Mike Colameco’s Real Food ROUGE et BLANC

Rouge et Blanc:
Circa 2011 this was a great little spot on a tiny one way street on the fringes of Soho. Owned by an American Sommelier named Thomas Cregan who put together a really solid French heavy wine list to go with the Vietnamese / French food prepared by Chef Matt Rojas who had worked previously at Eleven Madison Park and Degustation.
A menu of mostly small plates of creatively prepared ingredients that defied borders and were imaginative and delicious. The food press loved it as did I. But NYC being NYC it was there, then was gone a few years later.

on this episode of Mike K’s real food we’ll hit a great little Soho Kitchen putting out some wonderful food I never met a mushroom I didn’t like the restaurant is Rouge at Blanc and they’ve created a French Vietnamese inspired Cuisine that doesn’t make you happy adjust your medicine the kitchen is staffed entirely by Young cooks with great technique bottom that SL it right in and then it’s back to my kitchen where I’ll play around with salmon Bon style it’s all coming up next I’m Mike kco chef and food lover come with me and meet some of today’s most interesting chefs and their Crews at work in their kitchens real chefs real restaurants and real recipes that’s what’s on the menu this is Mike K’s real food we’re here on McDougall Street a couple blocks out the house and this is where it ends 6th Avenue bang done we’re in SoHo technically still feels like the village to me great restaurant neighborhood so restaurant’s rou at Blanc is kind of a French Vietnamese inspired restaurant really cool owner dope wine list great chef great pastry chef I’m stoked tight little menu beautifully focused my kind of place you know everyone here really cares so we’re going to go in do the show and I’m going to go in through the up side [Music] door Tom crean thanks for doing this a bit about your background and then how you got into this space and then the concept behind it I well my background is suier but initially my exposure to French food and wine was studying French literature in college had a good excuse to spend my summers in Paris doing research so please you need an excuse for that no and then a couple years ago I figured why shouldn’t I work for myself I was insisting on the chef that there’ be a lot of French elements in the menu but fusing it with Vietnamese cuisine created an atmosphere of a tabern and Saigon in the’ 40s and then I could do an all French wine list I mean that’s kind of the reason why I open the restaurant so I could do the wine list that’s a great reason open a restaurant it’s a casual atmosphere but the food is is very serious the wine program is very serious every element’s thought out and done perfectly a 17 wag went out chef Matt roas yes give me your backstory so you’re from Arizona so your nationality is born and raised uh Arizona my fourth generation my father is Spanish and my mother’s Mexican okay so just food cultures mingled you got it your grandmother your mother kind of got you inspired yeah you inspired from my family and then uh from there you know I just worked in professional kitchens and well great and you’re what 19 yeah you know I get how old are you you’re 21 uh 28 I just turned 15 to me we’ve got the mushrooms what’s the what’s the liquid what’s the binding B you and then we we uh mix in a little bit of sea urchin Santa Barbara sea urchin man super flavor bombs that’s beautiful surf Turf that is a new surfing Turf to me good looking food dudes talk a little bit about like your inspiration for the restaurant and where you worked and where you where you got these ideas all right well you know growing up as a young kid I always uh grew up with my mother and my grandmother cooking I was into food instantly uh I started cooking in restaurants around 16 uh went to culinary school as soon as I graduate high school came out here about 5 years ago uh you know popped around a few kitchens and my found myself at 11 Madison Park uh for about a year just when Daniel humm arrived yes just when Daniel hum it’s intense kitchen uh you know I learned what New York cooking is all about this is a b baby Yellow Tail baby Yellow Tail comes out of New Zealand it’s a wild line cot it’s nice it’s not as fatty as as a Hamachi but it’s um still catty it’s a little more leaner a lot more firm nice nice thank you uh I worked in at in Arizona with noou fakuda I worked with him for three years so you know my my background’s pretty heavily in that’s great they really you know they’ve got great technique great discipline great finesse yeah definitely knife skills super knife skills super clean I mean just definitely nice looking fish well keep up the great work we’re going to spend the day and night with you in here but I’m aw stoked that I appreciate it I’m glad you’re you know you’re a fan of the food hey I’m a fan of everything good just you’re good awesome thank you dude I love this food talk to me about this dish start off with the um baby Yow tail which is wild CAU line CAU from New Zealand um ugly fruit this guy right here let’s break down the segments kind of drop it in this little Cup right here this is one of my favorite foods a little slice of avocado and I must compliment you on your choice of knives you got this beautiful Japanese knife collection you figure the people that refined and invented samurai swords the samurai exactly the sharpest knif ever invented don’t mess with them they got soared stuff down why would you do anything else right yeah so then we’re just going to go right into the fish even though it’s leaner it’s still fatty like looking at marble and beef that’s beautiful yeah definitely and then uh you know just drape it over this uh beautiful fruit right here really simple a little bit of yuzuk coo which is a green chili paste it’s really uh really sour and really spicy we do try to focus on be Min Cuisine for the most part but we’re going to tap the Asian pallet yeah we kind of use uh you know whatever is needed for the dish from there we’re going to use the soy juice spread it all around finish it with these uh organ truffles that’s just such a cool looking truffle I’ve never worked with American truffles before that’s crazy I should move to Oregon I think I’d like it there and that’s it I’m looking at this thinking this is for me this is like one big shooter like it’s one big uh it’s a little big but you know once you get it all together you kind of squeeze everything it just all explodes at one time and it’s delicious and all these flavors and all these textures Chef we’re going to do this all right going to take one of the smaller ones I hope it works follow the lead Bottoms Up slide right in all right you go first you go first he can do it I’m going to I’m going to help my hand it’s like perfect it’s like just a mouthful delicious man order fire bone marrow Yellow Tail on order squash bone marrow squash and then I’m waiting on that rouer uh the razors are coming up in about five yeah you can fire that whenever you’re ready I really want to sort of break the food down here cuz the food’s so interesting all right what’s the next next we’re doing bone marrow that’s all the maroy goodness well first things first what we do is we make a housemade stallion uh soy bun does the pastry chef make this she does pastry Chef’s going to get a erased by the time I’m leaving here today I’m working on that okay I’m going to talk to Thomas so all we do is we just kind of flatten it out a little bit and we have um we have a pizza brick in the oven from the bottom super hot so what are we doing with the bone marrow bone marrow just a little bit of salt we just hit it on the grill slightly only a couple seconds that is a Hot Grill man after that we just pop this in the oven and then from there we got the baby octopus that’s literally a baby octopus yeah it’s got to be the I thought they were born bigger than this what do you do with them so then next we uh have a little bit of soy uh socket a little bit of sweet wine ginger and garlic and we just quickly marinate it in there all right so now the bread’s about ready beautiful yeah that’s it puffy delicious super gorgeous bone marrow ready the OV that smells really good too we’re going to grill the octopus I think so now we’re going to go right into the grill quickly just a few seconds on each side that’s one Hot Grill dude and you can kind of smell already smell like that so bur the ginger the garc you want to keep the octopus nice and tender so right there it’s done kind of like almost like a medium I me you can eat this raw from here bone goes right on the plate go right with octopus right on top it finish off it’s going to be a salted plum sauce right over the bone marrow like that as well coming through guys behind you behind you this is our uh housemade monkey bread that she’s uh she’s making right now we make it every day monkey bread that’s so classic what’s on top into a roll Malon Sal they’re beautiful Melissa Trang pastry chef here I have to tell you the first night I met you you weren’t wearing your pastry chef I was was you were I was eating dinner and you knew everything about the menu and I’m like how do you know so much about the menu and you said I also I work in the kitchen as well I’m the pastry chef insane yes that’s the way small restaurants work yes there’s lots to do it’s really great being out there getting to see how people feel about the food got me back you know what’s your day off you have one day off one day off that would be Mondays so that’s laundry and sleep day basically I know the drill look at that the beautiful little grain in there and salt what a great smell woo man oh man and my fingers are all buttery you can see that I’m just holding it that doesn’t make you happy adjust your medicine can’t go wrong what have we here boys so it’s a house ground Curry we make a base it’s got like 30 ingredients in it so these two things are related yeah so uh what we do here uh this was kind of our winter dish it’s going to be phasing out but it’s you know a mixture of gourge and squash root vegetables and then we just you know pile it in into the bowl Curry delicious man that’s got to be tasty as convenient this is our H vegetarian dish you know see that’s what I said I could be vegetarian for like 48 Hours 72 hours if you keep feeding me mushrooms and stuff like this I could do it and then I just wake up just Jones them and then uh we serve it with our side of housemade monkey bread where’s that name come from Monkey bre is like an old military thing or what’s that up with that well the way my mother used to make it is she would uh cut into like little rounds like really thin layers and just kind of layered into the bunt pan so like when it bakes you just peel off layers so it’s like monkeys peeling all the bread off yeah I get it all right hi pastry chef talk to me about what you’re making so the fla requires actually a three person pickup so wait a second you let her get away with a threepers pickup come on that’s like crossing the line there but it’s teamwork you know all right all right that’s how we want to look at it Go Team all right go I’m going to get out of the way maybe so first he’s going to start caramelizing some apples the fagra is marinated in miso first that’s why it has that color yeah it has that color tell us what you’re going to do on the pl chip so we use a casis reduction first and then we’ll just do a little drop of it a is that wonderful little Berry tastes great K Royale yes black currant black currant and then we’ll do a little swish pretty this is uh yamamomo they that’s what they call it in Japanese uh more mountain Peach we’ll use one piece is that right there this is a cocoa nib and a bios and chocolate like works with everything yes all right so go ahead you you’re going to work that’s a hot pan this kind of looks burned but that’s exactly what we want right there nice caramelization all right sounds like plate time all right you canel of ice cream first W Ro there’s no messing around with that no it’s apples that’s a beautiful PL of food thank you so brilliant thanks for having us in your work is is great and it’s really great to see pastry again going to these new levels talk to me about some more great great wine list what do you have here uh let’s start with the BL white we’ve got a uh 04 white burgundy there’s a slight perceptible sweetness to the wine but it’s Chardonnay it’s it’s got very nice acid there’s some uh nice Apple fruits there that’s golden that’s it’s golden that’s beautiful it’s a good Summer Wine when you think of Bergen you think of P Noir or Southern burgundy’s balet this is a blend of the two salute salé all right Ali Ali let’s see about lunch this is going to Bar Six uh Rachel so this Papo with wild mushrooms um and wild shitake we don’t see this technique anymore in Papio much yes bringing an old plasic back you want to eat it you can have it if you want I never met a mushroom I didn’t like look at that it’s just all mushroomy goodness man I love mushrooms so this uh this one of my favorite dishes all right sorry we got work to do this is uh this is one of our more rustic dishes grilled Fon just spread avocado smoked brook trout little bit of chilies and then we top it off with some uh smoked trout row you know what trout row is really good yeahor has gotten so expensive I’ve been eating trout R and thinking trout R is crazy good sustainable delicious that’s pretty you can fire that that uh rouer too okay describe me what I got going on here so this is a house made sausage um it’s got you know a lot of herbs chili uh fish sauce pickle pickle prot what’s the me it’s pork that’s beautiful PL a little bit of sunflower just for some herbs so let’s put this on bar six okay this one as well you go to Bar five uhoh there’s something new green papaya salad it’s uh mixed in with sweet tofu uh scallion cilantro and a curry vinegret and then we just Whole Fry these prawns you eat the whole sh the head the tail everything it’s all crispy R those like salt and pepper shrimp in Chinatown yeah it’s kind of a you know the same idea for the most part and then the shrimp are just delicious man head on crunchy eat them head to tail just pop them in the mouth yep so prep all day here you just got to work tight right yeah four people’s a crowd in here luckily you’re not all that big is there a height restriction is is there hold on am I suggesting a bias I love this kitchen because I feel like I’m tall at 5’8 I am a towering presence I remember the first time I was in Denmark man people there are huge Holland and Denmark huge it was like being being like with a basket ball team everywhere you went I never felt like such a [ __ ] in my life that’s the Roe for the lamb you make it you know stretch it out to order every time all right so that’s our Roi now we got our crazy lamb the nuttiest thing is like everything on the menu looks like something I’m going to like I can see it in my future so we’ve got this semi boneless whail exactly breast bones are out there’s just a little bone in here so boneless and it’s marinated in what uh we do uh whole grain mustard garlic and shallot and a little bit of lemon zest okay um over here we got bluefoot mushrooms from France uh local moral all right so go ahead you you’re going to work little grape seed oil throw them down on the flat side so they get a nice uh they get a nice color nice color on one side just beautiful see that that tastes great that’s like crispy some somehow when they get sauteed the flavor just amplifies while those are cooking we’re just going to throw down theil and then we’re just going to slowly Grill this guy probably the like the low side of the grill F the Quil we got a little bit of garlic butter here whole butter just going to let that garlic get golden brown Quail you want to serve at least like nice and medium so this is where we’re at right now you want to keep it nice and yeah you over cook it it’s totally dry yeah a little lemon juice just going to put these back right here then really quickly we’re going to cook some qua eggs so just going to pan fry them leave them nice and running kind of acts as a as a sauce as well so that’s probably good right there all right sounds like plate time so this is your pine nut butter pine nut butter just give a nice uh healthy Spoonful like that and then we just going to spread it this is uh Trump ppet mushroom pure kind of keep a nice light color so we got this amazing flavor base nuts mushrooms all earthy tones yes and then now we just go right on uh with the mushrooms sprawl this guy out very natural very natural looking and a little bit of vels vinegar around the edge yeah bonel is this great kind of fortified dessert wine coming from the south of France actually ages outside in casks great pairing with chocolate it’s going to be good with these flavors too then we’re just GNA top it right on top and uh for to finish it off just a little garish the quaill is marinated in mustard so we’re going to garnish with some mustard leaves and a little bit of uh shaved uh candy beads that’s a gorgeous plate man thank you very much that’s just so so much thought so good looking and I know it’s going to taste great I love restaurants like this with chefs who write menus that under promise and then totally overd deliver the meals I’ve had so far at Rouge at Blanc rate among the most interesting that I’ve had anywhere this year that’s gorgeous and thanks for yet another little spot that’s 15 minutes from my front door I just love it my pleasure the search for where I’m going to eat tonight just got more complicated rouet Blanc love that place uh hardworking team I thought I’d do like a riff on the bonme which is classic Vietnamese street food you know bonme is sort of endemic all around New York City all over Brooklyn downtown there’s little bonme stands with that sandwich that kind of captures that crosscultural French Vietnamese things but I thought let’s get salmon instead of pork as the protein instead of Pate as the protein and get those bonme flavors going and I’m going to make kind of a poached steamed salmon bonme style for want of a better term first thing we’re going to do is get our ingredients ready I’d say seven minutes later dinner’s on the table so let’s start prepping the ingredients scallions Carris and I’m going to use just the outside of the Cucumber I’m going to keep it kind of big cuz I love that sort of crunch little bit of jalapeno and we’re just going to exactly I want to put these ingredients in exactly as I experience them when I eat Bon me so just sliced and even though Ginger wouldn’t Norm be in there that’s how it is I shop I see stuff I like and I thought well I’ve always loved Ginger and salmon together just a touch of garlic everything’s going to go in the pan together so just a pinch of garlic I know this is going to seem remarkably easy but that’s how I like to cook why not make things remarkably easy complicated for what cooking simple so with my salmon with my ingredients assembled we’re going to move over to the stove all right got a pan I don’t want it too too too screaming hot we’re going to go in with just a drizzle of oil we don’t need a lot of oil cuz as you all know Salmon’s got a good amount of fat in it and this is really going to mostly steam so we’re going to get a little color there I’m just going to go in with all these vegetables few drops of lemon juice soy sauce little bit of rice wine vinegar and most importantly a lid it’s been about in real time two two and a half minutes that Salmon’s not a big thick piece of salmon I’m just going to take a peek inside this pan I think it’s real close to being done yeah look at that and that’s what she looks like just put this on a plate this just screamed for I mean you have to serve this with rice or a baguette we got a nice little crunchy baguette here so let’s go inside see what this is like small piece of fish I’d say this is maybe 4 oz 5 O of salmon but it’s this super fatty Super Rich cucumber Crispy Crunchy delicious all right they’re not doing this at rou Blanc they’re doing stuff that’s much more interesting much more technically difficult and much better but that’s why we go out to those restaurants to eat dinner out and make stuff like this at home that’s a riff on the idea so that in mind keep cooking try these recipes and we’ll be back as always next week [Music] 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