How did your career as a salad enthusiast & chef begin?
Depends how you mark the beginning! I always wanted to be in the kitchen. Even as a kid, I would make my mom pretend we had a cooking show called “Julia Child + Julia Mommy,” and we would perform for an imaginary camera as we made dinner. I’m a hands-on person, and while I spent my 20s as an artist, cooking scratched that same itch—and was far less loaded for me. I think so many of us end up in a career that was there all along, no matter how long it took us to see it.
I would say the big rupture happened when I turned 30. I had just finished my MFA at Columbia University, and I was super lonely spending all day in the studio. The art I made took a long time to develop, and cooking was the antidote: immediate, urgent, everyday, and social. I started a blog called Salad for President, which gave me an excuse to invite myself into the homes of artists I admired and ask them to make a salad with me. It was a fun project because it made use of all my skills—writing, photography, coercion. I was surprised to discover how much I loved recipe development and food writing; it was like learning a new language.
From there, I planted a salad garden on the rooftop of MoMA PS1 and hosted a series of food and art events that really cemented Salad for President in the public eye.
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Tell us about your new role as Executive Chef and Director of Artists’ Partnerships for the restaurant at the expanded New Museum! We are so excited to dine at Oberon soon.
How much time do you have? Ha!
I worked on Oberon for three years leading up to its opening and stepped away once it was off the ground. I love the process—imagining what can be and putting ideas into motion. I created menus for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, all of them a riotous celebration of flavor, produce, and travel. I also collaborated with artists to create nearly every touchpoint of the restaurant.
My mentor, the painter Dike Blair, gave us one of his gouache cocktail paintings for the cover of the drink menu. Caitlin Keogh painted a diptych for the food menu featuring headless women at a dinner party; your own head, peeking out from behind the open booklet, completed the picture. Laurie Anderson and I created chocolates with fortunes on the wrappers to take away at the end of the meal.
As the food on your plate disappeared, line drawings emerged from beneath it—works by former teachers and friends including Kara Walker, Ruby Sky Stiler, and Joan Jonas. Every coffee mug was to be unique, handmade by artists working within a limited palette. Glassware was subtly etched with cicadas mid-metamorphosis by Raúl de Nieves. I even developed a custom scent to complement the food on the menu.
Unfortunately, if you go there now, you won’t experience any of this. That’s a long story—and ultimately the reason I left—but such is life. How lucky am I that I got to dream it all up? If anyone wants to open a really special restaurant with incredible art at every turn, call me! I have it ready to go ;)
What’s your favorite part about the New York culinary community?
It’s full of doers. People in New York, especially those my age who have stayed, are insanely motivated and energetic. I left for Pasadena for five years, and I’m so grateful I had the chance to slow down, especially while my kids were small. But the pace of this city is my homeostasis. I feel most like myself here.
Congrats on the launch of your Salad for President instant dressing mixes! What was the process like for developing these recipes and how did you land on the 3 flavor options?
Oh man, this has also been such a journey. The mixes are shelf-stable powders, so there was a huge learning curve to “cooking” this way. It’s a little like watching my kids make potions—lots of trial and error. All of our ingredients are fine powders, like miso or soy sauce, in a dust.
It’s also funny making a product for a customer who is different from me. I love making dressing, and I have a whole library of ingredients to pull from. But I’m always hearing people complain about how boring their dressings are and, in turn, how rarely they get excited about making salad. No more! I wanted to create a clean-label option for people who want more from their salad but don’t feel like vinaigrette is the hill they want to die on. At the same time, I wanted to leave room for the user to riff, express themselves, and gain the confidence to start iterating in the kitchen.
For the initial flavors, we decided to start with things people already know, since the format itself is novel. There’s an Umami Caesar, Miso Ginger with toasted sesame, and Lemon Poppy with shallots. I think of Lemon Poppy as the everyday, zingy vinaigrette; Miso Ginger as the flex; and Caesar as the indulgent one, with obvious crossover into the land of dips.
Once we have those well-trodden bases covered, we’ll start rolling out more adventurous flavors. I’m also reformulating the mixes so that instead of adding citrus and fat, you’ll eventually just add the fat—making them even easier to use on the go.
What is your most common go-to salad that you make on a busy day? Does the salad appear in your cookbook, Salad for President?
Oooh, love this question. The Grilled Greek is probably my most often made salad, but I don’t actually use a grill everyday, but I do sear my dolma. It makes a huge difference. Another one is the melon with fried sage. I have added a sprinkle of sumac to that one and it’s so pretty!
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