A plate of deep-fried goodness: Antojos DF’s gorditas.

Being from LA, I have a natural affinity toward Mexican food and culture, but mine goes deeper than my native city to my family tree. When my uncle moved to the U.S. from Thailand he fell in love with a woman named Dora Lucero and married her almost instantly. Soon there were Thai/Chinese/Mexican cousins running around. My first exposure to real Mexican home cooking came when Aunt Dora would watch and feed us kids.

As I grew and started working at the family restaurant, the daily family meal was accented by homemade beans, rice and tortillas brought by our two prep cooks, Felipe and Chon. After my grandmother, these two gents were some of the most influential culinary guides to a young boy who spent countless hours at the restaurant. Over the hundreds of hours together prepping meat and vegetables, peeling shrimp, and making stock I learned the distinct differences between regional Mexican cuisines, from Puebla’s mole poblano to conchinita pibil from the Yucatan region.

In my teen years, my father started growing Chinese vegetables in Mexico. A lot of folks don’t know that most of the Chinese fresh greens we consume in the U.S. during winter are grown in Mexico. From November to March, most of the Chinese broccoli, bok choy, choy sum, long beans and Chinese squash on your table are all grown in central Mexico.

Soon after moving to Las Vegas, my colleague, Alex Stratta, pointed me to Los Antojos for some excellent Mexican food. I know Alex, Max Jacobson and all the LV foodies eat there and it’s been reviewed to death, so I won’t go there. Instead, I went back to one of my cooks who is from Mexico and told him about my meals at Los Antojos, and he mentioned another similarly named restaurant that might be related to it where he eats. I was intrigued! So on his recommendation, I found Antojos DF.

Unlike the tiny hole in the wall that is Los Antojos, Antojos DF is a very large, well-appointed restaurant. Its colorful tables and walls pair with a full-service staff that make this place a warm and inviting spot to bring friends and family. For folks that might fear hole-in-the-wall restaurants, this place fits the bill. There is a live two-piece band on weekends and you always get service with a smile. Every time I’ve visited, I was literally the only chinito in the house. I get the sense it’s a local spot loved by the Mexican community.

So, what to eat? Many things are good here, but the dish that I have to get every time is the gordita stuffed with chicharrón prensado. It is so out-of-this-world that I find myself craving it all the time, the same way one might get a hankering for pizza or BBQ or any other deliciously unhealthy fare. And the one at Antojos DF always satisfies.

A gordita is a fried dough pocket stuffed with your choice of fillings. Anything you would top a taco with can be stuffed into a gordita. It’s like a pita from the heavens, because it’s usually made with corn meal and wheat flour, so it has that sweet gritty crunchiness of corn-dog dough and the pillowiness that only gluten in wheat flour provides.

Rule #1: Always get it with chicharrón prensado! Qué es eso? Well, I’ll tell you! Chicharrones are pork rinds or skin from a pig. Yum, I know. Take that skin, render the fat out of it by frying and you have these airy crispy pork snacks called chicharrones. Now comes the prensado or pressing part. The rendered skins are now pressed into wheels of pork goodness. Think of a wheel of compressed fried pork skin that looks something like a giant Parmesan wheel – this is chicharrón prensado.

The magicians in the kitchens of Antojos DF shave off this chicharrón prensado and cook it in a rich red sauce of dried chilies and tomatoes. After they fry off the corn-dough patty, they cut a pocket in it and stuff it with the chicharrón prensado, some crumbly fresh cheese, cilantro, and onion and — OMFG! — Mexican sandwich crack! The chicharrón hits your blood stream, your heart starts to race, your eyes dilate, your adrenal glands spew and you get that feeling like when you’re about to go into freefall on a roller coaster! OK, now that might be a little dramatic, but I swear, this is one of my favorite eats in Las Vegas, period… full stop!

Also notable at Antojos DF are the sopes and cochinita pibil, and the refried beans with anything are crazy good. Of course, the restaurant will also gladly make you a chicken or plain cheese gordita, but the chicharrón is hands down ridiculous. You’d be a fool not to give it a try.

Originally published at LasVegasWeekly.com.

The Grand Tasting for 2010 Vegas Uncork’d at Garden of the Gods in Caesars Palace on May 7, 2010. Photo Courtesy of Tom Donoghue

Uncork’d has come and gone. It’s weird seeing it from the inside – getting the itinerary, being shuttled from here to there, from this press conference to that event, meeting with this media outlet, saying hello to this writer or that writer. I mean, I am far from an A-list chef and I still had meeting after meeting with PR and media. It’s a lot of fun, but the single most unique thought that went through my head during the festivities was that it takes so much to make it as a chef these days.

It’s not enough to just know how to cook anymore! We can’t all be like David Chang and fall into an if-I-build-it-they-will-come mentality. For most, it’s a lot of work that has to meet at the intersection between luck and skill. And even then having all three won’t guarantee success. A popular chef has to have a publicist or PR machine behind them, media training so when their publicist books them work they don’t flop and look like an idiot, an image, schtick or angle on the food world, a restaurant or outlet from which to practice his/her craft, and last but not least, some business smarts to strategize their moves! Whew! It’s exhausting.

So, let me break it down a little deeper. Just what does a chef need nowadays to have a chance at super-stardom?

1. PR machine! A typical chef spends 50 to 100 hours a week just working! That means working at the restaurant, planning menus, food costing, dealing with labor, writing specials. The day to day of it is pretty crushing. So how the hell is there any time left to show off your talent to the masses? Now and then a chef gets lucky and media people come into a restaurant, fall in love and invite him/her to be in their TV show, magazine, blog, radio show, etc. The rest of us have to have a publicist to stay plugged into the media world and find gigs. This is so important to the budding star chef.

2. Media training! I mean if you plan to be on TV in any capacity, this is invaluable! Forget about TV; how about the interviews and meetings that are going to lead to TV? If you bomb any of those, you won’t even make it to the small screen! Media training isn’t just getting better at being on TV, it’s being taught how to be a better person when around people, too. A great media trainer – and I know of one if you ever need one – will show you how to be “cool” by pointing out your faults (“opportunities”) on camera and showing you how to correct your bad habits. This is gold. In the beginning you might have very few chances to be on TV, so you have to make them count!

3. Grooming/Image/Angle. First, what’s your angle? It’s not enough to say you cook French or Italian or Chinese or Thai. What’s the hook? Are you regional? Are you a specialist? Is there a niche or do a million people do what you do? What’s your story? Why should I trust your cooking more than the dude at the restaurant next door? Here’s my story: I’m the kid that grew up in Thai town before there was a Thai town. Tony Bourdain calls me the unofficial mayor of Thai town… Blah, blah, that kind of stuff. So now that I know what you cook and why it’s different, how do you physically represent that? Hanging at the press launch of Vegas Uncork’d on Thursday, it was easy to see who the old guard Euros were and who were the USA cool kids! The old guard had their uniform: slacks and dress shoes, a chef coat worn over a designer collared shirt, and always a little facial hair like a mad scientist. The “I work so much and so late that there is never time to shave” look. Now, for us USA kids, the new uniform seems to be jeans over clogs (mandatory), chef coat over a cool t-shirt, and some kind of tattoo and/or piercing. Yes, dudes, I am guilty of dressing like an American chef.

So where the f does cooking come in? It’s crazy, but it’s equally as important as the ones above. You’d think the cooking should come first, but do you ever get the feeling that many TV chefs might not be great cooking chefs? It still trips me out, but it takes all that s**t to make it as an über chef today. And, yes, I’m guilty of all above. You need to evolve or get out of the way.

Between all of that, I think it’s easy to lose yourself and start believing you are great after the ten thousandth time you’ve heard it. I enjoy the game because it’s fun as hell, but I don’t ever plan on forgetting where I can came from and how fortunate I’ve been to work with amazing people.

So that’s it. That’s the formula to making it as celebrity chef that so many of the folks at Vegas Uncork’d have mastered. Trippy.

Originally published at LasVegasWeekly.com.

Okay, let’s face it: A dude that cooks is gonna go places in life.

All stages of his dude-hood would be complimented by the ability to throw down in the kitchen. The young dude cooks for the family to help out. College dude is cooking because eating out isn’t cheap, and it’s a total turn on for girls when a dude throws down in the kitchen. Post college dude will be date cooking to find the one he wants to settle down with (and to get some from those he just wants to mess around with). WHAT?! That second part was my inner voice. Whoops!

Now, date cooking accomplishes a lot of things. Why do you take the girl out to a fancy dinner and drinks? Well, to get to know her … blah blah blah. But check it, you can save $200-300 and accomplished your goal by making a great dinner with a nice bottle of wine for about $70. And you’ll impress the hell out of her, bro. Anyway, dating dude will eventually become married dude and family dude, and there’s something super satisfying about making a badass meal for your family. It’s primal, like I just went out and killed and cooked dinner for my clan. I am a BAMF! Hear me roar! Do you want to be one too? Here are the five quintessential things an up and coming BAMF cooking dude needs:

1. A badass chef’s knife! This is the totem that the man is judged upon in the kitchen. This is his Excalibur that he will do battle with. It’s the culinary extension of his you-know-what. A man’s chef’s knife is like his car; it should say everything about him.

2. A good meat thermometer/timer combo. A dude cooks dude food like steaks, roasts, prime ribs, and occasionally he has to roast big ass birds like turkeys and chickens. There is only one true way to tell if meat is done and it’s by temperature! Sure, a master chef can poke and feel his way to doneness, but the novice should live and die by the degree. You never know, it might make the difference between impressing her and sending her to the doctor with uncooked chicken or pork!

3. A bitchin’ wine key Dude, you’re an adult now. It’s time to properly learn how to open a bottle of wine. When you have that lady friend over and are fumbling with a bottle of Cab and a crappy wine key, you are not gonna close the deal! Your wine key should be like your timepiece; spend some extra shekels on it and it will tell the world you are a sophisticated grown up now. After she hits the road, you can reach into the hidden spot in your fridge for that frosty PBR and celebrate.

4. A nice set of pots and pans.  You need a non-stick omelet pan, a large sauté pan, a large saucier, and a roasting pan. Forget the 20 piece BS; this is all you need to be the master of your culinary domain. And if you’re smart, pick them up little by little during sales. Find a line you like and stick with it; don’t be a one of this kind and one of that kind dude! Go for something stainless steel, 3-ply and heavy duty! An omelet pan for the morning after, if you like her, and for roasting some spices. A large sauté pan does almost everything you need; the saucier is perfect for making soup, stock or sauces. And, finally, the roasting pan for those times you wanna get primal and roast large pieces of animal flesh.

5. A cool bistro apron. This is not a butcher apron that goes over the head. The bistro apron (around the waist) will make it look like you are the shizz in da kitchen. A butcher apron will make you look like a culinary gumby novice, all thumbs, no skills. And don’t get white—total amateur mistake. Get a dark gray or black. Appear mysterious dude! Let’s face it; protecting your designer jeans is more important than your t-shirt!

Finally, invest in some cooking classes and practice and before you know it, you will be killing the females! So the next time you have that fine lady over for dinner and you are impressing the crap out of her, remember who helped you look like a BAMF in the kitchen:

Your homie, Chef Jet.

Originally published at LasVegasWeekly.com.

Pissed at Pad Thai

Ever go through these phases of being in love with certain foods or dishes? Like, “I’m so into pork belly right now. I wanna try it every place I go”? Well, I am having the opposite problem right now! I’m really mad at Pad Thai!

But it’s not like me and Pad Thai can just stop talking. I serve maybe 30 to 40 orders a day of the stuff, and I look at them in disgust, almost anger! I was cooking Pad Thai the other day and thinking, Who the hell do you think you are? How can you be the quintessential representative of Thai cuisine? Who died and made you King of Thai Food?

The American version of Pad Thai has paprika, which isn’t even a native spice of Thailand, and a lot of versions are more sweet than anything. Thai food is prized for the balance of hot, sour, salty and sweet. Curse you, Pad Thai!

This has gotta be a phase, because Pad Thai is one of the dishes that put me on the map. It’s a dish I’ve studied and made for years and years. It’s the true gauge if some claims to know Thai food. There are some fundamental tests of culinary knowledge and ability – Filleting whole fish, making hollandaise, cooking a sunny-up egg. In the Thai kitchen, it’s making Pad Thai from scratch. If some kid came to me off the street wanting to work for me, “I’d say okay, FNG (f***ing new guy), make Pad Thai!”

You can’t fake good Pad Thai. There are two universes that you must master when making this dish:

1) The sauce. It’s a magical combination of tamarind, fish sauce, sugar, Siracha, vinegar and lime juice. You have to have taken a potions class just to get it right. On top of those ingredients, every chef has that magic item like eye of newt or pixie dust to make it theirs.
Can’t you just sense it smirking?

2) Cooking the damn dish is like the quest for bloody fire. How long did you soak your rice sticks? Did you soak in hot water to start gelatinizing the noodles for that perfect chewy mouth feel? Did you crack your eggs into the pan at the perfect time and have them just coagulate? Then your proteins, did you go for chicken or shrimp? Argh… If you woke up on the wrong side of the bed or had a fight with your partner the night before it’s a guarantee your Pad Thai is going to be FUBAR! Watching a chef make pad Thai is like reading their tealeaves. The minor way they spread the noodles around in the pan, how much heat are they applying, that perfect point of sauce absorption – you will know how skilled they are and if they are in a shitty or good mood! It’s truly an amazing art!

So why am I so pissed off and unappreciative of this glorious dish? Could this be my own psychological tealeaves? My therapist would say it’s a classic case of transference, unconscious misdirection of feeling. But it’s food, dammit! I’m not kicking my dog or giving my partner extra grief at home. I’m also not making sub par Pad Thai in the restaurant. On the contrary, I’m so obsessed with it right now, I’m making sure each one goes out as perfect as we can get it! Who the heck knows. But Pad Thai, I’m really pissed at you right now.

Originally published at LasVegasWeekly.com.

Proceed with caution. Photo: Nguyen Duong / via Flickr

So you know what I hate? I hate it when a guest orders a dish at spice level five, which is our maximum level of spiciness, then sends it back saying it was too spicy. Dude, it’s five out of five meaning it’s going to be frickin’ spicy! What did you expect, that I was only teasing that day because we were kind of slow? Or sometimes you get the yahoos that want to be all hardass and order a spicy five, and then it comes back to the kitchen in the hands of a smug server who’s like, “Chef, the guest says your spicy five isn’t spicy enough and dares you to bring the pain!” I can’t decide which one chaps my hide more.

Let’s remember something when it comes to spice: We are dealing with Mother Nature here. Have you ever enjoyed a bowl of fruit, like cherries or strawberries or something? So you are gazing at your bowl of cherries, and with some knowledge and experience you know to pick the ones that are darker and heavier looking because they are sweeter. You’re not a cherry expert, but you’ve heard the darker the berry, the sweeter the juice. (No, this isn’t the Porno Blog or the stripper blog; we’re talking food here.)

I’ve been doing this a long time, but I’m not a damn chili pepper whisperer. We deal primarily with Thai chilies and Serrano chilies at my restaurant. If you order spicy one to three, we will use sliced Serranos in your dish. Four to five gets only Thai chilies. If you want it even spicier, we’ll lay down some fresh Thai chilies and then finish the dish with dried Thai chili pepper flakes. Did you know that Prik ki nu or Thai chilies translates to “mouse-dropping chili?” Yes, they look like tiny little mouse shits! Well, they do in Thailand anyway. They are Mc-super sized here.

A lot of people ask, are green chilies spicier than red? This is an age-old debate and I’ve heard it answered both ways. In my personal experience, there is not much difference in color, but usually the smaller the chili pepper, the spicier it will be. It almost doesn’t make sense to try to rank the level of heat from 1-5 or 1-10. I’ve often thought just to change the scale to 1-3. 1 is mild, 2 is medium and 3 is spicy. Trying to spread the spectrum out to five is wonky, but not as wonky as trying to figure out the differences from 1 to 10. I often think ordering a 3 or a 7 is funky, and the cooks are laughing in the kitchen trying to figure out if they should add that extra chili seed to make it exactly a 7 or 8.
Heat depends on too many variables; maybe the dude or lady cooking your food is light- or heavy-handed. May they had a shitty day and are taking their frustration out on your poor, unsuspecting taste buds. Maybe they decide to make every dish a fuego just to mess with you. Or maybe the chills in this lot are just not that spicy. At the end of the day, your spicy level is a dynamic dance that we have to dance daily, not an exact science.

So let’s abandon the numbers altogether. The new Wazuzu scale will be:

A. I’m a weakling don’t hurt me.

B. I like some burn with my chow.

C. I want to feel the burn but taste the food a little.

D. I’ve been to Thailand and want my head to sweat.

E. I want it to burn going in and coming out!

Oh shit, I’m back to 1-5! Doh!

Originally published at LasVegasWeekly.com

Chef Endo's mysterious corn potato

Let’s go back a year and a half, pre-buzz, before the “all the chefs eat here, so you have to go” word had hit the street. After I got the offer to head up Wazuzu at Encore, I found one of the best sushi chefs I’ve ever worked with and asked him to help with our sushi program. So Matsu (aka Masaru Matsuura) comes on board and, in traditional manner, takes me out to dinner at his favorite Japanese resto-pub or izakaya, in Japanese. It was there I had my first spiritual culinary experience in Las Vegas.

Most izakaya joints basically want you to buy booze and give you some salty eats so you continue to buy and consume booze. But Raku’s Chef Endo is a motherfucking artist! You taste and feel every ounce of the love and attention he puts into his dishes.

Raku, located in a non-descript strip mall on Spring Mountain Road, is not an easy place to navigate for the noob or even the new breed of Chow-Yelping wannabe pros I chewed out in my last post. Every time I’m there, the table next to me is full of people that have no idea what to order. I’m here to help. Eating at any interesting restaurant is like a new relationship, not a one-night stand. You have to go back at least two or three times to really start to get it. But in the interest of speeding up the process just a little, here’s your first-timer’s guide to Raku:

It’s good to understand a little about Japanese food culture before going into Raku or any Japanese restaurant. In France, foods are broken down into stations, like sauté, fish, saucier and garnish. The Japanese break food down a little differently, by preparation. Main categories are nimono, simmered foods with sauces and soups; yakitori, wood-grilled skewered items that are marinated or basted while grilled (this can also be called robata, which is literally “the wood grill”); and agemono, deep-fried foods. There also always is a sashimi item on special at Raku, and the Japanese eat seasonally, so look to the specials board and try to eat there as the seasons change.

On to specifics. First, make a reso! There are only about 20-30 seats inside this tiny restaurant, and it is jammed almost every night, so definitely call ahead. However, space shouldn’t be a problem for long. The Raku team has taken over the adjoining space in its Spring Mountain Road strip mall and currently is preparing to double the restaurant’s capacity. According to the folks at Raku, the new space should open around the beginning of February.

Once inside, order some sake or treat yourself to a sake flight. If you are a noob, don’t commit to a large-format bottle. This is your chance to taste around the amazing sake selection. Raku always has a selection of great 300ml (small bottle) microbrew sakes. On a recent visit, they poured me a sake “Riesling,” a fun little floral number to start the evening, and as the food got more serious, so did the sake. Raku also offers flights that consist of chef’s selections, and all the servers know their stuff, so when in doubt, ask!

Next, check out the specials on the cute chalkboard that gets presented to each and every table. Pick two or three things on it, then order some staples off the regular menu. Remember, if it’s your first time, you’ll be back; don’t overdo it on the specials this time. But, if you see any of the following on chalkboard, jump on them: sea urchin udon, bluefin tuna or pork belly.

Art takes time, so bring some good company. Dishes come out as they are ready, and Raku doesn’t have a giant kitchen. Patience is a virtue, and it’s wise to order in clusters.

It’s also not a bad idea to hit Raku on the early side, so the specials will still be in stock. Chef Endo is a true artist; he’ll procure only the best seasonal ingredients and make only as many items as he and his team feel is appropriate. Once it’s gone, sayonara suckers! I think the perfect time to eat (not party) is about 7-8 p.m. Raku stays open until 3 a.m., so it’s a great late-night spot, but for the foodie experience, earlier is better.

On to the must eats! These are my usual dishes, and I’ll weave in some specials or things I haven’t tried around them.

Fresh tofu: Fresh homemade tofu is very hard to come by and Raku’s is some of the best I’ve ever had. There can be something bland and boring about tofu, but the fresh stuff at Raku is amazing. The texture is like burrata cheese, smooth and creamy with a mildly sweet flavor that will remind you of sweet cream. The tofu is served with grated ginger, fine chopped scallions and shaved bonito. Make sure to top the tofu with a little of each and drizzle just enough soy sauce to coax out all the flavors. Like gnocchi, don’t chew the tofu bites. Instead, use your tongue to spread all the flavors around your palette and savor it all.

Agedashi tofu: Endo lightly starches the fresh tofu above and gently fries it. The fried tofu is then bathed in his velvety dashi broth. Dashi basically is bonito stock, but Raku’s version is out of this world. More like a fine French reduction sauce than a stock, it has the depth of flavor of veal glace. He adds a smear of Korean pepper paste as a counterpoint to cut through the umami, but it doesn’t really need it. To find deeper layers of umami, Endo tops the dish with salmon eggs, Nameko mushrooms (butterscotch mushrooms) and fine seaweed.

One of the great culinary mysteries in this town is the corn potato. Most would never order this benign-sounding dish, but they’ be missing out. This comes to the table looking like a grilled cross section of corn on the cob. You pick it up, sink your teeth into it and the cob part is actually mashed potato! Now, you start to freak out a little and wonder how he gets the kernels around the potato so perfectly … well, if you’re a chef you do, at least.

The bluefin tuna sashimi at Raku is the best I’ve tasted in Las Vegas! A lot of tuna has that slight freezer taste to it, but Raku’s is served at the perfect temp, and is smooth and creamy with a sweetness that tastes like your best day on the sea. Sashimi tip: don’t make a wasabi/soy swimming pool. Take a little wasabi and dab it on a corner of the fish, then use your chopstick to dip only a corner into the soy, and savor. Never drown your fish in soy, and never pour more soy than needed into the soy saucer.

For the slightly more adventurous, try the beef tendon. They braise the tendon in dashi (my guess) until it literally is falling apart and then grill it over charcoal basted in the glaze. Totally ridiculous!!! Like many cultures, they’ve taken a piece of meat that you usually would leave for the pets and made it into a super luxurious treat that rivals the Kobe beefs served on the Strip!

Speaking of Kobe beef, Raku has that, too. The Kobe beef skewers with wasabi are a safe choice for less adventurous diners.
Now, you’re armed with the foodie ammo to prepare you to enjoy Raku thoroughly. Remember to order the dishes above and weave in a few specials from the board. Other notable dishes are the blue-crab miso soup, fried whole ice fish, uni seaweed salad, crispy asparagus and cold green-tea soba noodles.

Many people speak of Las Vegas as a culinary Mecca and plenty of big-name chefs have places here to sample. Admittedly, a lot of these Strip destinations don’t always deliver the goods, but we are very fortunate to live here and have Raku in our backyard. This is true a Vegas destination restaurant. So start building your relationship with Raku. Each time you visit you’ll discover some new culinary gems.

Last Tip: Check out the restroom before departing. I’m gonna leave this a mystery and not spoil it, but it’s a cool experience!

Originally published at LasVegasWeekly.com