Chef Ryan Andre
Redefining what Baton Rouge will try
Some board a plane, others take the train, but Chef Ryan Andre travels the world via whisk and Wi-Fi. The Gonzales native credits the power of online media, from Instagram and Facebook to YouTube and Netflix, for both global recipe inspiration and quick feedback from the Baton Rouge hungry as he masterminds new dishes and shares with his social network.
Now corporate chef of City Pork Hospitality (encompassing City Pork Charcuterie & Deli and the City Pork Brasserie & Bar; a third concept, City Pork Kitchen & Pie, announced its closing in mid-August 2017), Andre helms two restaurants proudly particular to the capital city, and not its more food-forward regional neighbors. Each menu update at the popular Brasserie, the more innovative of the two City Porks, is an indication of what interests the chef and what the majority of Baton Rouge is willing to see on their plates now, from Wild Boar Flautas to Char-Siu Pork and Chimichurri Wagyu Flank; the mantle is one Andre is happy to wear. We spoke recently about his deferred career as a plant operator, the Asian inspiration on the Brasserie menu, and challenging local palates. Find excerpts below.
On his career shift:
I actually started my first restaurant job to put myself through BRCC to be a plant operator. Six months into J. Alexander’s is when I decided I wanted to be a chef. I enjoyed that a lot more. I was only doing prep cook. Even just doing prep cook, I realized I wanted to be a chef and not work in the plants.
Everybody was for it. They knew that I enjoyed it. If I’m able to cook for twelve hours at work, then come home and cook for the family and still get that same desire and pleasure out of doing it, I knew that’s what I needed to do.
I took a little break after I left J. Alexander’s. I went to work back in the plants for a little while—did some part-time plant work. John Leatherwood, who used to be a front-of-house manager at J. Alexander’s, went to one of the hospitals on Perkins [now the LSU Health System Surgical Facility]. They were doing restaurant-quality food for the guests. We helped open that up and did the kitchen over there. That started my path of becoming a chef. Doing that, working in several other restaurants, going to culinary school—that’s when the doors started opening.
If I’m able to cook for twelve hours at work, then come home and cook for the family and still get that same desire and pleasure out of doing it, I knew that’s what I needed to do.
On Baton Rouge’s dining culture:
When I went to culinary school [in 2006], you had a few of your restaurants that had been here for years, like Mansurs and Juban’s, but you didn’t have those chef-driven restaurants where you heard about the chef and not just the food.
Social media now plays a big part in getting your name out there. You talk to the older chefs and back in the day they had to get written up in a newspaper or a magazine for people to know who they were. Now all you’ve got to do is post a picture of your dish and blast it out to 40,000 people. All of a sudden people know who you are. It’s definitely a lot easier in this world we live in now. As far as the “intertron” and the websites and all that. But we’re still in an area that’s trying to catch up with the times.
On palates:
People are trusting what we do here. They’re trusting me as a chef, knowing what I’m capable of, and then going out on a limb to try it and then really enjoying it. I think that’s what Baton Rouge has missed the most. In New Orleans, you can put anything on a plate. In New Orleans, they’re gonna eat it. But people won’t do that here. I don’t understand it. I could put out a fried piece of fish with étouffée on top of it, and it’d sell all day. But that’s what we’re trying to get people away from.
That kind of cooking is stuff that a lot of people know how to do at their house anyway, so I don’t understand why they want to go to a restaurant for that! I like to cook stuff where people are asking me, “How’d you do that?”
If you look at my menu, a lot of it is stuff I eat myself. It’s stuff I grew up with. We’ve got the rabbit and dumplings, which is a play on chicken and dumplings. It’s Southern fare, but I put a spin on it with Asian flavors. I like to make dishes and label them on the menu with what people are accustomed to seeing, but twist it to flavors they’re not used to. That’s what my signature stuff is.
On Asian flavors:
I’m a big fan of fish sauce, soy sauce, your gochujang chili paste. I like all those flavor profiles. It’s what I enjoy eating the most, so that’s what I like messing around with the most.
That kind of cooking is stuff that a lot of people know how to do at their house anyway, so I don’t understand why they want to go to a restaurant for that! I like to cook stuff where people are asking me, “How’d you do that?”
We don’t have a good Chinese scene in Baton Rouge. All we have are the China Woks and King Woks. Of course we have P.F. Chang’s, but that’s another corporate restaurant. My wife loves it. It’s good food. But I want more authenticity. Take you to the streets of China instead of the General Tso’s and all that. [Editor’s note: We also recommend Omi on Essen Lane.]
On updating the Brasserie menu:
The brisket, the club, the Cuban, the Big Pig, those all came from the Deli, and we brought them over here because that’s what people knew—everything else is new. If something’s not selling or I’m not feeling a dish or we run out of something, I can have it reprinted on two days and put back on the table with new menus.
A lot of times, people go to restaurants because they enjoy one thing on the menu, so they go there and get that certain dish. If my mother was in the mood for a seafood platter, she’d drive all the way out to Hymel’s on River Road, an hour, just to go eat a seafood platter. I want to be more of a restaurant where they come in here and don’t know what to expect, but they’re willing to just sit down and say, “Feed me, and I’ll enjoy whatever you put out.”
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