Category: Food


Roy Yamaguchi

Filed Under: Food

Roy Yamaguchi is a celebrity chef from the first season on Iron Chef Asian in Japan. After writing four cookbooks, he appeared in Top Chef Masters on the Bravo Channel

Nunn on the Run visited him at the first ever Food & Wine Festival in Honolulu, Hawaii and attended a pig roast at a farm. We discussed his background and massive chain of restaurants.

Jerry Nunn: Start our readers out, were you born here?

Roy Yamaguchi: I was born and raised in Japan on an army base. My dad is from Maui and my mom is from Okinawa. I used to come from Japan to Hawaii almost every summer. I worked in my grandfather’s general store.

How did you get into opening restaurants?

RY: My father loved to cook. He would always take us to excursions as kids to the different seaports to buy fish. He had a big interest in fish and fishing. That is how it all happened. My father was the one who cooked most of our meals at home. So growing up with my dad always cooking got me to be more involved with cooking myself.

Did you go to school for cooking?
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Buddy Valastro

Filed Under: Food

Buddy Valastro the Italian cake decorator rose to fame with Cake Boss on the television network TLC. The reality show follows the Valastro family around through various challenges as they run a business. Carlo’s Bake Shop is now the cream of the crop taking the cake with only a spoonful of sugar. Nunn stirred it up with Buddy recently on the road.

Jerry Nunn: Hey, Buddy. You are a fourth generation baker. How has your father Buddy Sr. influenced your cooking?

Buddy Valastro: I remember actually standing up on a bucket watching him. My dad would tell me, “Son, watch the way my hands move, just watch me and the way I do things.” It was those lessons that instilled the values today that make me want to always be a scratch baker. I want to use the best possible ingredients that I possibly can. The secret to Carlo’s success has been there for years. There are a lot easier ways to do it. If anyone has been challenged to go the easy route it has been me. I have endless opportunities to just slap my name on something or buy something frozen and use it. We have come to the point where we didn’t sell cannolis at the bakery because we didn’t have time to make cannoli shells. Everyone says, “Everyone else buys them, why not you?” I say, “That’s not who we are.” I want people to come to my bakery and get an experience that they can’t get anywhere else. It is just not cookie cutter.

How has baking changed through the years?
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Art Smith 2

Filed Under: Food

Chef Art Smith has been frying up cuisine for some of the most powerful people in the world, from the Dalai Lama to Oprah Winfrey. Smith has proven he can work with a pressure cooker on Top Chef Masters for Bravo. Nunn on the Run dined with the man behind the sweet potatoes at his restaurant Table Fifty-Two. Jerry Nunn: Hello, Art. What have you been up to? Art Smith: Recently I have been working on my health. I lost a great deal of weight, in fact 110 pounds. I recently cooked for the Dalai Lama, his holiness. I did a vegan lunch because he is Buddhist and I thought it would be differentl. I wanted to stress that not every high profile dinner has to be chicken. Why not do vegetables? I am also launching a new restaurant down south. Where is that going to be? View Full Article »

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Top Chef Masters

Filed Under: Food

Top Chef Masters heats things up for a third season with a steamy new format and sizzling new host with Curtis Stone. 12 new chefs take on new challenges at a chance to win $100,000 for their individual charities. Nunn on the Run pulled up a chair at the dinner table with Curtis and judges James Oseland and Ruth Reichl.

Hello, everyone! Curtis, how does it feel to be the new host?

Curtis Stone: my entire world revolves around food and I love cooking and whenever I can, I’m in a kitchen. This was a really special opportunity for me. I got asked to not only be involved in a show with some of the world’s best chefs, but also sit at a critic’s table with some of the world’s leading food critics.

So it was one of those experiences that I’ll never forget. I got to eat some fantastic food and get a real insight into how these guys judge their foods. It was one of my favorite TV shows ever and very different to other stuff that I’ve done. So it was a lot of fun.

And Ruth and James, what made you sign on for season three?
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Dale Levitski

Filed Under: Food

Dale Levitski served it up on Bravo’s Top Chef as a contestant and is now the Executive Chef at Sprout Restaurant in Chicago. He sat down to talk about his career and current culinary endeavor before a busy day of cooking.

Jerry Nunn: Hello, Dale. How would you describe this restaurant?

Dale Levitski: We are a chef driven restaurant. Our whole concept of what we do here is we take fine dining and neighborhood a la carte dining and we smack them together! We take all of the pretense and pageantry out of fine dining with food quality and innovation still there. I hate pretentious attitude and don’t think it has a place in a dining room. My whole thing is we are very friendly and educated in the front of the house. That is one of our main things because the menu is so ambiguous that every server knows every detail of every single dish.

JN: Sounds like a tough place to work.
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Sunda

Filed Under: Food

Named after the Sunda Shelf in China, this Chicago area restaurant has much to offer locals and visitors alike. Described as “New Asian” cuisine, Sunda is a Rockit Ranch Production meaning it is owned by partners Billy Dec, Brad Young and Arturo Gomez.

Nunn on the Run sat down with General Manager and Operating Partner Aeron Lancero to discuss daily operations and the history of the business.

The restaurant has been open since March of 2009. A celebrity hotspot in the past with guests such as Jamie Foxx and Katy Perry, currently Transformers 3 is being filmed in the area bringing in new leading lady Rosie Huntington and director Michael Bay.

While serving traditional Chinese, Thai, Japanese and Korean dishes, Sunda has created a mix with a variety to choose from offering casual to high-end dining.

Highlights from the menu are such items as the Caterpillar roll, made with unagi, avocado, spicy mayo and tempura crispies and the Crispy Pata, a Filipino dish, a confit pork shank flash fried and served with gravy and greens.

Guests are treated to interactive, engaging and energetic service and a great product. While some may say that the atmosphere can be loud, Aeron defended,” This is intentional. We want people to have conversations and mix well with other guests. We want this to be a social place.”

Sunda is located at 110 W Illinois St. Chicago, IL 60654 in the heart of downtown and very accessible to many hotels and shops.

On the weekends alone this venue can have over 550 diners so calling ahead is recommended. With private dining offered, a bar and a lounge, Sunda has an area to suit everyone. Visit www.sundachicago.com for information and hours or call 312-644-0500 to make a reservation.

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Paula Deen

Filed Under: Food

Paula Deen has been frying it up for years out of Savannah, Georgia and is now taking her cooking on the road. This Emmy Award-winning personality had plenty to say to Nunn on the Run.

Jerry Nunn: Hey, Paula. I heard you just signed with Michaels retail stores.

Paula Deen: Yes, Jerry, my products are just coming to Michaels. Hopefully everything will be in place the fourth quarter or the first quarter of next year.

JN: Great and you just did something with Walmart also.

PD: Oh yes! Walmart and I have doing business for a couple of years. I have some already prepared desserts with them. I feel really good. I just got through sampling and approving a lot of things for the holidays that are incredibly delicious.

JN: For example what do you have?
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