Hasta La Ideas

We interview an award-winning chef on bringing his distinctive Peruvian cuisine to L.A.

In the summer of 2009 chef Ricardo Zarate found a daring way to share his bold Peruvian flavors with Los Angeles. After many years cooking in elegant restaurants in London and Southern California, he surprisingly opened Mo-Chica in Mercado La Paloma, a food court near USC. With a menu that honored his traditional Peruvian roots and showed off his immense creative talent, he amazed local food scene devotees and eventually won many culinary accolades including Food and Wine Magazine’s “Best New Chefs of 2011” award. Zarate was also at the helm of the most coveted kitchen space in L.A. for four months in 2010, when he coordinated the myriad chefs cooking special menus at the revered experimental Test Kitchen.

Now with his beautiful new Beverly Hills restaurant Picca and a new Mo-Chica location opening in downtown L.A. later this year, Zarate has not only taken the city by storm with his masterful cooking and dynamic flavors, but has also helped put Peruvian ingredients and flavors in the mainstream spotlight.

We recently caught up with Zarate at Picca and talked about his mission to bring Peruvian food to the world stage and his devotion to Aji Amrillo. Our interview and his recipe for ceviche follow.

Why did you decide to open Mo-Chica in the L.A. after cooking around the world?

I came to L.A. because I had already been here and really liked it, and there is so much Latin culture here. Los Angeles is a difficult city to open a new restaurant, it is very competitive but one of the main things that drives me is challenge. Since the year 2000 I knew I wanted to open up a Peruvian restaurant—I had a vision that it was going to happen. I hope that in 20 years Peruvian food will be recognized as Japanese food is now. That’s my goal. People used to think of Japanese food as exotic and rare, and now it is part of world cuisine.

When you opened Mo-Chica in the Mercado La Paloma food court, were you surprised by the reaction?

I was very surprised and happy. The reason I opened Mo-Chica there is because I am very stubborn. I opened the restaurant during the worst time in the economy. In 2009 it was hard to get anyone to invest even one dollar. For me, my vision was ‘this is my only opportunity.’ I had to jump into the storm and try to survive. Peruvian food has always been there and now people are starting to pay attention. It was the right moment to do it.

Why do you think that Peruvian food works so well here in California?

In California, people like Mexican and Latin food. In terms of flavors, people here also like the umami flavors in Japanese, Italian and Mediterranean food. Peruvian dishes have all of these flavors on one plate. That is why I think it is going to be popular. You go to a Japanese restaurant and have very clean, nice ingredients. You eat Mexican and the food is very spicy. Mediterranean has the freshness. With Peruvian you can play with all of that on one plate, since the cuisine has Chinese, Japanese, African, European and Peruvian influences.

Can you tell us a bit about pre-Incan cuisine and how those flavors and ingredients factor into the dishes you make?

In my family we have descendents from the Incan on my mother’s side. Many of the ingredients we are using are in there, like sun-dried potatoes and the many types of corn like cancha, mote and choclo. We also have the Aji amarillo and Aji Panca chiles and herbs like Huacatay. A few weeks ago I went to the Santa Monica Farmer’s Market and we found Huacatay. I was so excited!

You use Aji amarillo chiles in many of your dishes. Can you tell us about them?

Aji amarillo is my favorite ingredient. If somehow that ever disappeared, Peruvian food for me would disappear. That’s how much I love it. I use it in many different ways. You can take out the seeds and make it mild or keep them for a spicier effect. It marries so nicely and is so flavorful, we put it in the cheesecake here and also started mixing it with miso…Right now we are importing then from Peru. My goal is to grow them here. We are working on it with a local farm. It’s tough. We have been trying since last year. Some of the plants died. In others attempts, the flavor was not right. Finally I received a phone call three weeks ago that the plants are doing well. Hopefully we will have the locally grown ones soon.

Another ingredient I would like to bring here is the Peruvian lemon. The flavor of the lemon is different than those grown in California. The Peruvian ones look like limes, but the skin is very thin. The flavor has acidity, but it is not as strong as the lemons here. When I use local lemons, I have to play a lot to balance the flavor.

You are known for cooking beef heart, can you elaborate on that?

Yes, in my country anticuchos is traditionally a street food of grilled food on a skewer. Beef heart is the number one most popular ingredient for anticuchos that you will find in Peru. We also cook stomach, tripe and many other ingredients.

You are also known for your classic and creative ceviches. What is the secret to a great ceviche?

First of all, it is fresh ingredients. The second thing to consider is the balance of flavor. For me it needs to be balanced with a kick. All the ingredients need to marry together. The kick can be chile, spices or garlic. Ceviche is a dish that needs to have power.

Do you have a favorite ceviche?

The most simple one is my favorite—sea bass, lime, onions, garlic, cilantro and for chile I would use Aji amarillo or Rocoto.

Ricardo Zarate’s Ceviche

For the ceviche sauce:

1/3 cup pure honey

4 garlic cloves

1/4 red onion

4 sticks of clean celery

1/8 lb fresh seabass

1 cup lime juice

½ cup coconut milk

1 tbs Aji amarillo paste

For the ceviche:

1 lb fresh seabass, diced

½ red onion, sliced

1 tbs cilantro, sliced

Red serrano chili (to taste)

Salt and pepper (to taste)

Notes: Aji amarillo paste is a yellow Peruvian chili paste that you can find in different Latin markets. You can substitute the serrano chili for either jalapeño or habanero chilis to taste.

Nightmare and the Cat celebrate their EP release with a raucous NYC show

“Drink your shots, pick up your beer and come watch us perform,” Django Stewart commanded the crowd at Mercury Lounge last week. “We’re Nightmare and the Cat,” punctuated his brother and fellow frontman Sam Stewart, kicking off the show to launch their debut EP. Eight songs later, sweating and dazed, the packed house saw the band off the stage with rapturous applause. The music that came between varied from lofty, thoughtful rock to soulful, layered folk. Dramatic, story-driven, catchy and with swoon-inspiring potency that envelops the band itself (as well as their performance and the new album), Nightmare and the Cat exude nothing shy of magic.

The two frontmen, despite their youthful appearances, both were members of since dispersed, but seasoned musical acts before forming the band a little over a year ago in Los Angeles. Sam spent seven years with London band Blondelle, while Django helmed The Midnight Squires.

Together, with multi-instrumentalist and singer Claire Acey, drummer Spike Phillips and bassist Julie Mitchell, the five-piece has performed both coasts, a SXSW showcase with artist Gary Baseman and the United Kingdom. Circumnavigating the Edward Sharp and Local Natives aesthetic, the band’s harmonies, taut instrumentals and atmosphere build, first and foremost, an environment where their stories exist.

The self-titled EP, lush and melodic, feels more than anything like a thrilling teaser for things to come. A melodic through line weaves among the tracks “Sarah Beth,” “The Missing Year” and “Little Poet.” Orchestration and backing vocals play off Django’s dynamic voice—often in dialogue, sometimes in alignment.

Just when you feel the band settling in with a sound, the closing song, “Anybody’s Bride,” punctures it with punkish ferociousness. The whimsicality might feel extravagant, but never disposable, glazing the music with a limitless sense of wonder. There is sentimentality and delicacy to even the more raucous portions of the tracks, knitting everything together as sound storytelling should.

Famed photographer Mick Rock, a supporter of the band and attendee at the Mercury Lounge show, once snapped an iconic photograph of David Bowie, Lou Reed and Iggy Pop, arms draped across one another. There was startling breadth and depth to those three musicians’ work. As If schooled in the language of rock, Nightmare and the Cat draw on these influences, blend their lessons and strengths and craft something all their own.

Top image by Sterling Taylor, performance images by Eli Russell Linnetz.

OHWOW’s group show reflecting the American mood of the past decade

As its name suggests, OHWOW’s “Post 9-11” show presents work by nine New York-based artists whose pieces are evocative of the mixed American mood following the attacks on that day in September 2001. While none of the work addresses the pivotal event explicitly, the curators explain that the exhibition “title puts a time stamp on this particular decade and marks a turning point for this group of artists.”

Of course, there’s also a mix of self-seriousness and an ironic tone here preventing too deep a read of the title. More than anything, the collaboration of these artists and friends—Dan Colen, Terence Koh, Hanna Liden, Nate Lowman, Adam McEwen, Ryan McGinley, Agathe Snow, Dash Snow and Aaron Young—speaks to their bond and an inherent “interconnectedness of the work,” united by place and time despite their distinct forms of expression.

One work in particular, the late Dash Snow’s digital color print, “Untitled,” (above, 2008, courtesy of the Dash Snow Estate) conceptually anchors the artists’ shared histories as lived on the streets of the city. The image of a mysterious, vomit-like splatter on pavement that seems as chaotic and repulsive as the actual events of 9-11. While the piece, both unapologetic and defiant, accounts for one end of the exhibition’s spectrum as a “visual memoir of a defining era,” it also introduces the tragedy of Dash’s untimely death, a moment that now unavoidably also defines the era and group.

The show opens at OHWOW’s Los Angeles gallery with a reception on Thursday evening, 30 June 2011, and will run until 27 August 2011.

Pictured, top row from L-R: Aaron Young, “HOME” (2011), courtesy of Bortolami; Dan Colen,“Blop!” (2011), courtesy Gagosian Gallery. Photography by Robert McKeever. Above: Ryan McGinley, “Tom (Golden Tunnel)” (2010), image courtesy Team Gallery and the artist.

Journey across the universe in a one-night-only show of whimsical work by an LA-based painter

Working out of her garage on a quiet street in the heart of Silverlake, Los Angeles-based artist Vanessa Prager gleefully creates her curious paintings and ink pen drawings. We caught up with the bubbly creative just a few days before her new solo show at ADBD Gallery, dubbed “Across The Universe.” Like many of her shows, it is a one-night-only affair with a special guest host and immersive installation piece, which Prager says helps create a relaxed atmosphere and draws the viewer into her illusory world.

With her works at the framers, on our visit Prager was busy putting the finishing touches on her installation, which will greet patrons as they enter the gallery space at ADBD and subtly continue throughout. Crafting little flies out of wax-like paper with her mom on a pile of real sod grass on the floor of the garage (which she will use to outline the room at her show), she told us about her more recent interest in painting animals—which is primarily “because they’re awesome!” Typically depicting people in heightened situations, Prager transfers that sense of drama to scenes in nature, where she captures the creepy feeling of encountering a group of large animals like deer or elephants.

The sun streaming in on the corner of the make-shift studio, Prager’s space is filled with warmth and a dizzying array of paints, old frames, tools, craft supplies, music sheets and inspirational works—like a lithograph portrait of her grandfather. You get the sense that there is nothing she won’t attempt to create herself, including the sink in the corner where she tediously cleans her brushes. “I knew I needed a sink out here, so I found an old one at a vintage store, hooked it up to the hose from outside and made it exactly my height.”

While her highly saturated works give way to a false sense of reality, her study of the universe feels accurate. Her portrayal of human behavior scratches at life’s emotional ups and downs, and the contrast between the bursts of color in the foreground and stark backgrounds reflects this natural turmoil.

Catch “Across The Universe” tonight, 2 June 2011, at ADBD in Los Angeles, hosted by Danny Masterson from 7-10pm, and mark your calendar for her solo show at Shepard Fairey’s Subliminal Gallery in April 2012. See more of her studio and works in the gallery below.

Reinvented wedding photography captures modern love

Cover bands and Jordan almonds aside, the real make-or-break wedding detail comes down to the one thing that may even outlast the vows—the photos. One wedding photographer reinventing traditional wedding photography is Los Angeles-based lensman Max Wanger. With a confident eye, Wanger captures effortlessly elegant images of love-filled weddings, engagements or couple’s lives, creating tangible memories that wouldn’t look out of place in a glossy publication. Describing his work as “offbeat, whimsical and romantic” and inspired by everything from Mos Def to “little kids who are way cooler than me,” this blogger-photographer-retailer had plenty to tell us about love, lens choice and lifelong commitment.

Big one first, what does love mean to you?

I’m not sure how to adequately articulate that. As a photographer, I’m lucky enough to be surrounded by love all the time and I’m lucky enough to be able to capture it. In that sense, love is what I see all around me.

Who inspired you to get behind a lens?

I built my first camera when I was seven-years-old. I made a Polaroid out of paper and scotch tape. I suppose that was the beginning of my photography career.

Did you plan to start shooting couples and wedding or was it something you just fell into?

As silly as it sounds, it just happened one day. I thought there might be a way to put my own spin on weddings, to photograph them differently. So I tried. Now, two years later, here I am.

How do you capture such intimate and private moments in your pictures without interrupting the moment?

I try to stay invisible as much as I can. The beginning of a shoot is always the hardest for clients because very few are comfortable in front of a camera. After a few minutes though, you get into a rhythm and it becomes all about them, and at that point I’m just an observer.

You are married yourself?

Yes, I got married last year. Shooting my own wedding would have been a pretty impressive feat, but, thankfully and luckily, we have amazing friends who are also amazing photographers so they shot it for us.

What are your tools of choice?

Photo mechanic to sort through images, Photoshop to process… Oh yeah, a few 5D Mark IIs, a handful of Polaroids and a Contax G2.

How did your popular blog and now online shop come about?

The blog was a necessity to get the work out there, to establish a voice. The shop was started because I wanted to do something different; I wanted to push myself in another way. The original idea behind it was to sell limited edition shirts based on my photographs. The hope was to sell a different shirt every month so people could collect them. I’ve since changed it so it isn’t monthly anymore. When I feel inspired to put another design out there, I do it. We actually just released our first hoodie and we also sell prints and postcards.

What is the greatest compliment you’ve ever received?

Someone once told me that I made them believe in love again. That was a pretty good one.

Does being behind the lens ever stop you from fully embracing the moment?

I don’t think so. If anything, I feel like I embrace it more behind the lens. When I’m behind the camera, I feel like I’m seeing a world no one else sees. I think that every photographer needs to feel that way, otherwise what’s the point? Sometimes I get so wrapped up in the moment that I have to be careful—I’ve almost fallen off of a cliff and a roof, and I’ve actually fallen into a pool. Not my finest moment.

What do you think of apps like Hipstamatic and Instagram?

I like them. I think they’re fun. Ultimately, that’s what photography is about—having fun, experimenting and letting go.

What do you do when you’re not shooting?

When I’m not shooting, I’m processing. When I’m not processing, I’m responding to e-mails. There’s no end to learning how to run a business.

What inspires you?

Off the top of my head—Rodney Smith, Tim Walker, Paolo Pellegrin, Mos Def, New York, Tokyo, negative space, simplicity, little kids who are way cooler than me.

What’s next for you?

The immediate are trips to New York, London and Ireland. In the future are commercial gigs, personal projects, a little golf and a lot of sleep.