by Scott Haas
“I went to the CIA,” Danny told me, “and even though the Culinary Institute of America—I call it ‘Skills USA’—gave me a four-thousand-dollars-a-year scholarship, the fees still came to twenty-two thousand dollars per year, exclusive of room and board. I graduated without a job owing the bank seventy-six thousand dollars! I was so broke when I graduated that I worked for the food services at Boston University for two solid years! Here it is, nine years later; I’m a sous chef at Craigie? I’m still in massive debt!”
Tony had none of the problems that plague most young cooks. He had no college debt. He and investors shared the same vocabulary. He had gone to the same types of schools as his guests. He knew that most cooks would never become chefs, and that made him special.
“I’m a rock star,” he had told me.
Having been brought up without the social and financial insecurities of most cooks, he was able to cook what he liked to eat without worrying about how it fit into a recognizable cuisine.
As tempting as it might have been, though, he and his team could not say “It’s Mawsian,” or, “food without limits,” as this would lead to misunderstandings, some deeper than others, and empty tables.
How did Tony describe the food to guests and when he trained cooks on what they would be cooking?
Without a clear definition of what he does, what he is looking for, and how to achieve precisely the flavors in the food, he ran the risk of cooking ad hoc. The danger was that in failing to articulate what he was after, he could not teach his crew to cook his food consistently. That was often true, night after night, day after day, as I watched the cooks hand Tony tiny spoons or thimbles of food for him to taste. They often lacked the confidence to say they had achieved the desired results, but wasn’t their hesitancy a natural response to Tony’s inability to explain his cuisine to them? The constant tasting, the uncertainty of his cooks, and his routine frustration and anger with them seemed due to Tony’s failure to focus on defining his cuisine, but I wondered if it wasn’t something else entirely.
Tony had created a system in the restaurant in which all critical decisions in the kitchen had to go through him. Since the food was him, it was nearly impossible for a cook to re-create what Tony was after without his direct involvement. What he was after was unwritten. What he wanted in a broth on Tuesday night might not be the same in that broth on Wednesday night. How is a “boudin noir–hoisin sauce” supposed to taste? Did “ramp kimchee” benefit from more vinegar? More sugar? More salt? How do we know these things?
The only person who could answer all the questions was Tony Maws, which led to constant misunderstandings.
Tony knew that having an indefinable, ever-changing cuisine meant that conflicts were more likely to occur in comparison to a restaurant that served classic versions of Tuscan or Burgundian food. There the guidelines were obvious. Follow the centuries-old rules, guided by a good executive chef or chef de cuisine, and the cook was set. Night after night, there was little improvisation.
Tony was being creative, but what was the psychological explanation for what amounted to a rebellion against the rules and traditions of many generations of chefs before him?
Under Tony’s system, he was allowed to be angry at cooks who invariably misunderstood him. If he had chosen to have a paternalistic cuisine—specific to a region with clear standards for each dish as is true for all the best cuisines, the food of our fathers—he would be angry at cooks who misunderstood his food.
Anger in more traditional restaurants is directed at cooks who are slackers or incompetent, and not at cooks who, as was true at Craigie, constantly have to keep up with the chef’s whims. No wonder Tony’s tasting menus were called just that: “Chef’s Whims.”
I had never seen restaurant cooks more unsure of themselves than the crew I met at Craigie—constantly asking Tony if what they were cooking tasted right, or needed something else, or was done. It was not laziness or poor skills, but rather that they honestly did not know what he was trying to do because he could not explain it to them consistently.
I finally asked Tony, “How would you describe your food?”
“That’s a difficult question,” he said. “Creative French?”
“Oh, c’mon,” I said. “It’s not French.”
“All right, let me think about it,” he said.
He thought about it.
A fascinating thing about certain chefs is that being analytical interferes with cooking. Danny, for example, had told me, “There are two things I hate doing. The first is writing and the second is reading.”
However, not being analytical complicates the single most important requirement of being a chef: Teaching cooks to cook the food.
“How about: snout to tail, sustainable food prepared using French techniques and Asian as well as local ingredients from as many organic farms as possible,” Tony said.
“That pretty much covers everything,” I said.
“Yeah, I see that,” he said. He laughed. “Let’s ask my mother.”
I was charmed: Here was a top chef asking his mother what kind of food he cooks. Imagine if each of us could have the kind of relationship with our mother where we could call her up to ask: “Hey, Ma, what is it I do, again?”
“Tony’s food is refined rusticity, French in technique, but it includes Asian ingredients and local products, too,” said Marjorie. “He’s all about sustainability.”
That did not sound very appetizing. I also did not understand what she meant by Asia: Vietnam? China? India? Japan? Korea? Thailand? As for sustainability, the word, like organic, does not hold the same meaning for each person using it. When you consider that the world’s largest sustainable grocer is Walmart, you realize the word could signify almost anything.
Oh, well, I thought, how about, “really delicious,” and suggested to Marjorie that we meet for coffee to talk about her son. We set a date.
Then it hit me:
Tony could not explain his food because he did not know what it was either! That was why he asked his mother. And since his food is so personal, his menu was the culinary equivalent of a teenager saying, I don’t know who I am!
If Tony did not know what to call his food, and if his mother did not either, could his staff tell me?
I asked front-of-the-house servers and hostesses as well as cooks and sous chefs what they were serving and cooking.
I began at the bar.
John Mayer, Texas born, looking so clean it appeared that he just stepped out of the shower, and with the magnetic smile of a broker, had ambitions to work as a youth minister, but until that happened he was serving drinks. He enjoyed the contrast between helping kids choose Christ’s path and making cocktails.
“It’s not as much of a paradox as you might think,” John said. “I was brought up Episcopalian. We like to drink. Jesus turned water into wine, didn’t he?”
This tension between two very different ways of life added to the general fun at Craigie. John was not the only one working at Craigie who did not know what he wanted to do in five years’ time. His solution to the conflict was an imaginative and youthful way to embrace contradictions. Soon enough he would have to choose: Working in a restaurant was a way to delay having to make the decisions associated with becoming an adult.
“Let’s go crazy,” sang Prince as John, Sally, and Ted worked at top speed to prepare the bar for service that night. Hands in constant motion, focus on the external: arranging glasses; stacking menus; slicing oranges, limes, and lemons.
“How would I describe the food at Craigie?” John asked rhetorically as he poured simple syrup from a jar into a bowl of sage and juniper. The aroma was intoxicating.
“It is French inspired,” he said, “eclectic, rustic with emphasis on organic, local ingredients whenever possible with incredible meat and fish.”
“That does sound good,” I said.
“It’s Tony’s food,” John said, “but heavily influenced by many traditions—Japanese, Middle Eastern, a
nd American.”
Prince sang, “Let’s go crazy, let’s get nuts, let’s look for the purple banana, till they put us in the truck, let’s go!”
“The food here,” John continued, “can be very refined or it can be roll-up-your-sleeves cuisine.”
As John spoke, his love for the food could be detected in the increased speed of his speech and the brightening of color in his face. Food was more than a way to sustain himself; it was spiritual.
“The last time I ate here,” John said, “I had the pig’s tails. Ate with my hands!”
“With your hands?” I asked.
“You bet! That’s how they’re supposed to be eaten,” John said. He began to drawl. “And I shared the pig’s head with a friend. You know what he called the food?”
“What?” I asked.
“Bad-ass food!” John said.
Sally came over. I had tried to engage her many times before, but she had always been shy and reluctant to express her ideas. She did not think that what she had to say was important, which may seem strange for someone who has to face a row of talkative customers, but having a well-defined role as a bartender, with a limited and repetitive script, was liberating. She could feign communication.
“His food is fine rusticity,” Sally said, and then returned quickly to her chores.
“Uniquely Tony Maws,” said Ted.
I pictured the three bartenders pitching these explanations to customers or guests seated on stools at the bar, newcomers flipping over the paper menus, printed daily, who were trying to figure out what was going on. The menu contained familiar choices—tuna, clams, bass, burgers, and chicken—but it had just as many strange terms. Terms that even for someone who writes about food serve as barriers to understanding: squid ink anchoïade, nuoc cham, purslane, sauce vert. In what sense are these words a reflection of a philosophy of cooking? Why are they all on the same menu? What chef is an expert at preparing this range of complex ingredients used in various cuisines? What do they mean?
It is fine if you are seated, hungry, and willing to try new things, but what happens to people who have never been to Craigie on Main?
The initial point of contact is the person who answers the phone: a general manager, host, or hostess. How do they describe the food to first-time callers who have heard or read about the restaurant?
“I tell them it’s very adventurous, fun, and fresh food with a French background to it!” said Julia. She looked as young as a kid in high school: long tresses, the smile of a cheerleader, the wholesome looks of a girl next door. Julia was new, having replaced Kim, who decided to take a two-month road trip west with her girlfriend before returning to Boston to look for a new job. “I tell them it’s influenced by Asian and Mediterranean cuisines, too? My dad? He eats out a lot? He loves the food here!”
The lack of specificity in all the answers provided by staff was puzzling. Did their amorphous descriptions of Craigie’s food show that they misunderstood what Tony had taught them about his kitchen? By saying that the food was all things, or most things, they were not saying anything. Unless…
Unless the staff meant that Tony was some kind of culinary genius who could use a startling array of ingredients to evoke deeper tastes than ever before! That he was not confined to a formal tradition. There were right ways and wrong ways of doing things at Craigie on Main, but not according to Escoffier. It was the world according to Tony!
Julia kept smiling. She was genial and confident. Like the other hostesses, she was a diva. Always on. The effort looked exhausting.
“People call in to ask about the tasting menus,” said Julia, “I tell them that we want to cater to what people like. You don’t like raw fish? Fine, tell us what you do like. You love mushrooms? We can do that! It’s fun. Anyway? I think that the fun of pleasing people with great food is more important than the style of cuisine.”
“Look, all chefs are baddies,” she said, and laughed. “And that’s great!”
I turned to the cooks to find out more.
Danny, as usual, was a whirligig. His jacket unbuttoned, the U of his wife-beater exposed, he was scrubbing down the huge stovetop, stirring a pot of chicken stock, and screaming at Bobby, “It’s not rocket science, get the fuck ready!”
Danny looked up from his chores and then back down again.
“We cook good food here,” Danny said calmly, leaning into the stove, putting his whole body into each scrub. “We have no boundaries—we’re not afraid to use ingredients from anywhere.”
“Taste this,” said Tony, appearing at my side, handing me a spoon with a blue-white dollop on it.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Jeez,” he said, “just fucking taste it!”
“Wow,” I said. Creamy, salty, sweet. Great consistency, too. “What is that?”
“Blue cheese dressing,” Tony said proudly. “Kind of a culinary joke for a chef, a friend, who’s coming in tonight for his birthday with eleven friends. The world’s most expensive blue cheese dressing: It’s made with St. Aubin cheese at twenty-four dollars a pound.”
“Uniquely Tony Maws,” said Danny, echoing Ted. Some kind of mantra, I guessed.
“Wow,” I said again.
“Have some more,” said Tony.
I did.
“Look,” said Tony, “we don’t have a tradition. All of us come from different places.”
“And your food reflects that cultural diversity?” I asked.
“It helps me to be prolific,” he said. “I’m interested in consistency, but I don’t want to get bored either. It’s like, ‘What, I have to make the corn soup again?’ When cooks come to work for me at Craigie, it’s never easy, but it’s never dull. Like our tasting menus which change all the time. Keeps us sharp.”
It was now 5:30; the front door had been unlocked and dinner service could begin.
“Let ’em in,” said Marjorie, “let ’em in!”
Nearly a dozen people stepped inside, out of the rain, looking like kids at a middle school dance: in awe, a little shy, excited about the night ahead, and hopeful. Stamping, shaking off the rain, folding umbrellas, wiping eyeglasses clear of condensation, accepting cloth napkins to dry their hair.
“Look,” whispered one guy to his date, “there he is. That’s Tony Maws! The chef.”
The guest and his companion beamed, straightened up, made a slight wave at waist level to Tony, and averted their eyes from him as Julia led them to their table.
I stayed in the kitchen at the pass, watching the cooks start work on the first orders coming in.
Matt was shouting an order to Timmy, whose long, cursive tat, Fire in the Night Forever, stood out on his right forearm:
“Hey, put that pan on the heat! Five orders of bacon all day!”
Then Matt said to Kyle and Carl: “Pigtails in thirty seconds!”
“Pigtails,” said Kyle and Carl.
“We are walking that now,” said Matt.
“We’re playing the clam against the tail,” said Dakota.
“Let’s play the squash in one minute,” said Matt.
“Squash,” said Dakota, “one minute.”
“Two sixes, all in, funky stuff,” said Matt.
All the cooks said back: “Two sixes, funky stuff!”
“Let’s get ready on four thirty-one four,” said Tony.
“Let’s get ready on four thirty-one four,” said Matt.
“James, I’m giving you a dorade in thirty seconds,” said Tony.
“Thank you,” said James.
James did not seem to respond to what was going on around him but instead, showing no emotion, went about the work robotically.
I elbowed my way behind the two line cooks at the meat station until I reached Matt, who was supervising the grill.
“What kind of food do we cook here? Is that what you’re asking me?” Matt said. He had a pair of tongs in his left hand that he used to turn the sizzling burgers. The fat in the butter and the delicious aroma of the beef capt
ivated me. “It’s really locally, seasonally inspired. There are not many rules. It’s French inspired.”
He flipped the burgers. The beef had been cooked sous vide, at low temperature, for over an hour, and then put on the grill to get a good crust. The burgers would be finished under the blue, coiled flames of a blazing hot salamander so that the Vermont cheddar melted into the meat.
“We also get to work with cool equipment and use beautiful products,” Matt said. “The best fish, the best beef, the best chicken!”
As the tickets flew in, the frenzy increased until it achieved a rhythm. The cooks were in a place different from the rest of us: not exactly a trance, but close to it. They worked as an ensemble, and it reminded me enormously of watching jazz musicians play. What kind of music or food was being created mattered less than the wondrous performance itself. All of them, as Tony had noted, came from different places, but here, in his kitchen, they were in the same place, moving as if they were connected to one another, anticipating reactions, helping out, establishing reliable, nonverbal ways of communication. It was flat-out beautiful, very different from the chaos out on the streets, or the spite and disagreements that characterize family life at times.
The relationship of the cooks to the food was hindered by Tony’s inability to explain what he was after in his cooking, but being a key member of a functional group of people helped to compensate for that.
These were nights they would, I believed, always remember, as their first youthful experiences of a selfless profession. Give it a name, define it, establish rules: All of it would for certain make their lives easier, but until that happened, they had, at least, the comfort of going through a powerful experience together.
“Two octo all day, one pork,” Danny shouted to Bobby. “Bobby! Two octo all day, one pork. Two octo all day, one pork! Bobby!”
