(And don't forget to save that butter, too, for serving.)

Johnson might have picked up a few of these tricks working in New York City kitchens like Empellón and Mimi, where her command of old-world French cuisine had every critic in town calling her a millennial virtuoso.But it was at Toro in Boston, under chef Jamie Bissonnette (a People's BNC in 2011), that she acquired the kitchen tool she values most: intuition.

It's what makes Johnson's dance with the deli canon so compelling.At Freedman's, Johnson treats tradition like a suggestion, an approach that frees her up to finesse old ideas while still tugging at nostalgic heartstrings.It all might be best expressed in her version of a black-and-white cookie, a vanilla-sugar number that is soft and tender where the OG version is dry and cakey, with glossy ganache and egg-white frosting where a purist might have settled for fondant.

With one bite it resolves every broken promise of every black-and-white that came before it, reminding us that in the hands of a true technician, relics have plenty of fight left in them.. 05. of 10.Michael Gallina—Vicia, St. Louis.

"Working with Dan Barber played a huge part in shaping who I am as a chef.

The reason I came home to St. Louis was to further what he taught me and bring it to a place I knew I could do some good.".My husband and I invite two friends over for dinner and we go wild, shaving the truffle over mushroom toast, incorporating it into pasta and butter.. We’re in a race to consume the truffle, since McGee has also cautioned, “The thing with our native wild truffles is that they don’t hold well.

Like specialty produce or Rainier cherries.Our native species are pretty fragile.” This is also why they’re so infrequently exported.

They aren’t produced or found in a volume that’s worth exporting and the industry isn’t there yet.. Why should you try American truffles?.The first native truffle I ever tried was procured by Vincent Finazzo of Philadelphia’s Riverwards Produce and it was from the Pacific Northwest.