Guidara, Will

Subterms

    Latest story

    163 Shares199 Views

    The Eleven Madison Park Hospitality Guru Who Worked on ‘The Bear’ Opens Up

    by

    Will Guidara, who has a co-producing and writing credit on Season 3, talks about the power of surprise and the calling of restaurant work.Until Season 3 of “The Bear,” only viewers who understood restaurant hospitality at its highest levels could spot the Will Guidara Effect.Mr. Guidara was the Paul McCartney to chef Daniel Humm’s John Lennon at Eleven Madison Park, the acclaimed New York City restaurant they once co-owned. During their 13 years together, the staff’s signature was delivering to diners small delights and outrageous surprises based on guest research and bits of overheard conversation. . He once made a quick run to buy a dirty-water dog that Mr. Humm cheffed up with quenelles of sauerkraut and relish and delivered it to a table of food-focused tourists who had mentioned they were leaving town without tasting a New York hot dog.Mr. Guidara’s book “Unreasonable Hospitality” first made a cameo in the show’s second season. The episode, called “Forks,” traces the evolution of the sweet but troubled Richie Jerimovich (played by Ebon Moss-Bachrach) who had been running the sinking Chicago sandwich shop that is at the center of the show. When it transforms into a fancy restaurant called the Bear, Richie finds his calling as a hospitality professional after he puts on a suit and spends a week learning service at a restaurant with three Michelin stars.While he’s training, a waiter overhears a family say they are bummed to leave Chicago without trying deep-dish pizza. Richie runs to Pequod’s pizza shop, brings back a pie and the chef, with a cookie cutter and some micro basil, turns it into a modernist dish that Richie delivers to the astonished guests. It’s pure Guidara.Richie learns from Mr. Guidara’s best-selling book “Unreasonable Hospitality.”FXThis season, Mr. Guidara was listed as a co-producer and given a story credit on an episode titled “Doors.” Sharp-eyed viewers noticed his “WG” initials when Richie texts someone about a restaurant closing, and he has a significant cameo in the season finale, delivering an impassioned speech about hospitality that begins, “There’s a nobility in this.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    More stories

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Television

      Did You Find These Easter Eggs in ‘The Bear’ Season 3?

      by

      Subtle, and not so subtle, culinary references are sprinkled throughout the show’s third season.In its third season, “The Bear,” a television show known for its dedicated hyperrealism, did not disappoint fans looking for real-world culinary references. As Carmy (Jeremy Allen White), Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) and their team of former sandwich professionals hustled for a Michelin star or two at their newly opened fine-dining spot, Easter eggs dotted the show. We’ve compiled a short list, with help from restaurant industry professionals, of the most true-to-life nods and hidden surprises:In certain corners of Reddit, it is rumored that the entire show is loosely based on the life of the chef Curtis Duffy, an owner of Ever restaurant in Chicago. But, while the creators have dined at his restaurant, “If they were studying me, I didn’t know it,” he said.The photos of the restaurant critics posted in the Bear office are of actual people, including the New Yorker writer Naomi Fry, the “How Long Gone” podcaster Chris Black and Sue Chan, who runs the culinary events and marketing agency Care by Chan. On the show, Marcus, the pastry chef played by Lionel Boyce, makes a “caviar sundae.” A similar dish was served at the renowned, now-closed restaurant 108 in Copenhagen, a culinary hotbed to which “The Bear” has referred numerous times.In flashbacks to Carmy’s time at the French Laundry, Thomas Keller’s restaurant in the Napa Valley, a sign beneath the clock reads, “Sense of Urgency.” “That sign sits under every clock in every restaurant Thomas Keller has,” said Nick Fitch, a co-owner of Alston Hospitality Group who spent 12 years working the dining room at the French Laundry and Per Se.The Pilot G2 Gel Roller Pen, with a .07-millimeter tip that Carmy uses to furiously scribble throughout the season (and to write his list of “non-negotiables”) caught the eye of Greg Ryan, a co-owner of Bell’s in Los Alamos, Calif. who worked in the dining rooms at Per Se and the French Laundry for more than five years. “When I was an expediter, those were just the pens you had,” he said. “They work well on receipt paper, don’t smudge, have a fine tip and write super-smoothly.”Much has been made of Mr. Keller’s chicken-trussing demonstration — “If you ask him his favorite dish, he’ll say roast chicken,” said Mr. Fitch — but a photo of his handprint cast in concrete also makes an appearance in the season’s first episode. According to Mr. Fitch, the handprint was initially in the kitchen at the French Laundry but was extracted during an extensive renovation and moved outside, along with handprints from Corey Lee, a former French Laundry chef de cuisine, and Claire Clark, a former pastry chef at the restaurant.Joel McHale, who plays Chef David, said on “Late Night With Seth Meyers” that he was “portraying” Mr. Keller. “I don’t think he’s as awful as I was, but he does whisper at his employees,” Mr. McHale said. Others have speculated that the character is based on Daniel Humm, the chef at Eleven Madison Park. Will Guidara, a producer on “The Bear,” was a business partner of Mr. Humm’s until the two had a tense public split. Mr. McHale said in a GQ interview this week that “David is apparently based on Thomas Keller and Daniel Humm,” and added, “There wasn’t any material. I’ve never met them.”In Episode 2, Carmy calls a dish of sea bass topped with potato chips a “Boulud nod,” as in Daniel Boulud, the renowned chef who created crisp paupiettes of sea bass in Barolo sauce. That dish uses thinly sliced potatoes as a crust for a skinless fillet, and Mr. Boulud has in turn credited a mullet dish made by Paul Bocuse as his inspiration.The tip-versus-service-charge conversation among the Bear’s staff touches on a hot-button issue that’s playing out all over the country. Many restaurateurs, most famously Danny Meyer, have tried to create a better system, with mixed results. In California, a recently passed law seemed to make restaurant service charges illegal (as part of a bid to reduce hidden fees), but then a second bill was passed, allowing restaurants to keep those fees if they are presented clearly.In Episode 7, Chef Marcus asks Carmy about a photo of Mr. Keller with Mr. Boulud and the chef Nobu Matsuhisa as much younger men. All three went on to become world-renowned chefs. Mr. Matsuhisa has opened restaurants on five continents, and popularized the now-famous dish of miso black cod at Nobu, his restaurant in TriBeCa.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares149 Views

      in Television

      ‘The Bear’ Season 3: Here Are All the Chef Cameos

      by

      Last season, the FX series featured a parade of Hollywood celebrities. In the new one, it’s showing off its food-world credibility with a series of cameos from star chefs.This article includes spoilers from Season 3 of “The Bear.”Three seasons in, it is clear “The Bear” knows how to book a guest star.Last season, this FX series about a chef — named Carmen Berzatto, but Carmy to nearly everyone — who transforms his family’s Italian beef sandwich shop into a fine-dining restaurant called the Bear, featured a parade of Hollywood celebrities including Jamie Lee Curtis and Olivia Colman. In the new season, currently streaming on Hulu, “The Bear” is showing off its food-world bona fides with a series of cameos from star chefs.In the premiere episode, titled “Tomorrow,” Jeremy Allen White’s Carmy reflects on his past, which leads to a series of flashbacks that take him to the kitchens of renowned establishments like Noma in Copenhagen and Daniel in Manhattan. Then, as a bookend, the season finale features a host of dining luminaries attending a closing dinner for Ever, a restaurant run in the show by Colman’s character, Andrea Terry. Colman is one of many returning guest stars (Curtis is another). Famous newcomers to “The Bear” include John Cena and Josh Hartnett, as well as the “Billions” co-creator and noted restaurant lover Brian Koppelman in an acting role.That finale, titled “Forever,” blends fiction and reality in a way now familiar to “Bear” fans. That’s because Ever is a real restaurant in Chicago that is “open for business and thriving,” Curtis Duffy, one of the owners, said in a statement. Duffy also said he was “honored to host so many of my peers from across the nation.” And, in addition to Ever, the series continues to feature various Chicago spots, including the Croatian cafe Doma and the sausage purveyor Jim’s Original.But it’s the chefs who steal the spotlight. Here’s who enters Carmy’s orbit this year.Daniel BouludIn the flashback-heavy season premiere, Carmy, while standing outside O’Hare International Airport, tells his sister, Natalie (Abby Elliott), that “New York’s got everything.” The next thing we know, he’s at 65th Street and Park Avenue entering Daniel, the elegant domain of Daniel Boulud. Boulud himself soon appears onscreen, training Carmy directly. One of the dishes we see Boulud showing Carmy how to prepare is his famous sea bass wrapped in thin strips of potato, which he developed at Le Cirque. A 1989 article in The New York Times explained that “the dish works brilliantly for several reasons. The crunchiness of the ultrathin potatoes contrasts with the delicate bass but does not bully it; the heavily reduced, almost pungent, red-wine sauce is counterbalanced beautifully by the sweet leeks.”Daniel Boulud appears in a flashback in the season premiere.FX/HuluWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More