Best is a matter of degrees, whether you're talking about the top chefs over the course of months or years.
Certainly this city's kitchens are staffed with more than competent sorts: Brian Luscher, Jean-Marie Cadot, Marc Cassel, Joel Harloff, Graham Dodds...we could go on and on. So in defining our picks, we looked for a combination of big splash and dull, plodding consistency.
Over the long run, consistency matters more. It's as the great Dizzy Dean reportedly said: "it ain't braggin' if you can back it up."
So here are some chefs who, bragging or no, really backed it up...
Best chefs of 2009:
1. Nick Badovinus, Neighborhood Services
There are few places like this, places where you are forced to wait in a crowded bar for an hour--sometimes more--for downscaled dishes and you don't mind a bit. Badovinus returned from the brash, bullying things he created for Hibiscus to almost flawless basics. Now he's planning two more Neighborhood Services. Seems he's on to something.
2. Sarah Johannes, Five-Sixty
Before its gala opening, all
the attention was hurled at owner Wolfgang Puck. It was left to the
young protoge to basically save Reunion Tower from becoming a mere
skyline relic. Turns out she's one of the city's best.
3. Stephan Pyles, Samar/Stephan Pyles
The
Dallas celebrity returned to the fray in 2006 with Stephan Pyles. Not
only did he keep that going, he also used what he gleaned from travels
around the Mediterranean and India to create Samar. Guess it's his way
of staying on top.
Best chefs of the 00s:
1. Sharon Hage, York Street
She
opened in a former garage back in the late spring of 2001. So for close
to a decade now she's kept a 40-seat restaurant with almost no visible
presence running strong. More importantly, she helped kick-start
interest in local and seasonal ingredients here. At the end of the
decade, almost every new place claims some stake with nearby farms.
2. Gilbert Garza, Suze
There
is a more famous Garza, but she just flirts with the limelight. Chef
Gilbert tends to hide in the kitchen, preparing some of the best foie
gras, some of the best trout, some of the best everything you've ever
tried in a neighborhood restaurant. And he was neighborhood long before
Badovinus came around.
3. Kent Rathbun, Abacus
In the
early 2000s there was Rathbun and his Knox-Henderson place. Since then,
he's won television contests, opened Jasper's and other restaurants and
started a number of careers. But all along, there's been Abacus--then,
as now, a destination.
