Saturday, July 02, 2011

We sat down with Joseph and talked about his palette, how he became a chef and his favorite ingredients.
How did you get into the culinary industry?
My mom was a chef so I grew up in it. She had to work late so she would pick me up from school and I would go hang out with her at work. Probably my first memory of the industry was when I was 8 years old slicing eggs for my mom. I started to like kitchen work, but she said, " You don't want to be in this business," and then she said, "But I'll show you how to do it so that any time you need a job anywhere you go you can get one. And that's true in the restaurant business. I got my first real job when I was 14; I had a part-time job washing dishes.  And as a dishwasher you're always doing side work, prep and all that stuff. I worked under a bunch of different chefs and then at Cartewheels Catering I was the night chef. I was a sous chef for six years and ran the kitchen before I came to Riven Rock. I came here [to The Terrace Grill] when Chris Havens gave me the opportunity to have my own kitchen and my own creative ideas in the forefront.
Most chefs shy away from the pastry aspect and here you make pastries for breakfast for the bed and breakfast guests and desserts for the restaurants. How did you become such a well-rounded chef?
Working in smaller restaurants you learn you're not going to have your pastry chef so you learn to be multi-talented and multi-skilled, filling the gaps where you're needed. Baking is like chemistry. I've always gravitated toward the cooking aspect more than baking because you can play with it. When cooking you know in your mind what things are going to taste like and you can imagine how things are going to taste together. You can execute that much easier than in baking.
How would you describe your culinary style?
My mom worked in a lot of high end restaurants that were Italian with actual Italians working in them so that's where I picked up on that type of cooking, plus the brick oven here lends itself to that sort of rustic Italian style cooking.
What do you like about working in the kitchen?
No matter how well you're prepared, when it's time for food service there's always this rush and you have to perform.
What's the one highlight you would tell people about the food at The Terrace Grill?
We use a lot of Texas products. That's a huge trend right now and we're on the forefront in this area. Texas produces a wide variety of food including seafood, beef and different things that are all done right here so you might as well get the freshest products possible. I think it's a really neat thing that we're able to do here. The slow food movement and supporting the local farmers is becoming increasingly important. Here's how I put my meals together: I call my fish monger on Wednesday and figure out what looks best and is fresh, then I go shopping and pick out fresh organic vegetables that look good and that pair well with the fish, or other protein, and start putting the components together. I think that's really where the best food and flavors come from. When I can get a Texas leek it has a little more spice than a California leek because of the hot dry growing climate here which brings out the bite in the flavor. I can pick organic vegetables myself or get vegetables picked that day from the farms I visit.
What are your favorite ingredients to work with?
Anything that's really fresh. With fresh ingredients you can go complex or minimalist with the preparation and it still tastes great.
And, what is your least favorite?
Chicken because it has no marbling and very little fat so it doesn't really have any inherent flavor.
What is your favorite meal to eat when you're not at work?
Anything I don't cook. When I go home I don't want to cook. When someone cooks a meal for you it tastes so much better than if you cooked it yourself. Bonnie is a great cook.
What's your favorite Bonnie-meal?
It must be the Scotch-Irish country boy in me, but grilled steak and a baked potato, something simple like that.

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