5th Annual StarChefs.com International Chefs Congress Schedule

For UK Chef Tom Aikens cooking isn’t just a job, it’s a calling, a feeling of belonging, and a profession that challenges the mind, body, and soul. Aikens believes that food is extremely personal and is always evolving and changing. In this hands-on workshop, participants will have the opportunity to get up close and personal with this London culinary luminary. Aikens will work alongside attendees to create dishes using fresh, high quality ingredients like New Zealand King Salmon that showcase his belief in treating the ingredients—from preparation to plating—as naturally as possible.

As founder and chairman of Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises, restaurateur Richard Melman knows a thing or two about running a business. With over 80 restaurants around the world, 55 working partners, and 6,000 employees, Melman has developed a core set of beliefs that are at the heart of his success—namely, to train, develop, and keep happy those who work for him. Don’t miss this once in a lifetime opportunity to ask questions directly to an operations mastermind. Come prepared with specific questions from the nitty gritty daily grind to the philosophical.

From clandestine supper clubs to semi-permanent eateries, pop-ups have become the trend dujour for both diners and chefs. By co-opting unused or underutilized kitchens in loft spaces, cafes, museums, or other restaurants, pop-ups give chefs the opportunity to experiment and take risks without the prohibitive overhead that makes opening a brick and mortar space so challenging. Whether as an extra revenue stream, an artistic statement, or as a way to test out a new concept, pop-ups can be just the ticket for a chef in the red. Join pop-up veterans Joshua Skenes and Noriyukie Sugie in this business panel moderated by food authority Josh Ozersky to learn all the ins and outs of popping up. They will cover finding a space, successful marketing, going full time, and will offer other practical advice for anyone who has considered starting a pop-up.

It’s clear, odorless, tasteless, and it freezes foods at lightning speed. Liquid nitrogen is an undeniably fun kitchen toy—but more than that, it’s a useful tool for creating a slew of cool (pun intended), unusual textures. The extreme cold (-320°F, to be precise) means that the liquid freezes so quickly that ice crystals don’t have time to form—it also means that you have to use extreme care when playing with this potentially dangerous substance. Join Chef Bryan Voltaggio for this in-depth workshop on advanced techniques with liquid nitrogen. Voltaggio will use liquid nitrogen and the Irinox Blast Chiller to demonstrate a variety of applications for keeping it cool in your kitchen and making the most out of these tools.

This year’s New York Rising Stars award winners will come together to share their version of what works and what doesn’t—what they regret and what they’d do all over again—in a candid, informative, and often entertaining “How to Make It” chefs panel. The path of each chef is different and so are their destinations. But they all share ambition, an uncompromising palate, a defined sense of culinary identity, pride in their work, and a timely concept. In lieu of a clear roadmap to success, they’ll instead offer their humorous industry anecdotes, trying times, and passionate perspectives, leaving their audience inspired to get back to their kitchens and do what they do best: make it.

Boudin noir is a delicacy that reaches back more than 2000 years to a time-tested technique of transforming blood into food. Blood is a viable and renewable animal resource, and despite being a historical dish, boudin noir has become a modern symbol of today’s “waste not, want not” mantra of cooking. In this hands-on workshop, Chef Brad Farmerie will demonstrate a number of dishes from around the world that highlight blood, including boudin noir, black pudding, and Taiwanese blood rice cakes. Farmerie will explain why pig and venison blood are preferable to cow blood and will teach participants how to add blood to their arsenal of ingredients.

Whether pastry chefs practice an art or a craft, the goal remains the same: to offer an exceptional flavor and taste experience. In this dynamic presentation Pastry Chef Jimmy MacMillan will illustrate his belief that while both kinds of pastry are valid, an artistic dessert combines the familiar with the rare, to create a new, exciting experience. In order to do this, pastry chefs working in the artistic style must update their arsenal with innovative techniques and equipment that allow them to progress. MacMillan will utilize tools like the Bravo Executive, Vitamix blenders, and other high and low-tech toys to demonstrate how they can save chefs time while simultaneously allowing them to create a new cuisine.

Kaiseki is a style of Japanese cooking that expresses the kisetsu, or season. It brings nature to the plate and offers diners the gift of the season. In this dynamic, interactive demonstration, five chefs, who all trained at or were inspired by the seminal Japanese kaiseki restaurant Kitcho, will each offer their perspective on kaiseki and the components that make it one of the world’s most enduring and iconic cuisines. Their group presentation will cover the art and philosophy of kaiseki and the role of sushi, vegetables, and presentation according to varying interpretations.

Grand Del Mar Wine Director Jesse Rodriguez and Chef William Bradley work closely together to create a symbiotic relationship between the food and the wine at Addison. The relationship they’ve developed over the years of working together has made for an exceptional dining experience for their customers, and serves as a model for other chefs and sommeliers who want to take their food and wine programs to the next level. Bradley and Rodriguez will show off a few food and wine pairings and discuss their process, from training front- and back-of-the-house staff to bringing their collaboration to the guests.

Is cooking an art, a craft, or something in between? The keynote panel for this year’s StarChefs.com International Chefs Congress will feature four individuals who weigh in at all sides of the spectrum: Dan Barber (Blue Hill), Thomas Keller (The French Laundry), David Kinch (Manresa), and writer Michael Ruhlman (The Soul of a Chef). While they may see themselves at different places on that spectrum, they all agree that successful cooking is the result of creativity and the careful balance of art and craft. Cookbook author Michael Ruhlman will moderate the discussion with Dan Barber, Thomas Keller, and David Kinch on the role of creativity in the culinary arts and the ways in which art and craft come into play. The dialogue will touch on the related tensions in the industry and will strive to bring attendees to a common ground. The panel will conclude with a discussion about the future of creativity, art, and craft in cooking, followed by a question and answer session with the audience.

Instructors Dave Arnold and Nils Norén of The French Culinary Institute are constantly looking for new ways to incorporate advanced technology in the kitchen, but now they’re furthering their techno-reach to include the bar. In this hands-on workshop, the well-known distilling daredevils will share their experiments and exploits in their latest passion, mixology. Participants will explore new cocktail techniques like clarification, carbonation, rotary evaporation, and centrifugation. Topics from dilution and ice to shaking, stirring, and batching will be also covered and attendees will have the opportunity to play with all the latest culinary toys behind the bar.

Coming to the main stage from Down Under, Aussie Chef Dan Hunter will share the latest Australian culinary trends and address the aesthetic of nature and how this translates to what chefs put on the plate. A protégé of Andoni Luis Aduriz, Hunter will demonstrate some of the exciting techniques he has been focusing on for the last year and will show how his cuisine appears to be driven by produce but is inspired by technique. Hunter will talk about how the location of Royal Mail (three hours outside Melbourne) and the restaurant’s garden impacts his daily work from the creative aspect to the physical labor.

In this engaging multimedia hands-on workshop, Pastry Chef Jordan Kahn will draw parallels between art, the subconscious, and culinary inspiration. Kahn, known for his off-the-wall desserts, will explore surrealist techniques and illustrate how expressing the subconscious can be used by chefs, pastry chefs, and beyond. Don’t miss this opportunity to work side-by-side with Kahn as he illustrates his artistically-driven culinary philosophy.

Does chocolate taste better while lying in the park on freshly cut grass? Or can the smell of rain splashing on a hot highway in Arizona influence the way you feel about chocolate? After the presentation of self-described “shock-o-latier,” Pastry Chef Dominique Persoone and gastromical scientist Bernard Lahousse, pralines may never taste the same. Persoone and Lahousse’s presentation combines tastes, smells, and visuals into a multi-sensorial experience that will explore how emotions and memories affect the chocolate tasting experience. Persoone will also present some of his innovative chocolate creations like the Chocolate Shooter and Chocolate Lipstick. Come along, open the box, and be prepared to experience chocolate in a completely different way.

From the Caribbean islands to the isle of Manhattan, tiki drinks are undergoing an island revolution as mixologists look to dig up cocktails from Trader Vic’s and beyond. In this unusual and stimulating meeting of the minds, Painkiller Mixologists Richard Boccato and Guiseppe Gonzalez will combine forces with Jean Georges Pastry Chef Johnny Iuzzini to bring a culinary emphasis to classic cocktails. Together with participants they will apply Iuzzini’s modern cooking techniques—liquid nitrogen, carbonation, sous vide, and more—with Boccato and Gonzalez’s historical knowledge and mixology background for a fun, fresh take on tiki.

From lush and complex to bold and jammy, Syrahs offer some of the greatest expressions of terroir in the wine world. In this Syrah symposium, Master Sommelier Geoff Kruth will lead participants through a blind tasting of the many faces of Syrah with everything from geeky, small, cool climate California producers to Australia and New Zealand varieties. Attendees will be challenged to rethink their preconceptions and see where the Old World meets the New.

In the grand debate on art vs. craft, creativity does not have to mean abandoning tradition. Tradition—the connection to people and place—is what gives food its emotional power. And understanding old ways of transforming ingredients is essential to good cooking. But imagination and creativity are what give cuisine a distinctive voice. In this main stage presentation, Chef Daniel Patterson will focus on unusual dishes that balance old and new, combining modern cooking with traditional flavors and techniques. Some dishes will use familiar ingredients in new forms, while others will highlight ancient flavors with new techniques.

For UK Chef Tom Aikens cooking isn’t just a job, it’s a calling, a feeling of belonging, and a profession that challenges the mind, body, and soul. Aikens believes that food is extremely personal and is always evolving and changing. In this main stage presentation, Aikens will demonstrate a lamb dish that illustrates where he is in his own culinary evolution and that showcases his belief in treating the ingredients—from preparation to plating—as naturally as possible.

There’s nothing like a cold, dry martini that’s just the right balance between two ingredients. And the Gin Rickey is so simple but immensely satisfying and refreshing. But when done well these cocktails are great examples of how proper technique and ingredient choices can elevate a drink. In this workshop, Mixologist Derek Brown will demonstrate the philosophy of cocktails by subtraction and how supposedly simple classics can be the hardest to get right. He will also discuss cocktail writer David Embury’s theory of “Roll Your Own,” which explores a few basic formulas that all cocktails are derived from.

Chef Normand Laprise believes that food is nothing without the human aspect. It is a chef’s relationship with farmers and ingredients and the influence of the people making and eating the food that puts a stamp on each dish. Join this master of the Montreal culinary scene in a main stage presentation where he will illustrate the marriage of art and craft in his cooking. Laprise will demonstrate several dishes and show how the craft of cooking (which he sees as artisanal and traditional) informs the art (which he sees as avant garde and an evolution).