I’m not well versed in Shakespeare, but the Soothsayer’s premonition to Julius Caesar to “Beware the Ides of March,” was on my mind as I walked out to the garage to procure liquid nitrogen. It was mid-menu on March 15th at my Chicago based, Michelin-starred restaurant, EL Ideas. This service would be the final one for our foreseeable future, as earlier that day our state’s restaurants had been mandated to close on account of Covid-19. As l had done almost every service over the last decade, I took a drag of weed from my vape pen as the snake-like, metal…
Le Cirque’s Sirio Maccioni was one of a kind
Le Cirque is French for “the circus,” and Sirio Maccioni, who died this week in Tuscany, was every bit the ringleader of the once-legendary New York restaurant. It’s hard to understand a person’s magnetism without being in front of them. It wasn’t just his bravado, good looks, and commanding presence. Anyone who was in Sirio’s company knew they were in the presence of someone larger than life.
In the mid-1990s, I was early in my tenure as a young chef in the original Le Cirque on east 65th Street, where I ended up working for around five years. The restaurant…
On buzzworthiness, food media, and no longer being the hot new reservation
Though more fragile than the bone china we use as a canvas for our cooking, a chef’s ego is the last line of defense. When all else fails, as it so often does in restaurants, putting blind pride front and center has rarely failed in a moment of crisis. Though that pride defends us in some places, it leaves us very vulnerable in other ways. Attention and acceptance, or lack thereof —from guests, colleagues, and mostly food media — is the elixir that fuels our resolve or the toxin that crushes our souls. Though I may have learned a lot…
It’s the key to improving your life — as well as restaurant culture
One night in 2014, I was cooking while heavily drunk. It wasn’t the first time. Near the end of service, one of my cooks did something to rile me up, and in a fit of rage I never experienced before, I forcefully grabbed him by the face. The next day, I received an email from someone on my team. The message was blunt: If I walked into my own restaurant, EL Ideas in Chicago, the entire team would walk out. What’s worse was my apartment is directly above the restaurant, so for two excruciating nights, I sat on my couch…
The lessons I learned from hitting rock bottom, and what they say about life in the restaurant industry
Having one’s mise en place under control is inseparable from being successful in a professional kitchen. Loosely translated as having “everything in its place,” the term reflects the spirit of working in a clean, timely, and organized fashion. But for our first five years at my Chicago restaurant, EL Ideas, the phrase held a second, more blasphemous meaning. For us it meant: “Let’s stop prepping and go do a shot.”
As EL quickly became known for the intimate interaction between diners and chefs, it became customary for us to do shots with our guests both during and after service. Many…
Phillip Foss
Phillip Foss is chef/owner of Michelin starred EL Ideas & co-author of the graphic novel Life in EL.
