For married chefs Ward and Walsh, travel is the single greatest source of culinary inspiration. And Oringer is the now-international restaurateur who helped them stamp their passports.
“Ken is so well-traveled, and he taught us to use the money we have to get as far away from Boston as often as we can, because there’s a whole universe of flavors to discover,” Ward says. Oringer originally hired the twosome to open Earth in Kennebunkport; later, Ward joined his kitchen at Coppa and Walsh at his former flagship Clio.
Last year, the spouses opened their first venture, Tapestry, an eclectic Fenway eatery serving myriad cuisines inspired by the spouses’ globe-trotting—much done with Oringer by their side. They’ve built tasty memories sampling street foods from Bangkok to Istanbul.
“Growing up, I didn’t really travel. Starting out as a cook making five dollars an hour, it was impossible,” says Oringer, whose name now travels far. Toro, his South End-founded tapas venture with chef Jamie Bissonnette, added locations in NYC and Bangkok, with a Dubai location opening imminently and more on the way. He’s always encouraged his team to travel and experience “the back alley spots that don’t have Michelin stars” but shine with passion and authenticity.
Of course, their travels aren’t always just for research. Last month, Ward, Walsh, Oringer and his wife Celine took their third couples’ vacation to Tulum, where Ward and Walsh had their 2015 wedding at Hartwood, a hot restaurant from married NYC expats. Oringer’s children served as the ring bearer and flower girl. These families cooked up quite a bond.
Perfect Pairings
By Scott Kearnan | Photo Credit: Holly Rike | Feb. 10, 2017
The restaurant industry is filled with cutthroat competitors. But Boston’s scene also boasts great camaraderie, and most chefs can name at least one industry predecessor whose mentorship made a profound impact. We asked some of the city’s young hotshots to share a veteran chef whose guidance has helped them grow inside and outside the kitchen.
Tom Berry & Juan Pedrosa
Back when Pedrosa met Berry, the former was “mad at the world,” a 17-year-old with a chip on his shoulder from tough times growing up. But Berry, an established vet who was judging Pedrosa in a cooking competition sponsored by C-CAP, a culinary scholarship program for inner-city youth, recognized the fiery young gun as a burgeoning talent—and a kindred spirit.
“When I was his age, both my parents died around the same time,” says Berry, who built his early reputation as Ming Tsai’s right-hand man. “It has always been tough not having that kind of support system: those people you know you can fall back on.”
Thus began the brother-like dynamic that gives both chefs someone to lean on. Pedrosa followed Berry from Cambridge’s Temple Bar to Nantucket, where he helped the older chef open Great Harbor Yacht Club. Now they’re teamed at Yvonne’s, a stylish supper club and one of Boston’s buzziest hotspots. A matured, mellowed Pedrosa does marvelous stuff as executive chef (The Improper deemed Yvonne’s Boston’s best new restaurant last year). He also lends support to Berry’s work as culinary director for the restaurant and its sibling spots, Back Bay’s Lolita Cocina and downtown’s just-opened Peruvian-Asian entry Ruka.
But their fraternal bond goes beyond the kitchen. Together they hit up Metallica concerts and visited Pedrosa’s grandmother in the Puerto Rican mountains, and they’re planning a Texas motorcycle trip. “Tom helped me find a place where I could grow as an individual,” Pedrosa says. “It took a lot of breaking down—and a lot of rebuilding.”
By Scott Kearnan | Photo Credit: Holly Rike
Andy Husbands & Kate Holowchik
When it comes to killer combos, sweet and salty is a tough pair to beat.
Take Holowchik and Husbands. She’s a wunderkind dessert wizard, currently doling out confections at the Townshend in Quincy, with a reputation as sugary-sweet as the creative treats (from boozy Fernet bonbons to popcorn ice cream) that place her among the area’s most popular young pastry chefs. He’s the tatted barbecue expert behind Cambridge’s the Smoke Shop and South End stalwart Tremont 647, a straight-shooting toque who unflinchingly withstood the tongue lashings of Gordon Ramsay on Hell’s Kitchen.
Yet Holowchik credits Husbands’ firm-yet-familial style with preparing her for success in the industry. “He’s been my Boston dad,” says New Hampshire transplant Holowchik, who received her “first real pastry job” in Boston at 647. She says Husbands offered the creative freedom that sparked her now-signature playful style, but tempered his latitude with tough-but-fair critique that egged her on to improve—not unlike Holowchik’s actual father, an ex-military man.
“He never candy-coated anything,” Holowchik says. “He was always firm. He’d occasionally yell. But he was always supportive with the best intentions.”
Whenever Holowchik was between jobs, Husbands held open the door at 647, where she’s cycled through three times. He’s watched out for her career, nurtured her creativity and helped her manage anxiety stirred by less-savory bosses.
She, in turn, helped soften some of his harder edges. “Kate has a focus and intensity, but she’s also just smiley and goofy. She brings levity,” Husbands says. “I’ve just offered little nudges. To be a chef is to be a teacher.”
By Scott Kearnan | Photo Credit: Holly Rike
Jason Bond & Josh Lewin
Without Jason, Josh wouldn’t have Juliet.
In 2010, when Josh Lewin took a gig as Jason Bond’s sous-chef at Beacon Hill Hotel & Bistro, he was fresh from military service and doing a lot of “soul searching” about his future. Lewin had spent much of his life in the food industry, but 80-hour workweeks in other people’s kitchens were stifling the creativity and self-expression that attracted him to cooking. “I wasn’t sure these careers were healthy and viable,” Lewin says.
Bond presented him a different path. Field trips together to local farms underscored the older chef’s personal engagement with his culinary craft, and his secondary artistic passion—Bond is also a trained classical musician—showed Lewin there could be a life outside the kitchen. When Bond opened Bondir, his acclaimed, intimate Cambridge restaurant, he offered motivation and guidance from afar that helped Lewin fill his shoes at the bistro. And when Lewin and partner Katrina Jazayeri launched Juliet, their chef-driven European-style cafe in Somerville, Bond offered encouragement and commiseration while Lewin navigated the daunting waters of starting a self-owned biz.
Paying it forward, Lewin has emerged as a vocal advocate for building sustainable long-term career models for industry workers. For instance, Juliet has a service-inclusive pricing structure and offers its staff unique profit-sharing opportunities.
His most poignant personal reward arrived last year, when Juliet landed on Bon Appétit’s annual list of the country’s 50 best new restaurants, the same honor roll his mentor made with Bondir in 2011. Bond was “instrumental in reshaping my passion for the industry,” Lewin says. When passion leads, foodie fame follows.
By Scott Kearnan | Photo Credit: Holly Rike
Karen Akunowicz & Joanne Chang
Chang’s most valued tool in the kitchen isn’t a fork, a whisk, a pot or a pan—it’s a chainsaw.
“Chainsaw” is a nickname that Akunowicz, Chang’s executive chef at Myers + Chang, earned early in her career for her “relentless” work ethic. Akunowicz has steered the South End’s funky Asian diner for the past five years, having been hired after an interview on Chang’s birthday. She’s been a gift ever since. “Karen is fierce,” Chang says. The acclaimed restaurateur, whose beloved Flour Bakery + Cafe soon opens a seventh location, says even she is inspired by the steely intensity that sets Akunowicz apart.
Together, though, their rapport is warm and sister-like. During weekly work debriefs at Myers—“therapy sessions,” quips Chang—the chefs joke, lovingly tease and, yes, finish each other’s sentences. That last talent will prove useful: Their co-authored cookbook, Myers + Chang at Home, hits shelves in September.
They’re true collaborators; Akunowicz is now a full partner in the restaurant. But she still considers Chang a pivotal mentor who helped her star rise—whether by prepping her for the spotlight of Top Chef (Akunowicz competed on season 13) or offering the guidance that helped her nab a second James Beard nomination in 2016, the same year Chang won for Outstanding Baker.
Above all, Akunowicz says, Chang exudes authenticity—the secret ingredient to work and life. “Joanne is one of the most genuine people I know,” she says. Chainsaw’s eyes suddenly look misty. “She makes me want to be my true self, to be honest and upfront. My mantra is WWJD: What Would Joanne Do?”
By Scott Kearnan | Photo Credit: Holly Rike
Brendan Pelley & Michael Schlow
The best mentorships are marked by mutual respect and shared benefit. In the crush of Greek cuisine that recently hit Boston, Schlow’s conventionally sleek Doretta Taverna & Raw Bar was a high-profile opening. But in November, Schlow tapped Pelley, a hotshot riding high on the buzz of his own Hellenic pop-up Pelekasis (a nod to his family name), to steer Doretta as chef de cuisine—and contemporize the veteran restaurateur’s approach. Now feta-festooned classics coexist with unexpected ideas like cinnamon-spiced egg pasta with braised rabbit and fried cheese fondue with pickled cranberry.
“We were successful at the traditional stuff, but Brendan brings a whole slew of new, modern ideas,” Schlow says, praising Pelley’s “balance of confidence and curiosity.” Pelley’s adventurousness also earned the approval of Schlow’s wife, Adrienne, whose Greek heritage inspired Doretta in the first place. “She’s an artsy-fartsy weirdo like me,” laughs Pelley. “She doesn’t just want old family recipes on the menu.”
Meanwhile Pelley, who previously considered opening a permanent Pelekasis location, says Schlow’s storied career, which encompasses nearly a dozen restaurants between New England, LA and DC, is a motivating model for his own future. “He’s given a lot of advice about big-picture business stuff,” Pelley says. “At my interview, he cooked me a five-course meal. Usually it’s the other way around. But that’s the kind of hospitality that runs through his company.”
“There’s much more ahead for him,” Schlow says. As a dad, he is also encouraging Pelley to spend as much time as possible with his newborn son, Cyprus. In food or family, it pays to foster the future.
By Scott Kearnan
Ken Oringer and Meghann Ward & Kevin Walsh
For married chefs Ward and Walsh, travel is the single greatest source of culinary inspiration. And Oringer is the now-international restaurateur who helped them stamp their passports.
“Ken is so well-traveled, and he taught us to use the money we have to get as far away from Boston as often as we can, because there’s a whole universe of flavors to discover,” Ward says. Oringer originally hired the twosome to open Earth in Kennebunkport; later, Ward joined his kitchen at Coppa and Walsh at his former flagship Clio.
Last year, the spouses opened their first venture, Tapestry, an eclectic Fenway eatery serving myriad cuisines inspired by the spouses’ globe-trotting—much done with Oringer by their side. They’ve built tasty memories sampling street foods from Bangkok to Istanbul.
“Growing up, I didn’t really travel. Starting out as a cook making five dollars an hour, it was impossible,” says Oringer, whose name now travels far. Toro, his South End-founded tapas venture with chef Jamie Bissonnette, added locations in NYC and Bangkok, with a Dubai location opening imminently and more on the way. He’s always encouraged his team to travel and experience “the back alley spots that don’t have Michelin stars” but shine with passion and authenticity.
Of course, their travels aren’t always just for research. Last month, Ward, Walsh, Oringer and his wife Celine took their third couples’ vacation to Tulum, where Ward and Walsh had their 2015 wedding at Hartwood, a hot restaurant from married NYC expats. Oringer’s children served as the ring bearer and flower girl. These families cooked up quite a bond.
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