More Top (Chef) secrets

Photo: Donna Rickles

Time Out Chicago: Hi, Stephanie. Your voice sounds a little hoarse; have you been doing a lot of interviews?
Stephanie Izard: I just got back from a trip to Mexico, and I'm a little under the weather, so apologies. Hopefully you can forgive me.

TOC: Oh no, it’s no problem. I thought maybe that you had just been doing a lot of press already.
Stephanie Izard: No, not yet.

TOC: Well I wanted to obviously talk to you about the show. Let’s jump in with something that a lot of people aren’t quite clear about. Some say you closed Scylla to be on the show. So can you speak to that? Is that what happened?
Stephanie Izard: No, no, and I would definitely like to clarify that, because that would be something that is just ridiculous in my mind. It just happened to be really good timing. I actually made the decision to close Scylla earlier last summer–—probably around the end of June. It just turned out that way, with the buyer and everything, that the timing was just perfect for going on the show.

TOC: What was the timing? When you did close, did you know that you were going on the show? I know that you didn’t make the decision based on that.
Stephanie Izard: I actually got final word that I was going to be on the show a couple weeks after the restaurant actually closed.

TOC: And when you did get on the show, did you know that it was going to be filmed in Chicago?
Stephanie Izard: I did. I heard, I just heard rumors that it was going to be in Chicago.

TOC: Did that make you want to be on it more? How did the fact that it was filmed in Chicago influence the way you acted on the show?
Stephanie Izard: I think it helped a little bit; obviously, it makes me more comfortable in my own city. It made it sort of fun to see what they were going to do with showing off our city as a culinary city. So each challenge that they had, and wherever they took us each and every day, it was really fun to see what the producers found in Chicago to be the highlights.

TOC: And did you always agree with that?
Stephanie Izard: Um, yeah. I think that everything that they did choose did highlight our city, and it was fun before I went to the show, I tried to come up with things that I thought they should do, or things I thought they might do. There were a couple I was right about, but there was definitely some of them that they really were able to catch us off guard with.

TOC: Are you friends with Dale? ’Cause you used to cook with them at La Tache?
Stephanie Izard: Yeah, I was the sous chef at La Tache. And we’re still good friends, yeah.

TOC: Did he have anything to do with getting you on the show?
Stephanie Izard: I’m not sure exactly how it was. I know a lot of my cooks just thought it would be a great thing for me to do. And Dale, once I did start the process, Dale did encourage me and thought that I would be great for the show.

TOC: Do you think that the show has been good for Dale?
Stephanie Izard: Yeah, he’s loving life right now. And he keeps telling me, wait, things are just going to get crazy out of control. But he’s loving it, and he had a great experience doing it, as did I.

TOC: Oh good. So, being one of the – I know the Bravo press people are saying that there were three Chicago connections; I am really only considering two—being one of the two Chicago chefs in the house, did you feel a responsibility to show the other chefs the city?
Stephanie Izard: A little bit. When we would be driving in the vans, they would keep asking me, “Where are we going, Stephanie? Where are they taking us?” But it was fun to, as we were driving through the city, point out things to them. I kept telling them, I want you guys to come back after the show has been on TV, so we can actually go out and enjoy the city together and go check out all the great restaurants that we have and other things that the city has to offer.

TOC: And what did everyone think of Chicago?
Stephanie Izard: I think everyone really enjoyed it. At first, we were spending a lot of time at the house, and we’re spending a lot of time in the Top Chef Kitchen, but we did get to see quite a bit of the city, and I think that they would all want to come back and spend some time here or there.

TOC: So on nights when you weren’t filming, or if there are nights that you aren’t filming, but let’s say you don’t have a challenge or something. Were you allowed to go and just eat wherever you wanted?
Stephanie Izard: I’m not sure what I can say about this, but we pretty much just all spent most of our time at the house. We liked to cook together at the house and just spending time getting to know each other and stuff like that. Not really being quite as public about it.

TOC: Okay. So was the experience what you expected it to be?
Stephanie Izard: I don’t think there’s any way to expect there. Do you expect it to be the way it was? I expected to meet some great people and have a great time—which I did. But you know, I just, I really had no idea what to expect going into it. And luckily I walked away having just a great experience.

TOC: So what was your strategy for winning?
Stephanie Izard: My strategy I’m sure is most people’s, which is to make food that tastes good, and try not to get, of course with cameras around and knowing that millions of people will be watching it is going to bring out a little nervousness in anyone, but I just wanted to try and get over that as quickly as possible and just try and make food that tasted great.

TOC: For people that were fans of Syclla, will they recognize your cooking style in the show?
Stephanie Izard: I think so, you know…

TOC: You work with a lot of fish; I know that’s your preference.
Stephanie Izard: Yeah, I would have liked to work with a little more fish. Again, I’m not sure what I can go into detail with this.

[Random PR rep]: “Yeah we just can’t get into any specifics.”

Stephanie Izard: But if I say this generally? Generally I would say I didn’t work with as much seafood as I would like, just because we’re shopping at Whole Foods. It’s a little bit different than the fish that we’re able to get as chefs in Chicago. I wouldn’t say it’s the exact same style as Syclla, but you can still see flavor combinations, and I tried to represent my style as much as possible.

TOC: You know, I don’t think people think about that. That hadn’t even occurred to me at all—that, I guess, part of the challenge of the chefs on the show is shopping at Whole Foods. You’re used to getting very specific ingredients and stuff that is probably better than what you can get in Whole Foods.
Stephanie Izard: Right. It’s the same with being a home cook vs. being a chef in a restaurant. You just don’t have the same exposure to different ingredients and so you know. If I have thought in my head of something I had at Syclla, and I wanted to make it for a challenge, once you get to Whole Foods you realize a lot of those ingredients aren’t available. You sort of have to adjust. But there’s great product at Whole Foods; it’s just a little different than we can get, especially once you get into the fresh seafood department.

TOC: Right. Jumping off of that, I wonder: A lot of times I watch these shows, not just Top Chef, but Project Runway and all these shows; I’m often thinking to myself, Are they really geared towards judging what makes a top chef? Are they really appropriate for that? Or are they just good challenges to watch on TV? Do you understand my question?
Stephanie Izard: I do. It sounds like you are asking, Is it really finding out who is the top chef or is it more for entertainment value? [Laughs]

TOC: It’s more like to the count of how indicative are these challenges of what you actually have to do as a chef at a restaurant.
Stephanie Izard: I think that a lot of the challenges—they try to not just have challenges that are about cooking, but also about being able to work well with others, which is important in a restaurant. Being able to be a leader, which is important in a restaurant. So I think that though, of course when you watch the past seasons you can see a lot of the challenges might seem a little… It’s not something that’s going to happen every day in a restaurant. A chef’s not going to have to cook out of only one aisle of the grocery store. I think they did that a couple seasons ago. But a chef is going to have to just think on their feet and make quick decisions and make it work if things aren’t going exactly their way. So though it doesn’t seem like everyday things that would happen in a restaurant, they do use qualities that a chef does need to succeed. Both in real life and a restaurant.

TOC: I remember we interviewed you when you announced you were closing Syclla, and correct me if I’m wrong. One of things that you mentioned was that you loved being a chef and you loved cooking, but you don’t love all the other things that come with owning a restaurant. Is that right?
Stephanie Izard: I just would like to be able to, towards, when I was at Syclla I just ended up taking on the tasks of doing all the accounting and doing the front of the house. Which is great, I’m glad that I know those things now. And I think that every chef should know how to do those and should be part of them. But I just would prefer to next time start off with a partner that can take on some of those responsibilities. And you know, of course, cooking is my more preferred part of the restaurant.

TOC: Okay, so if you win Top Chef then you, do you think that you would open another restaurant with the prize money?
Stephanie Izard: It’s very hard to say what the future is going to bring, but that is definitely one of the things I’d like to consider. Like I said, they’re doing it with an experienced restaurateur-type business partner.

TOC: Do you like being on TV? Do you think you’d like to do more TV?
Stephanie Izard: I don’t know. I haven’t yet watched myself on TV. So we’ll see how it comes out. I’ve been watching a couple clips, and of course it’s interesting to hear my voice when it doesn’t sound like this, and to see myself on television. I would say, the experience when behind the camera is a lot of fun and it would definitely be something that given the opportunity that I would do again.

TOC: Did it ever annoy you to have to live in that house with all those people knowing that your own house is so close?
Stephanie Izard: I just found it more comical. You know, every once in a while I would joke with them, and say, “Hey, um…you know my house—of course I can’t give details exactly where we were…”

TOC: I know where…on Wrightwood, yeah.
Stephanie Izard: Yeah. “Hey, guys, we can run to my house and have a little party.” No, it was more comical. I didn’t mind. It was kind of fun. It was like going to summer camp down the street.

TOC: Did everybody get along?
Stephanie Izard: Yeah, everybody got along. I’m sure there was little tiffs here and there, but for the most part you’re bringing together a bunch of people from around the country but we all have the similar interest, which is of course food. So we would talk a lot about that, and there’s just a lot of really fun people, which I think is what you find in the restaurant industry anyway, which is what draws a lot of people to it.

TOC: I’m going to preface this question by saying that on the Bravo press site, there is a list of episodes and it sort of does go through vaguely what some of the challenges are. So I don’t know if you can answer this question…
[PR: Ehhhhh…. Yeah. We can’t really talk about any of the challenges.]

TOC: Well, Stephanie. Let me ask you this. Is it hard to stay quiet about all this?
Stephanie Izard: Yeah. It is. I’m excited to, when the episodes start airing, to watch them with friends and family. Of course, even afterwards you can’t start to talk about it, but it will be fun to actually have everyone see my experience and know what it is that I was off doing for a few weeks. So it will be nice when it starts to open up a little bit.

TOC: When did Valerie get eliminated?
[PR: Yeah, we can’t talk about anything like that.]

TOC: I’m going to just ask the questions; just tell me if you can’t answer. I don’t want to bother you, but I don’t know what you can and can’t say. It’s rumored that you are in the final three or four.
[PR: It’s something we cannot talk about.]

TOC: Is there anything else that you can talk about that I didn’t ask you about?
Stephanie Izard: I…I’m just waiting for her to chime in and sort of comment.

TOC: I know you can’t say what you did on the challenges. But I’m going to guess that there was pastry involved. I know you didn’t do the pastry at Scylla, so how did you, there are things like that that aren’t your forte, that you had to do on the show. How did you handle those situations?
Stephanie Izard: I think before going to the show, and having watched past seasons, you know they are going to bring up pastries. You know they are going to bring up things that might not be your forte. So as far as for myself, I just spent some time talking with my old pastry chef Jeffery and just going over some basic—it’s nice to have some basic pastry recipes in your head all the time anyway. But I have spent a lot of time in the past doing that, so I just sort of went through a lot of my old notebooks and things before going on the show just to cover different areas of different cuisines, and pastries, just to sort of refresh my memory on some things I hadn’t been doing just when I left Syclla.

TOC: Did you feel like this was stiff competition from the other chefs?
Stephanie Izard: Yes. The casting people did a great job this year finding such talented chefs. Just people that are really moving ahead in the industry and a lot of people that are going to have great futures, and it was definitely intimidating at first. You know, sort of hear people’s resumes, and then also when you start seeing them cook. Just a lot of talent this year.

TOC: Are you allowed to talk to Dale? I don’t know why you wouldn’t be. But I wanted to know if this has brought you closer with Dale at all.
Stephanie Izard: Yeah, Dale and I still hang out just as friends. We can’t go into detail yet. I think it will be really fun after my season has aired, and now that his has aired, and we can just sort of talk more in detail with each other about our experiences. And when I have seen him, he’s just really proud of me for having done the show, and I’m of course so so proud of him for how he did on the show. I think we, both just being opposite sex, we both had the same experience, and we’re both just really proud of each other as far as our careers are going and how the Top Chef experience went for both of us.

TOC: Last thing. When you were out filming, one day, I don’t know what it was, but I was at Green City Market and there were cameras all over the place. And people were running up to see what happening, and there were blog reports that “Oh, I saw Top Chef crew at Whole Foods today.” Just kind of no details, but just kind of like maniacal fascination with everything Top Chef. How much did you come into contact with fans when you were shooting? How do you think you are going to handle it later? You know, like when Dale walks down the street now.
Stephanie Izard: People take pictures with him everywhere….

TOC: Wanting to touch his Mohawk…
Stephanie Izard: Right? Yeah, it’s interesting. During filming, you don’t really notice people taking pictures and things like that, but afterwards when I got home and looked on the Internet at the different blogging going on when we were filming, and I guess people must be busting out their cell phone pictures and taking pictures. It’s interesting to see how excited people are about the show. It’s kind of foreshadowing of what’s going to be happening when the show starts. But I really, I’m trying to prepare for what’s going to happen but we’ll have to see. I don’t know. It seems that people are Top Chef crazy, which is really exciting that I get to be a part of that.

TOC: Did fans try and talk to you while you were in the middle of a challenge like shopping at Whole Foods?
Stephanie Izard: I didn’t personally have anyone try and talk to me. You’re so focused on the short-term thing, that you have to do the shopping then. If someone did try and talk to me, you just sort of run right past them and try and find your next ingredient.