Chef Danny Grant is so cool. He is the youngest Chicago chef to receive two Michelin stars for the Chicago restaurant, RIA, he serves his delectable seafood tower at Maple & Ash {8 West Maple Street, Chicago; 312.944.8888} with a “pasta-back,” and his current chef’s tasting meal is listed on the menu as the “I DON’T GIVE A F*@K.” We recently chatted with Grant to discuss seafood at a steakhouse, cooking with balance, and what he sees as the next big trend in food.
Photo via Maple & Ash
DiningOut: Congratulations—you were the youngest Chicago chef ever to receive two Michelin stars, along with a perfect four-star review from the Chicago Tribune. Did this create added pressure? How did it affect you?
Chef Grant: We were quite frankly surprised because we were such a young restaurant, just trying to prove we’re cooking good food and caring about the product. It was a restaurant and a place where people just weren’t cooking like that in Chicago. There was the high-end molecular stuff and then the rustic, more casual stuff and we were in an area of the market that people were excited about. What it did for me and the team was give us a set of standards and we didn’t want to disappoint people. If we had no awards or raves reviews, people would come in with an open mind and lower expectations, but once one starts getting those accolades people come in with higher expectations. Our job was not only to deliver and meet those expectations, but blow them out of the water. That’s always our goal: for people to come in with expectations and we blow them away.
Photo via Maple & Ash
You’re a Long Island guy. Tell us a little bit about your path from New York to Arizona, then Chicago, France, and back to Chicago?
When I was younger, I was always working in a kitchen. I did a little bit of traveling and was in Scottsdale for a while. I would take some time off and stage as much as possible. Then I moved to Chicago, but every January the restaurant I was working at, North Pond, would close so I’d take that time to travel, go to France, set up and work in kitchens wherever I could. Then I settled down in Chicago for a little longer, did Balsan and RIA, and wound up in Miami for two years which was a great learning experience and a lot of fun. I learned how to fight for guests, how to put chef ego aside and give people what they want, which was a great experience to bring back to Chicago and Maple & Ash. All of those things worked together to get me to where I am now.
Photo via Maple & Ash
Your training is classic French. What are some of your favorite French dishes and how did it inspire the menu at Maple & Ash?
More than anything it’s using the style of cooking, the training, and the foundation in my mind/heart to create new dishes. The beautiful thing is that we don’t need to explain the food to people—they get it. Here’s really good food—good product, we treat it with love, cook it over a wood fire, and hope you enjoy it. That’s where our mind was in creating Maple & Ash. We introduce fun little nuances, talent, and flavor. Recently, I had my stepbrother who has taken an interest in cooking cook for us. It tasted good, but there were 45 cloves of garlic in it! A dish needs to have balance. One of our most popular items that has people falling off their chairs is our House-made Agnolotti—beautiful house-made ricotta, mushrooms, and black truffles with a little lemon juice to balance it all out. It’s not a bunch of complex things. When all of those ingredients are assembled together with good balance, care, and love, you get something that’s really great.
Speaking of non-meat dishes at a steakhouse, tell me a bit about your seafood tower and what makes it special.
Almost every steakhouse and brasserie showcases a chilled seafood tower, but how much more delicious would it be if you roasted all of that great shellfish in a wood-fired oven with chili oil and garlic butter—no salt or anything—which just complements the flavor of each shellfish. Everybody that comes to our restaurant pretty much orders it and goes nuts for it. About a year ago in the wine cellar—some of our best brainstorms happen inside the wine cellar—I made a seafood tower for the somm and some servers. We just looked at all of the leftover juice; it’s a sin not to make something to sop it all up. Now we have a pasta-back on the menu so after you’re almost finished with the seafood tower, this beautiful handmade pasta comes out tableside and they dump it in the juices and it becomes the best pasta ever. That could be my whole meal: just give me that and a really good white Burgundy and I’m set.
Photo via Maple & Ash
Lots of restaurants offer a chef’s tasting menu, but most don’t call it the “I DON’T GIVE A F*@K.” Can you expand a bit?
I think the funny part about it is the “I don’t give a f*@k” part because it is actually the opposite. We give a ton of f*@ks. Sometimes a group of 6 to 8 people come in and it’s hard to get on the same page with ordering. Now they can say, ‘whatever you want to send me to eat, just send it, we don’t give a f*@k.’ So many restaurants make it about the servers or the spiel, but we want to make it about the company you are dining with. Cut loose, take your watch off, lean back, and have some fun.
What do you see as the next trend for Chicago dining?
It’s something I’m excited about that’s already happening, but it will start happening on a greater level: the idea of really good food being accessible for delivery, pickup and drive-through. We’re actually working on a concept that will focus on some of that.
Photo via Maple & Ash
By Erica Bethe Kane
The post In the Kitchen with Chef Grant of Maple & Ash appeared first on DiningOut Chicago.