Gayle Pirie and John Clark: The _Heeb_ Interview

Chefs Gayle Pirie and John Clark are Slow Food legends, with long stints at Chez Panisse and Zuni Cafe and two cookbooks (Country Egg, City Egg and Williams Sonoma Bride & Groom Cookbook) to their names. Now the pair are heading up Foreign Cinema in San Francisco, where they are preparing to cook Heeb‘s first Slow Food Seder. Leading up to the event, we asked them where they get their grub, what makes them slow food-ies, and what "slow food" means, exactly.

What is "Slow Food" to you?

Slow Food returns us to cooking methods that restore, nurture, and celebrate the culinary traditions that our “fast society” drive us from. Slow Food is a return to the quality of community and family; and of being responsible and responsive to ourselves and others. Through Slow Food, people are once again united with the local land and the products coming from that land, and become more conscious of how fragile our food systems really are.

What interests you about the Slow Food movement?

Our culinary careers began in San Francisco. So the proximity to the organic and sustainable movement are our culinary foundation. When it comes to writing the daily menu, we rely on looking at the freshness of the food the farmers bring us and composing menus around that fundamental ideal.

What are your favorite dishes to cook and/or eat?

We use cooking techniques and recipes from France, Spain, Italy, Tunisia, and the Middle East to express what we ourselves would like to eat that day. We rely on a balance of natural meats, organic vegetables and light flavorful sauces that complement the food without overpowering it.

Which farmer’s market do you like best?

We live and shop in Berkeley and bring it into town (San Francisco), so that we are mostly at Berkeley Farmers Markets.

All of our purveyors are very local and come from every direction.

Who are your favorite food purveyors?

We get organic bread from Acme Bread in Berkeley, and organic cheese from Cowgirl Creamery in Point Reyes, and all over America, where hand made organic artisinal cheeses are more and more available. Our meat is supplied through a local company called Golden Gate meat. We can buy all of our meat naturally raised, without hormones, antibiotics, etc. Many selections are organic. All of our eggs are organic from a supplier in Lodi named “New Life Farms”

For seafood, our friends at Monterey Fish in SF provide the best in sustainably captured fish. We have worked with them for nearly 20 years.

Our fruits and vegetables will have many farms:

Martin Bournesque brings us arugula he picks on Thursday morning in Salinas—it’s on the menu that night. His rose geranium makes the best ice cream. Capay farms, Marin Roots, Riverdog Farms, and the folks at Terra Sonoma in Sebastopol bring us so much variety from Yolo County and the entire group of smaller farmers in that area. They are representing many farms, so it’s like one-stop shopping.

Many traditional Jewish dishes are steeped in symbolism and history – how do you feel that fits in with the Slow Food movement?

We enjoy working with this wonderful group of people. Together we support the Slow Food movement, from the seasonal selection, quality of product, and rich traditions and cooking methods used by generations of families and communities in the past.

What do you think?