Art of War
Inaugural ‘Burger Brawl’: Collaciti v Basile - Wednesday April 15th, 2015
The human condition is to win. We always want to win. No matter how big or how small, we want to win at everything in life! A kiss on the first date. A parking spot right next to the mall doors. Turning a profit the first year of starting your own business. Fries at the bottom of the bag. Winning gives a sense of achievement and indeed, success and the feeling you get from the reward of your work is something that cannot be explained, but only felt.
There's no question there's been an increase of presence in the world of gourmet burgers in the last decade. What was once an American quick service counter item, massively associated with fast food, is now a global gourmet phenom with every artist using more and more non-conventional ingredients and making it their own. The "fast" gets dropped to make room for art and what we're left with, is food (in sandwich form) where in some cases are so deliciously gorgeous, it could make an onion cry.
Burger Brawl is the brainchild of culinary heavy hitters Dan Gunam (AdHoc Group) and Life Ruiner (no, really) Jonny O'Callaghan aka Jonny OC (formerly of The Beverly Hotel, Toronto) in partnership with Samuel Adams. A series of after-hours, in-your-kitchen competitions between two restaurant chefs comprising of black-box ingredients with a common goal of creating the best burger in the city. The team over at Branding and Buzzing didn't have much convincing to do when they asked if I wanted to join them at the inaugural event. We would see Chef Matt Basile, the "Rebel Without A Kitchen" from Fidel Gastros & Lisa Marie face off against Chef Vittorio Collaciti, best known for his Top 5 placing on Top Chef Canada Season 4, who had the home court advantage at his Queen West palace, The Good Son.
Photo by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
I brought along two close friends of mine, Scott, a closet foodie and a force in the Toronto Film & Television industry and Louise, a self-professed burger connoisseur who, is a Barbie girl in a burger-world; sharing her dolled-up burger adventures for the last five years at Burgers and Barbies. We arrived early enough to catch the end of dinner service so, as we sat indulging in the scrumptious offerings of The Good Son's menu we were able to also observe the sea of diners divide while the staff played a landscape game of Tetris with the empty tables to make room for the growing crowd of burger-obsessed spectators.
Photo by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
As I washed down the last of our spread of spicy (fried) brussel sprouts, wild mushroom pizza and bulgogi short ribs with my second bottle of beer, I was greeted by Johnny Segundo. A friend of mine, ex-colleague in a past life and currently the Jr. Sous Chef at The Good Son; by his side, Chef Vittorio. An opportunity for a pre-game photo with these two fine gentlemen offered me a moment to kick my curiosity and find out what the Chef's strategy was for the evening - and it was simple; keeping it simple. In the distance, through the collective of attractive smiles, Samuel Adams bottles and beards, I could see Chef Matt conversing with his colleague from Lisa Marie - so, I made my way over to meet the visiting team. Chef Matt divulges that his approach is to [also] keep it simple, utilizing the black box ingredients to the best of their potential.(Understandably, for both chefs, there really could be anything in that black box. Keeping the process simple makes for a great strategy, especially when you're racing against a clock.) Having eaten at Lisa Marie several times, I found myself talking about his Double Pancake Pork Burger and how it changed my life. It really did.
“Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base.”
The main event was preceded by a battle of the Sous Chefs from both competing restaurants. The burger side dish challenge between The Good Son's Sebastian Sánchez and Lisa Marie's Isabel Sánchez (no relation) saw a black box battle with eggplant, heirloom carrot, labneh [soft cheese strained from yogurt] & Thai basil cress. The preliminary event definitely got the excitement up as Jonny OC went through the crowd asking who they thought would win. Cheering fans rooting for their favourite Sous drowned the sounds of little blue birds fluttering off into the social media abyss acting as digital carrier pigeons for hashtags and photos for the world to see.
Photo by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
After a very exciting and eventful round of slicing, frying, dollops and chiffonades, both chefs presented their eggplant canvases. Two very different interpretations of the black box ingredients with each one representing the style and finesse of the culinary backgrounds of the competing Sous. While both dishes showed beautiful representations of edible art, it was Isabel's dish (photos 2 and 4 below) from Lisa Marie who prevailed in the battle of the side dishes. Sebastian (photos 3 and 5 below), takes home the experience of his first cooking competition with his head held high and the strong support and congratulations from his team at The Good Son.
Photos by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
As a quick cleanup commenced in preparation for the main event, if you closed your eyes and listened to the commotion, you could single out the laughter and conversation that echoed throughout the restaurant. The sounds of bottle openers, arranged almost symphony-like among the chewing and lip smacking of the complimentary house-made sliders that circulated throughout the crowd. The theme of family coming together at the dinner table as professed by The Good Son mantra is eerily felt through the air and through the vibrations from human interactions.
Photos by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
As the gauntlet opened, the mood of the room reached levels of elation and overall general hysteria. The familiar "let's get ready to rumble" phrase (sans Michael Buffer) was followed by an eruption of cheer as the chefs lifted the covers off of their black boxes to reveal the ingredients they would have to incorporate into their masterpiece; brie cambaret, cinnamon cap mushrooms and of course, the chuck beef. As the chefs strategized their plans of execution, Sous Sebastian & Sous Isabel from the preliminary round set the canvases on which their chefs would paint their interpretation of the best burger. The beef; divided, ground, seasoned and pressed. The utensils and tools pulled from their metaphorical holsters. The 1L portion cups full of Sam Adams, set within arms reach.
Controlled chaos, for lack of a better term is the only thing that comes to mind as the forty minute time limit closed in on the final moments. Four chefs scrambling to plate four burgers all the while navigating through cheering staff, photographers and videographers who, may I add were unaware of the danger that lies in a hot kitchen. Mario avoiding Donkey Kong's barrels as it were.
Photos by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
As both chefs raised their hands and stepped back from their canvasses, a sigh of relief and satisfaction from them could be measured in litres. The battle was done, but in a sense the war would be far from over for one of them. Or both, perhaps?
On one side, Chef Matt's "Gruyère Juicy Lucy" comprised of, as the name suggests, a gruyère cheese stuffed patty, topped with yellow cheddar, butter cooked mushrooms, a spicy red onion aioli and an egg, over easy. Chef Matt explains that the softness and creaminess of the cheeses would compliment the creaminess of the beer while cutting through the flavour profiles of the fat that would come from the burger patty.
Chef Matt's "Gruere Juicy Lucy"
Photo by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
Chef Vittorio's "The Good Burger" comprised of a ground chuck patty topped with tempura mushrooms, a brie+cheddar mix, scallions, tomato, mushroom ketchup and mushroom aioli. He explains to me in a later gathering, the reasoning behind his choices:
Chef Vittorio's "The Good Burger"
Photo by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
“I put those ingredients together because I always focus on acidity with a burger because the meat is very rich. I wanted to bring out the mushroom flavours; because it was one of the black box ingredients, I wanted to utilize the mushrooms in as many ways as possible.”
Da Vinci. Gaudi. Both artists and geniuses in their own right. As with Colacitti and Basile, both of these artists offer the city a continuous and consistent arrangement of edible masterpieces from open to close, each business day. The real winners, in a sense are each and every individual that walks through the doors of their establishments. The battle the chefs face each day is the constant want and need to do different and better and to keep us "art-goers" hungry for more, even when we're already at the end of the last notch on our belts.
It's this type of "friendly-fire" that keeps the proverbial wheel of culinary fortune turning. Because if you're not competing with someone else, you're competing with yourself.
To my college professor who told me that food cannot be art, I leave her and you with this: Art can be anything. It can be physical, it can be emotional. It can be the process of creation or the act of destruction. Art can only be interpreted as art by the artist and the appreciator. In the case of Collacitti v Basile, as with any chef that is constantly competing with the one next door, as with any battle where the goal is to prevail over the other, the act of creating something beautiful [and comestible] while being able to maintain your core values and principles without sacrificing the quality of the results, is, in my opinion, the very definition of the Art of War.
Photo by Jeffrey Chan. Courtesy of Samuel Adams
It's this type of "friendly-fire" that keeps the proverbial wheel of culinary fortune turning. Because if you're not competing with someone else, you're competing with yourself.
To my college professor who told me that food cannot be art, I leave her and you with this: Art can be anything. It can be physical, it can be emotional. It can be the process of creation or the act of destruction. Art can only be interpreted as art by the artist and the appreciator. In the case of Collacitti v Basile, as with any chef that is constantly competing with the one next door, as with any battle where the goal is to prevail over the other, the act of creating something beautiful [and comestible] while being able to maintain your core values and principles without sacrificing the quality of the results, is, in my opinion, the very definition of the Art of War.
Article Disclaimer:
This article was sponsored by Samuel Adams and facilitated by Branding & Buzzing.
Some form of compensation may have been received to attend this event and write this article.