Chef Greg Atkinson has been constructing Northwest cuisine for 20 years. Now, he’s working on plumbing and roofing.
Atkinson hasn’t changed careers. Far from it. He’s building a new restaurant in Winslow from the ground up.
“I wanted to have a place that didn’t have any baggage. Something that would be truly new,” Atkinson said.
The busy chef who has been helped define Northwest cuisine is the author of six food books. He will be signing his latest, “At the Kitchen Table: The Craft of Cooking at Home” Oct. 26 at Bayview Thriftway. After, he’ll lead a cooking class for those signed up.
His new bistro, Restaurant Marche’ Bainbridge, will open in January, he said. It will seat 48 inside and another 24 on a deck. The name (French for market) isn’t just some haute sounding moniker. The restaurant is next to the Bainbridge Island farmers market and refers to an old style of French cuisine based on farmers market finds.
“That’s what my passion is: cooking what’s local and what’s in season,” Atkinson said.
Dishes will range from apple wood grilled and locally pastured steaks, to Salade Nicoise made with grilled wild Northwest tuna, to moules et frites (made with Taylor Shellfish mussels and Skagit Valley potatoes). A modern touch will come from an immersion circulator that will produce items like liquid-centered duck eggs for a classic Salade Lyonnaise.
Local sourcing is important to him and a huge part of his ethos.
“Today I spent the day on a farm where a local farmer is raising pigs for me,” Atkinson said from his office next to the restaurant site. Those pigs will provide bacon and cured ham for his operation. The same farmer will also provide eggs.
Locally foraged food, like mushrooms and sea asparagus, will also be part of the menu, Atkinson said.
In the constantly changing and overlapping arena of food movements, the two that Atkinson has been a longtime proponent of are local sourcing and sustainability.
The latter is important to Atkinson because of food security. “The industrial food supply is highly dependent on oil,” he said. It’s needed for fertilizer production and transportation.
But, he’s not dogmatic about his philosophies. “The last 20 years I’ve been writing books that seem to promote local food and yet I don’t hesitate to use saffron from Spain or chocolate from Central America.” But those are some of the exceptions.
“Fresh and local just tastes better. It does cost less energy and leaves a smaller carbon footprint.”
Atkinson grew up in the Southeast but cemented his reputation during his seven-year tenure as executive chef at Seattle’s Canlis Restaurant.
Canlis, a longtime Seattle institution, had a reputation for state-of-the-art American food, but it was getting dated when Atkinson arrived in 1996, he said.
“The menu hadn’t changed much. It was kind of carved in stone. What I brought was flexibility and seasonality,” Atkinson said. His goal was to give the food a sense of time and place.
Atkinson’s plan worked. Canlis went from a 1.5-star to 4-star restaurant and went from $2 million in annual sales to $5 million by the time Atkinson left.
His new book reflects his philosophy on cooking as part of culture, he said. “Being conscientious about what we eat is one of the best things we can do for the environment and our culture. So much of what it means to be human is related directly to how we cook and eat.”
Atkinson doesn’t dismiss the raw food movement but he makes a strong case for cooking. He agrees with recent anthropological studies that theorize that cooking food allowed the human species to make gains on the evolutionary ladder.
“In many ways, cooking is what makes us human. More than language and using tools it’s what distinguishes our species from other critters on the planet.”
“At the Kitchen Table” was published Oct. 15 and contains 80 recipes and essays that promote the idea of cooking at home for pleasure.
“Our mothers were liberated from cooking. Now, we don’t have to cook but we can for fun,” Atkinson said. “Food doesn’t have to be generic and mass produced. It can be hand crafted. To some degree everyone can participate in that.”
The class Atkinson will conduct, which offers with a complimentary wine pairing, will cover carrot flan with lamb’s lettuce and hazelnuts, poulet au Riesling (a white wine version of coq au vin) with buttered noodles, and apple custard tart.
Craig Sailor: 253-597-8541
craig.sailor@thenewstribune.com
AT THE KITCHEN TABLE WITH GREG ATKINSON
When: Oct. 26. Public book signing is 5-5:30 p.m. (free). Cooking class is 6-8:30 p.m. ($85).
Where: Bayview Thriftway, 516 W. Fourth Ave., Olympia
Information/registration: 360-754-1448, www.BayviewSchoolofCooking.com
BOOK INFORMATION
“At the Kitchen Table: The Craft of Cooking at Home” by Greg Atkinson, $17.95, Sasquatch Books
JOIN THE DISCUSSION | Register here
We welcome comments. Please keep them civil, short and to the point. ALL CAPS, spam, obscene, profane, abusive and off topic comments will be deleted. Repeat offenders will be blocked. Thanks for taking part — and abiding by these simple rules. A thorough explanation of rules of conduct can be found in our Terms of Service. If you have any questions, including why your comment may not be showing immediately after you submit it, be sure to visit the commenting FAQ.