STATE

Rick Bayless, the Chicago Chef, to Prepare a State Dinner

Photographs by Aynsley Floyd for The New York Times
Rick Bayless’s menu includes herb ceviche, right.

By MARIAN BURROS
Published: May 11, 2010
Sign in to Recommend
Twitter
Sign In to E-Mail

Print


Reprints

Share
CloseLinkedinDiggFacebookMixxMySpaceYahoo! BuzzPermalink FOR the Obama administration’s second state dinner, the White House has once again turned the cooking over to a guest chef. Rick Bayless has been asked to prepare the elegantly balanced, many layered Mexican food for which he has become famous at the dinner on May 19 that will honor President Felipe Calderón of Mexico.

Related
Times Topic: The White House and Food
Green Ceviche With Cucumber (May 12, 2010) In November, the chef Marcus Samuelsson was put in charge of the state dinner for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India.

Mr. Bayless was rumored to be the first choice for White House chef after the election because the Obamas spent many date nights in Chicago enjoying the tasting menu at his restaurant Topolobampo. Yes, they love burgers and fries, but they also love to explore the bold flavors and carefully crafted dishes that come out of the Bayless kitchens, which also include Frontera Grill and Xoco. (After the election, Cristeta Comerford was retained as White House executive chef.)

Mr. Bayless, who was asked once last year to cook at the White House but had a prior commitment, still can’t believe his assignment. “This is probably the biggest honor I’ve ever had,” he said. For all its honor, though, cooking at the White House is trial by fire for a restaurant chef who must perform in unfamiliar surroundings.

When he came to Washington the week of the Obama inauguration to cook for a charity dinner, Mr. Bayless had to prepare his dishes in an antiquated kitchen with a recalcitrant stove in a private home. He ended up using the microwave, but his warm Midwest demeanor never faltered. A state dinner for 200 guests is something else entirely, and a restaurant chef used to sending out four, maybe six plates at a time has to shift gears.

The first lady’s office has not said where the dinner will be held. But whether it is inside the White House or under a tent on the South Lawn, the tables will be one flight above the kitchen, which is on the building’s lowest level. Mr. Bayless will have to think about how to keep the food from growing cold or collapsing while it waits to be served. The pyramid style of plating is out.

To compound the complexity, the guest chef cannot order ingredients himself. It must be done by the White House executive chef from sources that are kept secret for security reasons. (When any president eats away from the White House, a tester is in the kitchen to guard against poisoning.) Officials said no to Mr. Bayless’s request that he be allowed to make two or three long-simmering, complex sauces ahead of time and ship them frozen to the White House where they could be tested. So Mr. Bayless and crew will be coming to Washington two days earlier than planned to begin preparing a 28-ingredient Oaxacan black mole.

The White House kitchen garden will supply parsley, chives, lettuce, arugula, radishes and mint for the menu, which also includes a green-herb ceviche similar to one found in Mr. Bayless’s next cookbook, “Fiesta at Rick’s,” to be published in July. Dessert, incorporating local strawberries, will be prepared by the White House pastry chef, Bill Yosses, after consultation with Mr. Bayless. All the dishes are served at Mr. Bayless’s restaurants.

According to Walter Scheib, who previously held Ms. Comerford’s job, White House menus were never revealed in advance for the same security reasons. But Camille Johnston, Michelle Obama’s director of communications, said the reason for not releasing further menu details was because “nobody tells guests what they are eating a week before.”

Ms. Comerford and the deputy White House social secretary sampled the meal at Frontera Grill two weeks ago and signed off on it last week, plunging Mr. Bayless deep into the logistics of banquet catering. “Two hundred is a hard number,” he said. “When you get above 100 people for dinner like this you really have to rely on a lot of hands.” For the May 19 dinner, many of those hands are not experienced in putting together a Bayless meal. “You have to come up through the ranks to know how to cook the way we cook,” he said.

But he will have the accomplished services of Ms. Comerford, who has become quite acquiescent to the frequent invasions of her kitchen by guest chefs, and not just at state dinners, a custom seldom seen in previous administrations. Not so some of the former inhabitants of that kitchen, like Roland Mesnier, pastry chef at the White House from Jimmy Carter to George W. Bush. “It would be insulting,” he said.

Mr. Bayless fell in love with cooking at his parents’ barbecue restaurant in Oklahoma City and has traveled throughout Mexico with his wife and restaurant partner, Deann, learning how to make regional foods. He remains slightly shocked by the White House invitation. “I still can’t believe I’m doing this,” he said.

He said his selection as chef for this dinner showed that he had “contributed something that the public at large wants and respects.” And he said it is significant because “when we are doing something very special it no longer has to be European or gussied-up American but from the heritage of a whole bunch of people in our country who have never been in the spotlight.”

He couldn’t resist taking a jab at French cooking, which for generations was the only cuisine appropriate for state dinners. “French chefs come to the kitchen and are amazed at how complex Mexican food is, the layering of flavors,” Mr. Bayless said. “The food speaks for itself. It’s not being whipped into submission like a French chef would do.”