When you receive an invitation (via email) from someone who runs a restaurant not too far away from you, someone who knows how much you love pork, and that someone says, “Would you like to be my guests at a celebration of pastured pork at Rover’s?” Well, if you are us, you say yes. Immediately.
Today, in glorious afternoon sunlight, we stood in the courtyard of the best French restaurant in Seattle, watching Thierry Rautureau grill up some sausages.
Hell, yeah.
If you don’t live in Seattle, you may not have heard of Rover’s. (However, many people travel from across the country to sample the tasting menu.) If you live in Seattle, you might not have eaten at Rover’s. For most of us with modest budgets, it’s a celebration space. However, everyone should want to come eat food overseen by this man.
Chef Rautureau grew up in the Muscadet region of France, where he learned traditional cooking methods and respect for ingredients. In his early 20s, he traveled to the United States, cooking for a great while in Los Angeles. A visit to Seattle in 1987 brought him to Rover’s, which had just been put up for sale. Rautureau bought the place and transformed it into the fine dining (and yet still not stuffy) restaurant experience it is today. He has won the James Beard award for Best Chef of the Northwest. And if you would like to hear him expound on food, Rautureau has a rollicking great radio show with Tom Douglas, one of Seattle’s other great chefs. (Shauna would like you to know that appearing on that radio show, twice, has been her favorite publicity stop for her book yet.)
But that’s all biography. What we love best about Thierry is his capacious heart and fabulous sense of humor. And what other restaurant owner is out grilling ribs on his day off?
And some mighty fine ribs they were.
Don’t you just want to dive into that plate right now? Smokey and meaty, with no hint of bottled barbeque sauce, these were fingers-clamped-to-the-bone-and-they-are-not-coming-up-until-all-the-meat-is-stripped-by-the-teeth ribs.
Here we had tender pork belly with farro. (Shauna can’t eat farro, of course, but Danny reported this was fantastic. That is, only after he wolfed down second helpings.)
And here, pulled pork. It was a different kind of pulled pork than our friend Lorna’s delicious dish, so we don’t have to compare. We just ate it. And it was good.
Kielbasa. House-made, made with local ingredients, in season, and oh my god look at those pockets of fat. Can you imagine the taste? Yes, it was that good.
This one was almost obscene. House-made bacon, thick cut (as you can see) from Skagit River Ranch pork belly. I don’t know what they did or how they did it, but this was the most delicious full-bite of bacon, slightly brined and beautifully smoked, that I have ever eaten.
(We want to make our own bacon this summer.)
Everyone there beamed in the sunlight, eating such fine pork. Some of the top chefs in Seattle had gathered, along with food writers, caterers, cooking teachers, and generalized pork lovers. Just being there would have been enough. But we were there for a good cause.
The man on the right (the one talking in this photo) is Seth Caswell, formerly the executive chef at Stumbling Goat Bistro, and soon to open his own restaurant, perhaps by the end of the summer. (Between him and Thierry is the talented Adam Hoffman, chef de cuisine at Rover’s, and the one doing most of the heavy lifting in its kitchen.) He’s also the president of Seattle Chef’s Collaborative, which is a group of chefs dedicated to keeping the sustainable food supply strong. Chef’s Collaborative organized this lunch to enlighten folks about local pastured pork, and the people who make that pork happen.
The gentleman on the left is Mark Baker, who runs Cascade Natural Farms in Port Orchard. His mostly Berkshire pigs have a “…firm, white fat and sweet, juicy tender meat that will leave you wanting more.” (That’s his quote, but after eating his pork, we believe him.)
And the cheerful woman on the right is Cheryl the Pig Lady. (Don’t worry. She named herself that.) She has been advocating for happy pork for years. And she sells her pork at the Puyallup farmers’ market every Thursday, should you wish to sample some of the pork we ate.
Not at the party (but their bellies and trotters were): Skagit River Ranch and Lopez Island Farm.
We listened to impassioned speeches and earnest conversations. Everyone was eager to understand each other. It felt like an important day.
And then we all returned to the buffet table for more pâté.
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