“Getting a Michelin star is not just about having good food, it’s also about how precise everything is in terms of taste, balance of dishes.” Bon Appétit spends a day on the line with Akshay Kumar, Chef de Partie at Indienne–Chicago’s first Michelin-star Indian restaurant and one of only three in America. Go behind the scenes with Kumar as he takes you through a typical day and see how a Michelin-star restaurant is run.
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00:00Indian is unique in a way that we do offer four different tasting menus, one being vegetarian,
00:07another being non-vegetarian, a vegan menu and a pescetarian menu.
00:11Everybody in this kitchen has so many preps needs to be done. It's about being efficient.
00:15Getting a Michelin star is not just about having good food, it's also about how precise everything
00:20is in terms of taste, balance of dishes. My role currently is to take care of entree section.
00:27Chef the party legally translates to chef of the section.
00:30Anything that's coming out of that particular section, it's completely you who's in charge.
00:40Good morning, I'm Akshay, chef the party at Indian.
00:42It's 8.30 in the morning, I have a lot to do, let's go.
00:45So we are going to start with our paneer dish. So I'm just going to grab my paneer.
01:00It's a really firm Indian cheese. What we're going to do first is slice these paneers.
01:06So this is a paneer roulade. It's basically paneer that's been sliced very thinly.
01:10The reason we don't make fresh paneer is fresh paneer tend to be really soft
01:14because if the paneer is firmer, we can actually slice it really thin.
01:19We can fill it up with whatever we need. So at Indian, we do have four different menus.
01:24This particular dish goes on the vegetarian menu. We want our menu to be more accessible
01:28to more people. And in India, we do have a lot of people that follows vegetarian dietary
01:32restrictions. There are a lot of other people that's involved in doing this dish. As you can
01:36see in the back, we do have my whole team here. This particular paneer dish will at least need
01:42one, two, three, four people, including me, it's five people's hands before that dish
01:49hits on the table. Hierarchy-wise, almost everybody's shifty party. It's just a fancier
01:54word of calling a cook a cook. You are in charge of one particular section. When I came in,
01:59I started in the cold section. Almost six months in, that's when I switched to Andhra.
02:04Now that I've been in Andhra for almost six months, next probably for me would be sauce station.
02:08So we are done with the paneer slicing. So right now what I'm going to do,
02:11I'm going to make the filling of this particular roulade. This onion paste requires almost three
02:15hours of making it. So this is something that we do a day before. It has a bunch of different
02:19spices that we use. It's been blended. And then the next component is the mix of three
02:24different nuts. We're using almonds, we're using cashew nut, and we're doing pistachio.
02:30Cilantro, salt now. Paneer doesn't particularly have any flavor to it. It is more of a textural
02:36thing. And paneer has this tendency, no matter how much you try with paneer, paneer doesn't
02:40absorb any flavors. We make sure that seasoning is on the higher side. I don't have OCD,
02:45but I try to do it. Everything's symmetrical. Getting a Michelin star is not just about
02:50having good food. It's also about how precise everything is. We should approach every dish
02:56or every action in a more responsible way. Currently in the United States, we have three
03:00Indian restaurants that has one Michelin star. It's about being efficient because everybody in
03:05this kitchen has so many preps needs to be done because as we know, we do have four different
03:09menus. Everything that we do should matter. Paneer particularly goes really well with certain
03:14combinations. So these flavors, that's something that goes with paneer that we already knew. We're
03:18just trying to bring those flavors in a different way. So finally we have something that's visually
03:22so different, but at the same time, when it comes to taste, it's something people have eaten before.
03:26Trying to bring in like a modern twist to what we are doing. Now I'm going to roll these guys up.
03:30I came in early today because this dish particularly takes quite a long time for me to
03:35make. This way the kitchen is sort of empty and I have my own pace. I would really want to say it
03:40out loud why I know how to roll these ones, but I think I shouldn't. So this is the first roll and
03:46these paneer are going to get rolled again with a switch chard. So anything green vegetables
03:51goes really well with paneer. It's traditionally done. I try to choose the best switch chart I can
03:56possibly for this dish. And this process needs to be done every day because the color doesn't
04:00retain that long. So I'm going to blanch it real quick. Once I make a quick dip, then I put it back
04:05in the ice water, shock it so the color retains. The chlorophyll, the moment it hits the cold water,
04:10it just brightens up. I do add sugar and salt in this, so the color retention is much better.
04:16Chef Sujan knows his colors. It's just not about texture. It's just not about taste. It's also
04:20about the color. There will be a little more water left in it, but that sort of keeps the paneer soft.
04:26The reason I like quesadilla menu is it's something that needs to be changed more often than
04:30traditional a la carte restaurants. I really like to change up what I'm doing every few months because
04:36it's boring. Now these guys are rolled up. I'm gonna chill these guys. So it's 10.30 now.
04:48I just got another delivery here. I'm gonna quickly go do the delivery check and then come back.
04:53We do have four to five different vendors. You can put it around here. Every ingredient that comes
04:59in, it's sort of part of everybody's responsibility. It's just not one person's. At that moment in the
05:04day, right now, I am the one who's receiving it, so I want to make sure that everything is
05:08received the right way. The turmoil is just in the season right now. Whenever he has something new,
05:12he tries to bring it to us and we try to figure out whether we can do something with it.
05:17I do want to ask you about the mussels. Where are they from? They're from Prince Edward Island,
05:21so they're confederation coasts. So super nice rope grown, real beautiful. The last time we gave
05:25you the Mexican. Yeah, from Baja, California. I did use those for the trials. How'd they go?
05:30For me, it was more the shell that attracted me. Yeah. The shell is a beautiful blue color. Oh yeah.
05:34It's because I'm trying to use that as like a presentation tool. Let me know how those go.
05:38I think it'll be a great fit. How's your day been? Good, man. It's been busy. It's pooping season.
05:43I do have a turbot that I just received. A turbot is something that I'm trying to work on for the
05:49new summer menu. I tried to look in the gills. Is it fresh enough or not? If it's red enough or not?
05:54Just looking if there are any bruises in it, making sure the scallops, the shells are completely
05:58shot, like just making sure that they are in the right size that we need.
06:02It's 11 o'clock right now. I made some time today to work on a new dish. Being a cook is great.
06:06You learn a lot when it comes to a point where you want to start doing your own thing. You sort
06:11of want to bring your own voice to the picture. Chef Sujan, he's the founder and the head chef
06:16of Indian, is the soul of the restaurant basically. This dish is something I wanted to
06:20do for a long time. I wanted to do it for a long time. I wanted to do it for a long time.
06:25I wanted to do it for a long time. I wanted to do it for a long time. I wanted to do it for a long time.
06:30This dish is something I want him to taste today. I want him to taste this because the new summer
06:36menu is coming in almost in a month's time. I've been working on this for the last almost four
06:40weeks now. Basically what I'm doing is I'm trying to make a filling of this. It's going to be filled
06:45inside a deep fried batter that's coming out of a siphon. I am in a good space now. That's why today
06:50I feel like I can make Chef Sujan taste it. The smell of curry leaf is just amazing. Back home we
06:57have a curry leaf plant. Curry leaf is one of those ingredients that's prominently used in the
07:01southern part of India. Curry leaf and coconut oil, a love of my life. Something I would die for. A
07:09good coconut oil slaps. It slaps so beautifully. The fat that I'm going to use right now for this
07:13dish is coconut oil. I generally go with first the flavors. Once the flavors are in the picture,
07:18then I weigh everything out and then create a recipe out of it. And I like to be a little more
07:22free-handed when I try to create something. So the ginger that I'm using in America, it's not
07:26as strong as Indian gingers are. We need to use a lot more than what we use generally back in India.
07:31I learned that after coming here for sure. I started cooking with it. My chef was like,
07:34dude why aren't you putting enough ginger? I'm making a masala, a dried roast masala,
07:38which is basically onions, ginger, curry leaf along with some Kashmiri chili powder. Kashmiri
07:43chili is one of those dried chili powders which has a lot of color in it but doesn't have a lot
07:47of heat to it. This is getting blended. I'll go for a little bit of turmeric. So what I'm going to
07:52do is I'm going to saute this mussels really quick so that it opens up. 90% of the food that's
07:57been made in Kerala uses coconut oil and that's something that we don't get a lot of chance to
08:02show to the world. Traditionally this dish is made of clams. In Kerala, we have something called
08:10toddy shops where they sell coconut liquor basically. And clam roast is something that
08:15we've eaten in those toddy shops a lot. It sums up Kerala's all the flavors. For me, I'm just using
08:20mussels in this scenario is because when I came to Chicago, that's when I was actually introduced
08:24to mussels for the first time. What I've realized is Americans and somebody who's from India tasted
08:29that they should both be able to relate to this idea. I can quickly open these guys up and take
08:36it out. Inspiration for me were these shells. The beautiful blue tinge that you see inside is
08:42something that inspired me to like want to create something out of this as my plate. So once that's
08:47done, there's the liquid that comes out of it. I'm going to reuse this liquid in the sauce. The flavors
08:52of the mussels stays in the dish itself. Because it's a filling, I don't need the texture per se.
08:57It's the flavor that matters to me. Hi, so my truffle guy is right now here. How are you doing man?
09:04What do you got today? We do get truffles almost two days in a week. So this just arrived. Every
09:10time that he gets the best, he just comes to us first. At least that's what he tells us. I mean,
09:14look at this. What's better than this? These are Italians. Umbria. Summer. Black. So generally,
09:20we do take around two pounds of it. I try to take the smallest guys out to be honest with you. I
09:24don't like the big ones because the smaller ones are much easier for me to work with. I do this
09:30in Chicago for 10 years. But the family in Capricci is doing that for four generations. That's all
09:36yours. Pleasure is mine. Have a great day. So we're going to get back at the R&D. I'm just going to
09:41quickly finish these guys because my time is running out. I have literally 10 minutes left on
09:46my clock right now to finish this dish up. This should be good. Now the muscle is sort of
09:57incorporated in the basic masala. That's how I call it. The shells just look too beautiful to
10:02just throw them away. So this batter was made in the morning. It needs to be freshly made and
10:10it has to be really precise. We are basting it right now. The thing with R&D is it's a lot of
10:15uncertainty. I don't know what I'm looking forward. If there are ideas in my head,
10:19I'm trying to bring it all together. Now we can get Chef Sujan right now.
10:23What's up? Hey Chef, how are you doing? Good, good. How was your trip? Good. This is a snack
10:28that I was thinking by itself in the beginning of the course. I know it might need even more acid.
10:33It might need something more, I understand. It's crunchy. The filling is good. We need some
10:38chutney on top. Some chutney on top. Yeah, like a coconut or tomato chutney. That's a lot of acid.
10:43Acid for the color as well, for the presentation. And then if we add a little bit of, you know,
10:48small can of kaviyan. And then some edible flowers. Just elevate it a little more. But
10:52yeah, thank you. But the flavor is great. As I said, I'm curious. The breakfast with the muscle
10:57bun is good. For me right now, I'm happy at least the fact that he likes the flavors. He likes the
11:02idea that I had. I was able to translate that. I think that's a good start for me. I feel really
11:08satisfied about it. So it's one o'clock now. It's the time for the reservation meeting. It's pretty
11:17much what we get to know how to go about the day. The restriction that needs to be followed today.
11:21For tonight, we have about 10 vegetarians, 34 non-vegetarians, no pescetarians, no vegan as of
11:27now, and nine pescetarians. And there's one guest, lactose intolerant, but butter is okay.
11:32So we do scallops without bulge of butter and green pea puree instead of the cauliflower puree
11:38and sea bass to be finished without butter on the top.
11:42So this meeting is with the entire back of the house so that everybody exactly knows
11:46what they need to do. For tomorrow, we have about 96 covers with 88 tasting and 8 top prefix. Friday,
11:52we are at 118. Gourmet butter nickels has been ordered. It's on the way. It might come about 5
11:58pm-ish. So be ready for the last moment preparations and let's have a good service guys.
12:10I just got done with my reservation meeting. I need to like now move because I have like
12:15easy enough two hours to finish all my prep and then move to my service. So I'm going to start
12:21cleaning my scallops now. These are from Boston. So where we use this is in our non-veg tasting
12:26menu. I clean these bad boys up. So the shells is then reused again. We use the shells as sort of
12:34like the plateware for this particular dish. So shellfish allergy is one of those most prominent
12:39allergies. Any utensils I'm using, I'm not reusing that anywhere else. Right now everything that I do
12:44would be only seafood. So now I'm just going to rinse these scallops in cold water so that all
12:49the dirt that's on it can be quickly taken off. There's an extra muscle that's always attached to
12:54the scallop. We tend to take that out because as soon as it hits the pan, that tends to tighten up
12:59real quicker than the other parts of the muscle. So basically I'm arranging these bad boys for the
13:03service because I know exactly how many I need. Just before the service, I take them out and then
13:08I cook them. So now I'm done with scallops. The next thing I'm going to go for is sea bass. Just
13:13make sure that every seafood prep is done together. It is specifically for the pescatarian menu. So
13:19this is the sea bass I've got. I'm basically going to remove the center bone. It's a huge bone.
13:23I try to get the most out of it where I'm not wasting it out. So now this bone actually gets
13:30all the way here. I'm trying to get at least three different roulades out of this.
13:36It is. I think I am on a roll. What I'm going to do is take out a little bit on the sides
13:43so that it just curves in and take the clean wrap.
13:47So the idea about making this roulade, we do it a day prior. We keep it overnight in a chiller
13:51so that it retains the shape that we need. We're trying to create a circular shape on it so that
13:56when we sear it, it's sort of like a circle that's on the plate. So now I'm just going to
14:01tightly wrap these guys. As you can see, it's taking a shape of a cylinder. Once this is tied up,
14:09I take a cake tester. We just take the excess water. So as you can see, the excess water comes
14:13out of it. At the same time, if there is any excess air that sort of pockets, comes out of it.
14:17And that way when it's cooked, it's cooked right. We're going to vacuum pack this
14:21and then sous vide it. And then finish it with searing the meat.
14:30So it's four o'clock now. I have a lot of things to be done. I need to set my station up. I'm going
14:33to grab everything that I need for my setup. Without these guys, I am screwed. And if I don't
14:39collect these guys before the service starts, during the service, it's just going to be chaotic as hell.
14:44It's pretty much all the trays that I need for the setup.
14:50So if I'm using blue, if any seafood that needs to be handled, I use this to be handled.
14:54Any red meat that needs to be handled, I use this. Setting up station is something that's very
14:59personal. So everybody has their own way of setting their stations up. So even the same
15:03station is not set up the same way by two different people. So when I try to organize
15:07things, there is precise spaces where I keep my stuff. It's always in the same place so that
15:12it's the muscle memory that comes into the picture.
15:16We sometimes do hide one or two things. You gotta do what you gotta do.
15:20And you have to be ready for service, regardless of what it is.
15:28This is one of the final prep that I need to do before my service starts.
15:32This is basically scotch blossoms. Because this is very delicate, the grilling needs to be done
15:38really precisely because otherwise the flour gets ruined completely. So these goes with the
15:44sea bass. I'm going to make a filling that's made of crab. So this is basically onions that's been
15:48cooked with a lot of black pepper and curry leaf and ginger. I'm going to add the crab mix to this.
15:54I'm going to fill it in a piping bag. I'm going to fill my zucchini blossoms with these and then
15:59give it to the grill section so that I can grill it and pass it back to me before the service starts.
16:05This is Chef Sonu. Hey bro, how are you doing? So he's the one in charge of the grill.
16:15So it's almost the time for the service. I'm just portioning the fish that I did earlier on.
16:20Searing of some scallops. So as soon as I'm done with this, we'll be doing the final tasting and
16:26then it's the service time.
16:29So before we start the service, we taste each and every sauce. Also
16:38a few other things which cannot be rectified later.
16:48That's a little too sweet.
16:53Also the color, a little more bright.
17:00Maybe touch up chili. Just touch and the pani puri is too sweet. So rest everything is okay.
17:08Let's get back to service. For the pani puri, since it was sweet, we add some chaat masala,
17:14black salt, a little bit more of acid. That's how we rectify it in the next 30 minutes and then
17:19our service starts. So it's five o'clock. It's time for my service to start now. I would ask you
17:26to kindly leave. Thank you so much for spending the day with me.