Spice Table the other day if he was the sous chef that used to just send things over. Back then there was an Asian sous chef that for no other reason than seeing a familiar face, maybe, used to just send stuff over to me and I’d nod.

It wasn’t Bryant. He says there was one other dude back in the mid-2000′s.

Then one day in 2007, I moved back to LA and got a job here and found myself back at the pizza bar eating squash blossoms.

I got to know Matt Molina and Karla, who is now in Singapore.

I asked Matt one day, how do you guys do it? Day in day out, consistent deliciousness year after year. He said, “I’m a creature of habit.”
That’s awesome.

I guess I’m a bit of a creature of habit too — a creature who habitually eats himself round at Mozza.

But then you go to a Korean restaurant and they put down basically a smoldering rock from the inner depths of the earth’s core made out of the lava that singes trees into dust and they carry that over crying infants and place in front of you with out even a warning. You got hot charcoal spewing in the middle of the table for your BBQ and fire rings of stone at your elbows and not a cloth napkin in sight to guard against the heat.

The whole time, no matter how long it takes you to eat it, the fucking thing is about a million degrees.
You burn your roof and tongue, your spoon glows like the tip of a blacksmith, and every time you reach for panchan with your chopsticks a small piece of your elbow always seems to brush the hot bowl leaving bibimbap hickies on your arms.

There’s not much I can order anymore at Korean restaurants since I stopped eating meat and fish. Even the things that look vegetarian are made with fish sauce or shrimp paste. But bibimbap is something that can always come through in the clutch.

But did you know that bibimbap in it’s true form is actually not vegetarian? Bibimbap comes from the town of Jeonju in the northern region of the southwest section of the peninsula. The rice is cooked in beef stock to give it it’s rich umami flavor. The origins of this bowl of mixed craziness in Korea, some say, goes back to a mixture of all the ingredients after a ceremony. I can see how that happened.

Koreans celebrate birthdays, dead spirits, and holidays with a table full of small panchan and namul. Look these words up. Hundreds of plates sit on the table as ghosts eat them in our mind and at the end, we flesh living humans mix it all up and grub.

The reason why Jeonju is the home to bibimbap is not what you may think. It’s not because of the rice or the kochujang or the stone or any of the things that seem apparent at first glance.

It’s because of the bean sprout.

There is a specific bean sprout that grows in the area of Cholla Buk Do that has a structure that doesn’t break down when cooked and has a flavor so distinct that there is nothing like it. It’s this tiny sprout that the bowl rests upon.

I went to Jeonju once. A quiet town that sits low amongst foothills and green trees and farms. My grandparents are buried near there. Everywhere I looked there was bibimbap. Like ramen in Fukuoka or hot dogs at a baseball game. I must have eaten like 10 different ones in 10 different places. And it really was like eating prosciutto in Parma.

Nothing like it.

Each spoonful opened new worlds and I could feel the land. You eat a lot when you are in Jeonju. It’s a farmer’s appetite type town. Spoonfuls the size of a cupcake. Sweat dripping down your temples. Elbows again with hickies. Infants crying. Hot lava all around. And you couldn’t be happier.

That damn bean sprout.

Yes, it’s extremely hot.

* * *

Watermelon Bread!
Thass all, folkes.

First off, last Tuesday we did a special music meets food album listening party for my friend, TOKiMONSTA. It was quite an amazing night. We had journalists from the music industry and food world all gathered in A-Frame to listen to her new album with fresh ears and souls.

TOKiMONSTA and I dreamed it would be special to try and shake up the normal album listening experience by trying to match the food with the music, kind of like how a sommelier matches wine with food. Beats and Bap. The music became the food and the food became the music.

In order to do this, I needed to listen to the album and understand its moods. I had to sink into its dimensions and try and translate it through the food while enhancing and not taking away from the sonic vision of all her hard work. I think it worked. We threw food on the table and made everyone eat with their hands through the crazy intro then as the moods got dreamy we served a bowl of soup and progressed through raw courses and finally in the dreamy state started dumping piles of gummy bears and chocolate on the table as we all came out of our skin.

It wasn’t easy though.

I must give credit to my team. They trusted me even though I couldn’t communicate exactly how it would all be done. I just saw “it” and, like maybe Jordan saw a win, I had a will to make it happen. I was curt, I pushed, I demanded, and I changed things second by second. I’m sure they were confused and frustrated with me, but I was possessed. And in the end, they held me down and we held Toki down, and through the maze, we found a new way to experience food that never existed before.

On Saturday we had a very special guest that came to us from a magical part of the world. Massimo Bottura from Osteria Francescana in Modena, Italy. It’s the fourth best restaurant in the world. I think it’s fifth now but fuck it, to me it’s still the fourth.

I never met him before but as soon as I did, I was compelled to hug him. I feel like I knew him and he knew me. Modena is the land of Balsamic, Parmesan, sour cherries, and Ferraris. He came with his team and they were as sweet and nutty as that wonderful cheese that they grate daily. He sees the world in such a soulful way, I just sat back and listened.

He “got” what I was trying to explain to him about LA, about our regional cuisine. For him and Modena, it’s the nature and his products and the ways of food making that have been transgressed across centuries.

For LA, I tried to explain, it was our people. The mixing of cultures from faraway lands that came together to make a new regional food, that is LA. He kissed me on both cheeks.

It was glorious for the kitchen crew as well. Look, we don’t really look to swim in those waters that is San Pellegrino best restaurant in the world honors over here at A-Frame. We respect it but don’t really give two shits about it, to be honest. We just do what we do and hope you love it, because we love it.

But watching my chefs Jude and Ben smile from ear to ear as they cooked and watching the front of the house take pictures with this amazing man, it made me smile and think. We as restaurant folk don’t have that much. We don’t make that much money, we work long hours, we sacrifice time away from our families, and all for what? It’s for the craft and it’s for you, the diner, of course. But what’s in it for us?

Well…it’s those small moments where we get to cook for another chef and share our connection to this wonderful world of the kitchen and the quest for flavor and cooking. It’s our hug and handshake and in return we reverberate with emotion for days.

Then last night, we had the Prince of Darkness himself, Alice Cooper, in our patio with his whole family. He’s everything his identity has come to be on stage and so much more beyond the stage. Such a witty, funny, slapstick, insightful, dude. Still and forever rocking shows and dinner tables and life.

And now I’m here, trying to put the final edits on my book so hopefully you can read it in the bathroom, one day.

Love you all, take care.
Papi

Things are gonna be lovely.

It’s one of my favorite things to eat. And I’m gonna put it on the menu at my new spot in Koreatown late summer, The Line Hotel on Normandie and Wilshire.

It’s basically soba noodles on blast. Garlic made into a grated purée, ginger, green onions the same way. Kimchi, shredded lettuce, shredded sesame leaf, sesame seeds, sesame oil, mountain herbs, and a sauce made from a kochujang blend some vegetable broth and some vinegar. Mix it all together and eat cold.

It’s pretty awesome. Like a spicy garlic Slurpee.

Some other homemade goods are the two fermenting pastes that we worked on all winter in the back there. Dwenjjang and kochujang. Some fresh radish kimchi julienned. Soy marinated gobo or burdock root. And some fresh greens. This meal will leave your breath smelling for at least 36 hours, but the moment will last forever.

Vegetables can be turnt up and get nasty if you just have fun with it. Steamed and bland is over. Let’s move on.

I know it’s the big thing these days, especially amongst the blogging community to find and frequent the boulevards of Alhambra, San Gabriel, Arcadia, Monterey Park, Rosemead, Temple City, and Rowland Heights.
Find the funkiest and smelliest.
Some small place with sticky tables, as if that is the measuring stick for what defines a good meal.
Hole in the wall or give me hole in the head. Death.
Liberty is not something manifested by the properties themselves as they are auspiciously nominated as the nom nom and given the equivalent of a cheer. Pom Pom.

I love me some XLB and beef rolls and dung po pork and clay pots and sea cucumber and pork floss and Chengdong noodles and water fish and jellyfish and hand pulled noodles.

But you see, they are not these quests of Columbus. They are normal gatherings. Family affairs. Graduations.
From the inside out, it’s actually just food.
Not a find.
But “discovering” is exhilarating, I guess. Stamping it to claim it exists even though it existed already can be empowering. Imperialism.
It’s quite amazing to see the energies that swirl nowadays.
Intestines being slurped like pasta.

So in this age of the educated and adventurous diner, I chose to take it back and explore what actually used to be a fascination of mine before the renaissance of weird is good.
Americanized Chinese Food.

Oolong tea with sugar.
Pictures on the wall.
Set menus.
Thick noodles.
Gloppy sauces.
Fortune cookies!

It was always an adventure to see what was served and what was tolerable. What was considered acceptable.
It has it’s own place.
It’s actually all this country understood just until recent times, as thousands of dishes stood in stables waiting one day to be unleashed.

Obviously that day has come and America is a better and more delicious place due to it.

But what about before the dung po pork or Dan Dan noodles or even steamed fish were acceptable things to order?

So, I went to Yang Chow again, after years removed.
Magic Johnson looking down on me through framed glass.
I ordered the Mu Shu vegetable and the Lo Mein and the fried rice and the green beans and watched table after table receive plates of slippery shrimp.
It’s not the food of DSLR’s but in it’s own moment, it’s fun and anthropologic of how we once were and what we were afraid of or what cooks were holding back on. It’s unapologetic.
It’s American history.
I poured sugar in my tea and sat back in yesterday thinking about the food of tomorrow.
In that moment, Yang Chow was delicious.
Not adventurous, but it made me wonder.
So that in of itself was rewarding.
I finished my Mu Shu like a burrito and opened my fortune cookie reading it this time, believing everything to be true.