When you think about French pastry, one of the most classic traditional pastries is the eclair. An eclair is like a blank canvas that can be easily adapted to any environment. Ingredients are the most important aspect of a perfect eclair, and they need to be used at their peak.
— Johnny Iuzzini
The inspiring thing is that people are often more experimental with their desserts than other courses. It allows me to be more creative and excite people.
I really loved traveling the U.S. and seeing regional differences within the same country and how the same ingredients are used in very different ways. I love how the 'old guard' of cuisine are still pioneering so much of the direction of food today.
I love biscuits. I have a real thing for a biscuits, and if it's not made right, I'm gonna come down hard on somebody.
You can tell a lot about your cooks' personalities by their music collection. I personally have such an eclectic collection, partly due to the combining of music libraries with girlfriends past.
I dislike cloyingly sweet desserts - sweet is not a flavor - so I suggest dialing back the sweetness and focusing on what the dessert is about, whether it is a ripe fruit, chocolate, etc.
I like the Rockabilly look. My background is half Italian, half French. I wear cowboy boots and jeans.
I have pictures of me feeding deer and possums with baby bottles. I am such an animal lover.
We never really know what people are capable of until the only person they can rely on is themselves.
As chefs, especially pastry chefs, your creativity plays such an important part in your daily work. We truly do have a blank canvas to work with every time we create a new dish.
If you would ask me some of the ingredients that people are surprised by that could appear on my menu are such things as bleu cheese, vegetables like parsnips and rutabaga, bacon, pork fat, fois gras, truffles, and olives.
I am not a shock jock pastry chef. I don't create desserts using strange ingredients just for the sake of doing so, like so many of my colleagues in the industry.
Chocolate is one of the backbones of the pastry kitchen. It is one of the most important ingredients in our pantry. It is very versatile, it is complex, and it is extremely temperamental.
Whenever a chef cooks for his own ego rather than his guests, he/she set themselves up for ridicule and failure. In the end, it's the service industry. Our goal is to make our guests happy through our cooking.
Everyone has a different impression of what they are eating; not everyone tastes the same things, and definitely, not everyone has the same food memories.
For me, some things, like, I just don't want to know what they are before I eat them. Like, if you're going to start feeding me, like, sexual organs of animals, or, like, a monkey's brain or something - I'll eat it. Just don't tell me what it is until after I've finished it.
Baking is about multi-tasking. If you are organized and prepared, that's half the battle.
Cooking is about imbibing different cultures and putting them in a plate on the table.
I have worked in kitchens since I was 15 years old and never had a break.
I see myself as half country boy and half city boy, so I need both to balance me out. I couldn't spend all of my time in either place.
If you take everything personally and to heart, it will tear you apart. Take criticism, learn, adjust, and move on.
Adding salt to desserts helps to balance and pronounce flavors. Almost all of my desserts have salt in them. They don't taste salty per se, but if I gave you two of the same item - one with salt and one without - side by side, you would realize something was missing.
First and foremost, food needs to be delicious. It should pop and explode with flavor. Food should please all the senses.
I'm very much half city and half country boy.
I played every sport in high school for one year. If I couldn't be great at it, I quit. I would rather not do it than be average.
Pastry school is great for a foundation and introducing you to basic techniques, but it is really up to the chefs to practice, practice, practice and refine their techniques.
It's funny, you know, growing up, you are always introduced to people as your uncle this or your aunt that or your cousin this. By the time I was in my 20s, I had no idea who I actually was or wasn't related to. It's kind of a running joke in the family.
Part of what makes a great chef is the ability to adapt, cook, and to taste. A great chef will use all their food knowledge, food memories, and senses to work with each ingredient and apply themselves to the dish they are creating.
The true mark of professionalism is the ability to respect everyone else for their styles and always find something positive in every dining experience and highlight it in your thoughts and words.
A savory chef must first master his knife skills and understand the basics of sauces and soups, etc., before he/she may move on to become a great chef. It is no different for pastry chefs. If you do not have a strong foundation and are a master of the basics, then you will never be that strong - you will never be a master of the trade - period.
As most people will tell you, the best pies have the best crusts. It has to be tender, flaky, and full of flavor. That is the key to a great pie.
Daniel Boulud told me at a young age, 'Whatever happens to you in your career, you're going to be great - be humble. Just be humble.' And I think about that daily. Like, whatever happens to me, whatever awards we win as a team or whatever else, just be humble.
When I was a kid, I would come home from school, and my mom would buy the industrial-size Famous Amos cookies or Chips Ahoy when I was lucky. And I would sit in front of the TV set with a glass of milk... and I would dump cookies in there, smash them with my spoon, and eat cookies and milk with a spoon watching 'The Dukes of Hazzard.'
TV has taken a crazy turn, especially in the industry of food, where everything is either a competition show or a sort of reality show. We've lost the kind of shows that are, like, 'Here's how you do this,' like the old Julia Child shows.
There are so many restaurants that cook for themselves and think they are different. But it is always about making your guest feel special.
There's always time to date.
As kids, my mom would always let us help bake, and if we behaved, we got to lick the beaters clean.
Just because you love to cook and you are good at in your home environment doesn't necessarily mean that you are cut out for competition. It is a different animal and requires you to approach cooking in a very different way.
I am classically trained in French pastry, but I am American and have a natural curiosity and playfulness that comes through in my cooking. I like to present flavors that people are familiar with in unique combinations and forms that may surprise them.
I prefer dark chocolate. I like French over Belgian... Valrhona is the best.
A pastry chef's lifespan in a restaurant is limited. You have to open a bakery or pastry shop. There's only so far you can go in a restaurant.
Everyone has days when things can go wrong. That doesn't make you a bad pastry chef - that makes you human.
Every few years, I change my look for the simple reason that I get bored. If you Google Image me, you will see so many different looks: long hair, short hair, clean shaven, beard, etc.
I was an amusement and water park fiend as a kid growing up. I loved them. My brothers and I would go whenever we could. We liked all the super steep/fast slides and flumes where you would get completely soaked. Our absolute favorite was the tubes, though.
I have been a fan of the Beastie Boys ever since I can remember. I have a ton of their music on my iPod and even still have a t-shirt from a show I saw when I was a kid.
Chocolate is the go-to ingredient for many people. It is the thing people crave when they are happy and celebrate; it is also the go-to ingredient for many people when we are sad or depressed. It makes us feel better.
I actually have a pig collection in my cabin: all types of old wood hand-carved pigs that my mom started for me as a housewarming gift.
I love pies of all types. I especially love rhubarb. I grew up with rhubarb growing on our property, and my mom would make rhubarb pies and jam. I have to admit, though, my earliest memories of rhubarb were not fond ones, but over time, I grew to love it.
If I can't do something and excel at it and do it well, I have a tendency to give up on it really easy.
Plain sugar cookies, no matter how well they are made, are a bit boring to me.
