February 2004
Chef
Chris Cosentino is crazy about "guts," known to most
of us as offal, innards or variety meats. And we're not talking
about fancy stuff like foie gras or sweetbreads. He means
guts-the parts that make some diners cringe when they hear
about the night's special--hearts, livers, tongue, tripe,
brains, and all the other nasty bits. Cosentino finally had
a chance to share his love of offal when he took over as executive
chef of Incanto, a rustic Italian restaurant in San Francisco,
this spring. He changes the menu frequently and on any given
night, guests may find specials like Venetian style pork liver,
spicy lamb tripe with mint, or house-made coppa di testa alongside
more traditional dishes from all regions of Italy. His love
of meats is not limited to innards; he also uses "odd cuts"
of meat, less popular cuts like pork shoulder that he braises
in milk or pigs' feet to stuff ravioli. These odd cuts and
guts are often overlooked; used in processed meat products,
animal food or discarded altogether. But Cosentino recognizes
the importance of reviving old world traditions of using and
appreciating just about every part of the animal.
People often associate the "lesser" cuts of meat with poverty;
if given a choice, why would you choose to eat pig's feet,
beef tongue or lamb brains? Cosentino says, first and foremost
because they taste good. He wishes that people would get over
their psychological aversion to innards and just give them
a try. "People love to eat foie gras, which is just fattened
duck or goose liver, so why should they have a problem eating
pig's liver?" Using these cuts is also a more sustainable
way of eating. As farmer/philosopher Andrew Griffin of Mariquita
Farms put it when writing about Chris's cooking, "what could
be more wholistic than using and appreciating the whole animal?
After all, it's not like chickens march around on a hundred
drumsticks like feathered centipedes or pigs are just hams
dressed up in bacon." In our culture we often take the availability
of meat for granted, valuing animals only for a few choice
cuts. This attitude seems to have developed in the last few
decades, as supermarkets have replaced neighborhood butchers
and convenience foods have replaced the home cooked meal.
Cosentino is changing that attitude, a few meals at a time,
by sharing his passion for old world traditions.
There are other reasons, too, that have made Cosentino an
advocate of variety meats. Often these odd cuts, especially
the innards, are much more nutritious than the choice cuts
people regularly enjoy. For example, beef tripe has 25% more
protein than a T-bone steak and only 5% of the fat. And yet
another reason that Cosentino is a proponent of variety meats
is because they are affordable; helping him to keep the prices
at Incanto reasonable, making it accessible to more people.
Cosentino strongly believes that "not only the rich should
eat well."
Cosentino comes by his love of guts honestly. On one side
of his family, he hails from English sausage makers who made
a name for themselves in New England. On the other side, his
family was working class Italian immigrants who cooked tripe
for Sunday dinner and received house calls from the local
butcher. He grew up eating plenty of odd cuts and guts, but
didn't learn to cook them from his family. His great-grandmother
Rosalie taught him to make Italian specialties from her native
Naples from the time he was a small boy and had to stand on
a chair to turn the handle of the pasta machine. But when
it came to her tripe, he was so put off by the smell that
he wouldn't even go into her house when she was cooking it.
But it was from his family experiences that he developed a
taste for meats, from sausage and proscuitto to even the dreaded
tripe.
In culinary school, the focus was on primal cuts only. Cosentino
says that no one ever talked about guts. Instead they taught
the students that innards (other than foie gras) had no place
in a fine dining restaurant. But as he cooked his way around
the country, learning from many esteemed chefs, his eyes were
opened to the virtues of variety meats. At Mark Miller's Red
Sage, in Washington D.C., he learned how to make sausage and
which cuts were best for braising. Later at Chez Panisse in
Berkeley he learned about curing meats from watching Christopher
Lee prepare lardo and proscuitto. In his free time, he read
and experimented, often succeeding but occasionally learning
the hard way. The worst incident was the time he oversalted
the ham for the crocque monsieurs at Belon, turning it into
an inedible "salt lick." But through trial-and-error and armed
with a few specialty cookbooks, Cosentino is reviving traditions
that were mostly lost, except for in a few grandmothers' kitchens.
Living
and cooking in the Bay Area for the last seven years has immersed
Cosentino in the ideas of sustainability that are integral
to the northern California food scene. He shops at the farmers'
markets for both restaurant and home, getting to know farmers
and the amazing food they grow. A few years ago, he met his
match at the market, someone who shares his enthusiasm for
odd cuts and guts. Travis Potter of Potter Family Farms, raises
cows, pigs, sheep and goats in supremely sustainable conditions.
Potter was thrilled to sell guts to someone who could appreciate
them and would spread the gospel to the masses. But Potter's
pork and lamb operations are still fairly small and he cannot
always keep up with the demand. So Cosentino has had to seek
out other sources, though sometimes it proves tricky to find
all the cuts he wants. For example, he can easily buy a whole
pig's head, but it comes without the ears. All of the pigs'
ears, it seems, are sold separately for dog treats. So much
for getting to try that crispy pig's ear salad anytime soon.
But adventurous eaters need not worry; there are plenty of
other delicacies to be enjoyed, like grilled lamb's liver
with polenta and arugula or beef marrow ravioli with pumpkin
and sage. And for the less adventurous eaters there are many
more "normal" dishes on the menu, but be warned, Cosentino
has an uncanny knack for convincing even the most reluctant
diner to give it a try. For more information about chef Chris
Cosentino and Incanto, visit www.incanto.biz.
Written By: Tatiana Graf
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