How a Legendary Chef Runs One of the World's Most Iconic Restaurants — Mise En Place

- My technique is simple, I use cutlery and I use a spoon. (scraping) Live scallop. You know, everyone uses different professional knives and you just need this. Yeah, I don't do this every day, but I really try to get my hands dirty from time to time, you know. Just to see, stay in touch with the guys because they really are the backbone of the kitchen, you know, they're the backbone of the restaurant. (upbeat music) I think Eddie is probably the fastest butcher in New York City. You know, black sea bass. I mean, I'm pretty good at filleting fish, but this is like, I mean, look at this, they have no meat left.

He's also going to use some tuna, we already got a sea urchin. Executive Chef Mark Lapico. He has been with us for 17 years, from Canada. Canada is fine. They're good with fish, you know, so here we are. This tuna comes from Hawaii every day. - Look at that color, it's spectacular. It's a little leaner and pairs very well with one of our signature dishes, tuna noodles, which are cut in the style of udon noodles. - Seeing this preparation, we will never be able to take that off the menu. People come once a week, twice a week, to eat tuna noodles.

You really have to have good knife skills for this. I mean, that's just a couple of times, and people have no idea when they start eating the noodles with chopsticks. It's like, how are you doing this? You know, Eddie is the teacher. That's the staging and then go upstairs. Thai chili, olive oil and salt. It is probably the

most

popular dish. - It is a treasure. This is good, it's exciting. - I've been using uni since I've been in New York since 1986, since Maine, sometimes since Japan. But we feel that the ones from California are very sweet.

Wow. The purple ones are the best. - Wow, look at that. We are very lucky, like we came out of the water on the other side of the country, and you know that this morning they are here and in an hour they will be on our menu. - Sometimes people have no idea what it takes to bring that little uni to the toast. Blow them up, open them, the work. - For us the product is key, you know, that's number one. We sold tens of thousands of cookbooks, no one has replicated this restaurant and I think it's because of the origin of the product.

And then we have a fabulous team. So winter is sometimes a bit tricky. There isn't much good fresh produce around, but the good thing is that it's truffle season. Now we are going to check a shipment of black truffle. I mean the aroma is spectacular. You can see it, check it out. - Oh! - This is one of those relationships that we really try to cultivate, these guys know that as soon as they clear customs, they come directly to us. That usually gives us a lot to choose from. - Is that true or not? - Very sure. - Okay, first stop. - Save $5, $20, $100 per pound, of all the nickel and dime

place

s, this is not the

place

in my opinion.

The same goes for caviar. So you could say this is my favorite part of the day, or at least reviewing the product. Especially because I love eating caviar. We opened each one of them, we tried each one of them. If you look at the caviar, you will know that each of the beads is individual. Wow, I mean, to me, this is something extraordinary. I love the color, I love the beads, I love how clean the finish is. We opened shortly and again they hit the mark. We're right there. Between the classic egg caviar and egg toast, we went through quite a bit of caviar.

That, and JG has a tendency to reveal it. (laughs) So that'll cover us for the day. We have Joe Rhee, executive sous

chef

, who will prepare one of our signature dishes. It is a toasted egg yolk placed between two pieces of homemade brioche. That starts with the eggs, they are tempered and then cooked for about an hour. It's been described as the best grilled cheese sandwich in the

world

, which I think might be pretty fair. Mainly because it contains a large amount of caviar. In many of our dishes we look for precision. They make a lot of custom things for us, including in this case a ruler that has the precise measurements of the egg toast.

All our recipes are measured to a tenth of a gram. We want to make sure that if someone loves egg toast in New York, when they get it in Tokyo or Brazil they will have the same experience. Therefore, appearance and weight are extremely important to us. How many egg toasts do you think you've made? - I would say close to a million. - (laughing) A million? - I cut every bread, I cook every egg. In the restaurant it's all me. So if you see it, you know who I am, it's me. - Each one of them is exactly perfect, so it will fit perfectly on the tray, and that's why we use the ruler, I love this. - Ideally, the butter should be as soft as possible, so that when you throw it in, it just lands. - Well, you know it's going to be like this perfect golden brick and you know, the sunlight up in the kitchen is magical during the day.

At the right angle, when the egg toast is on the griddle, it al

most

looks like the sun is shining. I know it sounds a little dramatic, but honestly, it's pretty cool. See, now when you look at it and it's like that perfect brick, this is the ruler's reason. That's the precision. - I love those trays. This is like you've mastered it, huh? When this is cooked, the brioche will be golden brown. A little sea salt, herbs, a spoonful of fresh caviar. And I think the texture of the crunchy, the creamy, the hot, the cold, the salty, is a 10.

We have about 40

restaurants

around the

world

, but this is the flagship. Jean-Georges is the flagship. When I'm in New York, people see me here every day. At least 10 hours a day. - The pigeon has just arrived. - This restaurant is really the center of activity. This is where we create all the recipes and export them around the world. I would never put a dish on the menu if I didn't try it and if I didn't eat it from A to Z. So, we're thinking about what? - I'm thinking about smoking it all. -Chef Greg Brainin is our culinary director and he develops all the recipes for us.

I mean right now we're working on a squab dish, we don't have our sauce yet, we don't have a condiment yet, we don't have a vegetable yet and that's where it starts. I like pigeon with some spices. - I think we should season it now, leave it, - Okay, rest. - rest for a few minutes with the seasoning. - Alright. - With cardamom, yes? - Let's do it. - What do you think, cardamom? - I like cardamom. - I'm going to go ahead and make a spice mix. And what I normally do in a process like this is do it for one, in this case four.

If we like it, we simply expand the recipe. But I weigh everything as we go, so I don't have to try to go back to something. What do you think? - Oh yeah. - Alright? - Yes. - So look at this. Greg made a mixture of spices and salt. I mean it already smells good. We basically have four because I think we're still negotiating how this whole dish is going to play out. We thought about frying one, like a Chinese technique. We're going to roast a whole one and then I think we can break one up and roast it under the Salamander.

I definitely think we are on the right path. It cures for 20 or 30 minutes just to set it and then smokes. - Our menu here changed about six months ago, we have a lot of vegetarians, I mean 20% of our clientele order plant-based dishes, etc., so we decided to really go in that direction. - All deliveries are starting to arrive, we are working on a new dish, Caraflex cabbage. - Here we have your Caraflex and your celery root. This has started to sprout a little because it just came out of the ground. - That's great. The best thing about vegetarian and vegan

restaurants

, they don't prepare a fake version of a fish dish.

They are allowing the vegetable to speak for itself. We divide the cabbage into quadrants and then weigh it. It is important that the weight is the same in each of them so that the cooking time is exact. Once the cabbage is fully cooked, you will be able to see that it is almost translucent and super tender. Hailey is going to put the celery root puree inside and then we are going to brown it on the grill. She's going to glaze it and we top it off with shaved white truffle. It sounds a little far-fetched, but I think someone who buys a piece of cabbage at a restaurant like this has a hard time seeing the perceived value in it. - Do you have the truffle? - You know that the restaurant has a responsibility to make sure that people feel that they have gotten value for their money, that they have seen some creativity. - Let's try a

chef

challenge here.

It's Greg and Mark. One will be fried, one roasted, another roasted. Different flavor, different texture. - We didn't really think it was a competition, but that's okay. This will be the one that will take the longest. 12 minutes of cooking and three of rest. (upbeat music) - This can be beautiful too. The others are cooked with bones, so there is always more flavor with the bone. This will be a little cleaner, but the service will be faster. - When you add a little bit of butter and you're getting ready to drizzle it in when it starts to get this soapy, it's like the perfect temperature.

The milk solids haven't caramelized yet, you still get a little bit of that lactic flavor. I love this color, its shine. (upbeat music) - Then we'll try the fried, the roasted, the roasted, to see which one provides more intensity, right? Fried it is super juicy, succulent. - This is the roast. - The smoke on the spices, perfect. I think both bone-in roasts are better. - Flavor, juicy. - I think that the roast brings, because of the butter, it brings a little more. - I mean that on the grill it is more practical for us, I think.

Because all the tastings we have are one, one, one, one. But it's much better in the bone. - I mean, that's the best part. - Yes I think so. - I think we can do it. - So what are we seeing here with this turnip? - Turnip, kohlrabi and then, - Whiskey. - Roasted, bone-in whiskey? In the bone? Good. - Now it's about ten past three and I think we lined up in less than two hours. It was fun, I love it, I love that we had a direction to move forward, but we really have to prepare for service now.

So she is Baju, she is the head chef at the fish station and one of her tasks is to make the buckwheat crepes in which we will then wrap our prawns. So we start with a little bit of excess in the ladle and then dip the rest in, and the main reason is that you want the crepe to be very, very thin. Once they came in, we cleaned them, removed the claw and the head. That's something we'll use to make a broth. Just nice and crispy on the outside, that's what you're looking for. It's almost like a cast.

At 5:00 p.m. m., the cooks are there, the whole team is at a family meal. We generally take this time as the last moment of the day before service begins, where we can actually open each container, spoon in each sauce, and make sure all the

mise

en place is tight. If something isn't right, now is the time to redo it. The last thing in the world we want is for a client to point out what we have done incorrectly. Are chives cut well? Is dill hydrated? Is the caviar cold enough? Often this also serves as dinner.

And then when that's done, we'll be open, we'll be on it, we'll be in service. Sending a madai uni mushroom now. Hannah, you can make all three toasts. Window three, Hannah or more? I need three pieces of toast, but not before three minutes because the mushrooms are not ready yet. Guys, pick up double crab. 6:00 p.m. m., things are heating up right now, we're getting halfway through dinner service, so we're starting to heat up a little. - Here are your fry. - We're busy to the point that there will be some action, you know? We like it, it's like the best. - Behind you, guys. - There is a tuna and a double tatsoi and I think that after that we are going to do, we need a crab, a trout, and we will make some ravioli all together. - Mercy.

You have a risotto. Beautiful. Let's do everything. - Second course, a tuna, a tartare. We are going to finish the double pigeon, both regular. - One more so we can finish the table. - Sounds good. Felix, do me a favor, just leave that fingerprint there on the side, thank you. Thank you. - I mean, that's a bomb, huh? The truffle at the university? - That's magic, for sure. Alright, now we're going to make a trout, a ravioli and a king crab. - I need the food I need to touch food every day. And even if Mark has done it perfectly, I still need to get involved, get my hands on it and try things.

It's part of my DNA, you know?