Jordan Kahn
By Leslee Komaiko
For dineLA.com
Jordan Kahn, chef and partner at Red Medicine, which opened on the edge of Beverly Hills late last year, has worked with some of the most celebrated chefs in the country. They include Thomas Keller, Grant Achatz and most recently, Michael Mina. But in December, Kahn was launched into the limelight not for his food, but because when Los Angeles Times’ restaurant critic S. Irene Virbila came to dine at Red Medicine, her picture was snapped and she was asked to leave. We talked to Kahn about this (though we gather he would like the world to move on), how he got on the pastry track and where to go for cheap, delicious Thai food among other things.
I wanted to discuss the S. Irene Virbila incident. People were very polarized in their reactions.
Our reasons are reasons we believe in and not meant to be a stunt or act of publicity. It was meant to be just for ourselves. We want to succeed or fail based on our own merit as a restaurant.
Presumably this was something you and your partners discussed in advance?
Yes. Noah [Ellis, managing partner of Red Medicine] approached me during service one night and said, "I think Irene is here. What would you like to do?" [I said] "Honestly, I don't really want to serve her." That was pretty much it. Then the media got hold of it and turned it into this whirlwind. There were writers writing about it based on the stories of other publications.
Do you think it has affected business?
It's impossible to say because it happened so soon after we opened and it was also during the holiday season. We are getting busier and busier.
Any regrets?
No.
Do you worry that you are going to be known for a long time as the chef who outed S. Irene Virbila?
You are the first person who has mentioned this to me in a month or longer so I’m pretty sure people have forgotten about it. More important things are going on in the world right now. Any chef that has ever worked with me or knows me, even if they don’t like me, they’ll all tell you the same thing: I am extremely focused and serious about what I do. This is not something I do to get wealth or fame. I do this for me. It consumes every part of my life.
And just to be clear, the reason you did what you did was because you felt S. Irene Virbila had been unnecessarily harsh in a review she did of XIV?
She was unnecessarily cruel to me personally, yes, but she has also been unnecessarily cruel to a lot of other chefs who I know and I know them to be extremely talented, driven, and hard working.
Okay. Let’s move on. You mentioned focus. Even as a teenager it sounds like you were incredibly focused, attending culinary school at 16. Do you remember when you first started getting excited about food?
I do actually. I was probably four. Mi abuela used to cook dinner three nights a week for us. She is hands down the best Cuban cook in the world. And I’ve eaten at what is considered the best restaurant in Calle Ocho in Miami. Also, my father, when I was really young, started growing herbs in the backyard. His mom was from Sicily. One of the first memories of food I have is of helping him pick through pounds of basil to make pesto. To this day the smell of basil is nostalgic. It transports me.
When did you decide to go the pastry route? Or was it more happenstance?
Happenstance. I graduated high school early and went to culinary school. While I was there, I got a job working in one of the top restaurants in Charleston. They didn’t have a position in savory, but they did have a position in pastry. I said, “I’ll take it.” The pastry chef was a certified master pastry chef. This guy had some serious skills. You could set up twenty 10-inch genoise cakes. He could cut them each into 32 lateral slices in three minutes. Some things he was ridiculous on. I learned a lot about basic pastry: how to make curds, how to bake custard more properly. When I went to work at The French Laundry I was in savory. They had a stage position. When my three month stage was up I asked about a position and the only position they had was pastry. I was like, “Ah. Second time in a row. There must be something to this.”
Do you ever miss the quiet of pastry?
We run the whole kitchen that way. It’s very quiet. The only one who speaks is my sous chef Ari who expedites. There’s not a lot of clanging, not a lot of noise. All I do all night is plate. I’m not on the line cooking.
Is that an unusual way for a kitchen to operate?
It’s less common. But it does exist. It’s how we executed at Alinea. Our kitchen is much smaller. I’m literally facing my cooks. I don’t need to yell. I can literally whisper and they can hear me.
When I saw that there was a manifesto on the Red Medicine website, I thought, oh surely here comes some attitude. But it is actually very humble and talks to the reader about, for example, how their own mother’s bun cha is surely superior to the Red Medicine version.
I wrote that. I really like it here. But more than any other city, people here are hyper critical. A lot of it has to do with everyone here blogs or Yelps or writes comments on blogs. I’m thinking to myself, if you think you’re coming to a Vietnamese restaurant and have what we call a spring roll and you’re Vietnamese or you’ve been eating at this spot in Westminster your whole life-- So I wanted to give people a sense that we don’t think we know how to make it better than other people. We’re inspired by it.
I go twice a week to Laurel Canyon and Silverlake and we forage for wild herbs and flowers. You’ll see nasturtium and coriander. Our food really speaks to that. It’s meant to be very earthy and our aesthetic plans on being very organic. Our plates will look like part of the land where the flowers are from. We use a lot of direct influence from our surroundings.
One thing I’ve found compelling about Los Angeles is how beautiful it is. No one talks about the fact that there are wild flowers and herbs growing everywhere. In spite of the fact there is so much beating it down, mother nature prevails here. That made a big impact on our cuisine.
Vietnamese cuisine is very light but has a lot of femininity to it and the flavors are very punchy. We wanted to keep that spirit. Our flavors are very bold. In the same dish you’ll have super acidic, super salty, super sweet. Also we do play on some French because of the French influence in Vietnam and because I worked in French restaurants.
Had you cooked Vietnamese much prior to the Red Medicine gig?
I did at home but not professionally. I don’t think of our food as Vietnamese. We use some flavors and borrow some techniques. I‘m very happy with the way our food has turned out and it’s because I have not cooked it professionally in a Vietnamese kitchen. It’s what makes it unique.
Do you still go out to eat Vietnamese?
I have not left the restaurant in a very long time. When I do I would love it. I’m usually there at 9 a.m. and I leave at 5 a.m.
Sorry. I’m going to be your mother here. But is that healthy? Doesn’t a guy need a break?
At some point. But right now I’m doing okay. I have a really great support staff.
That helps propel me.
Tell me something you absolutely love to cook with, whether an ingredient or tool.
That’s tricky. Everything is important. I’ll tell you about an herb that I had never had before and a lot of Vietnamese people would make fun of me. I know it as fish leaf. It’s literally an herb that smells and tastes like fish. It’s pungent and very strange.
Is it good?
I think it’s terrible. I ate a bunch of it and tried to put it with a bunch of stuff. It’s really neat. But it doesn’t smell or taste like good fish.
What are your favorite places to grab a bite?
I have places I used to go before we opened the restaurant. I don’t think I’ve eaten an actual [restaurant] meal in three months. Before that, a spot I really like is a Thai restaurant called Hoy-ka on Hollywood just east of Western. It used to be called Ord Noodle but they changed the name. You cannot spend money at this place. You can literally order the whole menu. They have crispy pork ka prao you have to order with fried eggs. It doesn’t say anything about fried eggs on the menu. It’s one of the greatest dishes ever.
The best tacos I’ve had outside Mexico City are on Third near Normandie from the taco Truck La Tehuana. They’re only there for a couple hours every night. All the salsas are made in a molcajete, the tortillas made a mano.
And for fancy? Do you ever do that?
No. Never. I’m poor. We don’t have money for fancy. My cooks make more than I do.
8400 Wilshire Boulevard, Beverly Hills, 323.651.5500, www.redmedicinela.com
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