![\"Gabriel](\"http:\/\/pdxpeople.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/2017-05-12_1047.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nBy PDX People<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n PORTLAND, Ore. \u2013 If you\u2019ve been following the rise of the Portland food scene in recent years it\u2019s not hard to be a fan of Gabriel Rucker, the acclaimed chef from Little Bird Bistro <\/a><\/span>and Le Pigeon.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Born in 1981, in Napa California, Rucker<\/a><\/span> got into cooking because according to him he wasn\u2019t \u201cgood at anything else\u201d and after moving to Portland in the early 2000\u2019s he would open his first restaurant in 2006 at the age of 25 and his hard work would also be responsible for putting Portland on the global map as a top food destination.<\/span><\/p>\n If you ask anyone where their top destinations in the United States are for food, Portland Oregon is typically at the top of their list but it wasn\u2019t always that way. In the late 90\u2019s and early 2000\u2019s Portland only had a few great restaurants including Wildwood and Paley\u2019s Place but thankfully that changed when Gabriel Rucker came to town and started Little Bird Bistro, followed by his work at Le Pigeon.<\/span><\/p>\n As with growth in any other niche or industry, the Portland food scene began to grow in waves following Little Bird Bistro and we soon had Pok Pok<\/a><\/span>, Toro Bravo and many other excellent restaurants who were soon calling Portland Oregon home.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n What was Portland like then, food-wise?<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n When it came to food, no one was talking about it much. For me, though, it was a bigger game than I was used to in Santa Cruz. I was really lucky to get a job with Vitaly Paley. I looked at his menu, and the fact that he had bone marrow and snails in\u00a0one\u00a0dish was like, \u201cBull\u2019s-eye! That\u2019s where I want to work.\u201d A kid who worked there told me he could get me a stage at Paley\u2019s, and I totally lied to him and told him that I knew how to brush gas on the hotline. I really didn\u2019t, and Paley\u2019s kicked ass. I depended on faking it to make it, and that was it.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n What started Portland\u2019s transformation into a \u201cfood city\u201d?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Well, Wildwood was a restaurant. Paley\u2019s Place was a restaurant. Higgins was a restaurant. Those were probably the three that opened around the late \u201990s, before me. Those were the ones that started to get Portland on the map.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span>I think that everything happens in waves. Then there was Gotham, Ripe and Clarklewis with Naomi [Pomeroy], and that\u2019s when I got involved. So that was a quick wave, and then you had Andy [Ricker] with Pok Pok, you had Le Pigeon and Beast opened up a little bit after. You could also say Toro Bravo with John Gorham was in there. That was when Portland started to get a lot more national recognition. I give [Portland Monthly\u00a0food critic] Karen Brooks a lot of credit for getting Portland on the map.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n Were there any influential people outside Portland who helped?<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n One thing that I really remember is that Eric Asimov came here in 2007 to write a\u00a0story about what was happening<\/strong><\/a>. I feel like that was what ignited it. Once\u00a0The New York Times\u00a0says something is cool\u2026<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Rucker was recently named to the 2017 Forty Under 40 class and he\u2019s certainly earned the recognition because since opening his first restaurant in 2006 at the age of 25 he\u2019s been a leader in the Portland<\/a><\/span> Oregon food scene, consistently challenging the establishment and taste buds of the city while bringing dishes to his menu that any food lover would find familiar if they were to dine in one of the fine restaurants of France.<\/span><\/p>\n Besides being an innovator in the Portland<\/a><\/span> Oregon food scene and gaining recognition for his James Beard award <\/a><\/span>wins, Rucker has also been working hard on a cook book for the last two years while starting a family and consistently coming up with fresh ideas to keep both Le Pigeon and Little Bird Bistro on the top of the minds of most Portland foodies.<\/span><\/p>\n “At Le Pigeon, the food is on a pedestal,” Rucker says. “There’s James Beard Awards hanging on the wall. People fly from New York and it’s their destination restaurant. They are expecting to be blown away.”<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n At Little Bird, “not every dish has to push a boundary. Take the new steak: it’s just hanger steak, French fries, some melted cheese over the top and a green peppercorn cream sauce. But I’m so excited by it. There’s no dots of sauce, no garnishes. It’s just good because it’s good.”<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Little Bird, which opened in 2010, was designed as a perch for longtime Le Pigeon sous chef Erik Van Kley. At the end of April, after a four-year run that included The Oregonian’s\u00a0<\/em>2012 Restaurant of the Year<\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/em>honors,\u00a0<\/em>Van Kley left to open a restaurant of his own<\/em><\/a>. On May 1, Rucker walked into the kitchen with a mission: Steer the ship back toward the kind of French-influenced cooking he’d always envisioned for the restaurant.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Today, the two-time James Beard Award winner is free-associating with the kind of twisted French dishes that first put Le Pigeon on the map. Rucker knew he wanted to add fried chicken to the menu. Why not make a fried chicken coq au vin? Roasted marrow bones and “Jambon de Paris” sandwiches are both Little Bird staples. Why not top that quivering marrow with scraps of ham and melted cheese? Rucker seems particularly pleased with his new, “dirty and nasty” double cheeseburger, which comes with brie but can be ordered “a l’Americaine” — i.e. with slices of American cheese.<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n After more than 10 years in the restaurant business and countless awards the good news is that Rucker isn\u2019t content to slow down and settle for anything less than excellence in his restaurants.<\/span><\/p>\n Besides continuing to win awards and gain recognition, Rucker has worked hard to keep Portland on top of the global food scene with his work on social media and he\u2019s gone from being the fresh faced 25-year-old with something to prove to one of the most respected chef\u2019s in the world.<\/span><\/p>\n In a recent interview with Marthstewart.com<\/a> he sat down to discuss some of the most important lessons that he\u2019s learned during his career.<\/span><\/p>\n What\u2019s the most important lesson you\u2019ve learned after more than a decade in the restaurant business?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Always treat people\u00a0with respect. Let your employees, especially the cooks, be themselves and participate in the creative process.\u00a0Balance is also key. I have two kids with another one on the way, and I\u2019m now able to be home with them four nights a week, which is super important to me. You always hear about chefs burning out, and I\u2019m really trying not to do that. Right now, if you come to Le Pigeon, three nights a week, I\u2019m there making your dinner and searing your foie gras, which I love and want to keep doing for the next 20 years. And I\u2019m lucky enough to have such a solid team that I know the food will be great even when I\u2019m not there.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n What\u2019s your best advice for home cooks?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Rules are meant to be broken. Recipes are just a guideline. Don\u2019t get so wrapped up in \u2018did I do exactly that or exactly this.\u2019 If it feels right, go with it. If it feels wrong, stop and read the recipe again. I like to have fun with food — take it seriously but also don\u2019t. There\u2019s a time and place for a directly sourced, beautiful organic piece of\u00a0<\/em>chard<\/em><\/a>, and there\u2019s a time and place for an awesome piece of melted American cheese. A practical tip: don\u2019t add all your salt at the end when you’re cooking because you\u2019ll have to put in so much more. It\u2019s important to build blocks of flavor along the way.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Did you cook a lot when you were a kid?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n One of my chores was making dinner once a week. My favorite dishes to cook were spaghetti — I would make the sauce from scratch — and anything Mexican. I also remember being very young and making my first tuna salad, but I put a bunch of weird stuff in it. A lot of the food I\u2019m familiar with is simple Americana stuff, not necessarily stuff made from scratch, but medium-level junk food, which\u00a0I still pull from sometimes. We make a pigeon churro at the restaurant, where the pigeon is confited, tossed in cumin-scented maple syrup, deep\u00a0fried, and tossed with Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Have you taught your kids to cook yet?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Yes, my three-year-old daughter wanted a real knife for Christmas this year. I got her a lettuce knife. It\u2019s plastic but serrated so she can cut stuff. My son is five and he just goes and gets a knife out and cuts up apples now. They hang out with me in the kitchen, and I\u2019m very aware of their respective cutlery but also making sure they\u2019re not fearful. My wife will also bring the kids by during the middle of service at Le Pigeon, and they have no fear — they\u2019ll just walk right along the line.<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n After seemingly dominating the restaurant scene in Portland Oregon for 10 years now and winning prestigious awards many people want to know what\u2019s next for Gabriel Rucker.<\/span><\/p>\n Like Andy Ricker<\/a> and other great chefs in Portland, Rucker isn\u2019t content to live off his success for the rest of his life, he\u2019s continued innovating because he knows that what happen last year doesn\u2019t matter in the food world since people are only interested in what\u2019s happening now.<\/span><\/p>\n Rucker has stayed busy in 2017 working in his restaurants but he\u2019s also managed to continue giving back to other chefs and restaurants in the community to endorse their food and his favorite eats in Portland Oregon.<\/span><\/p>\n If you had to name one personal favorite dish from your restaurants, which would it be and why?\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n The\u00a0butter lettuce with lamb neck and lentils\u00a0at\u00a0<\/em>Little Bird<\/em><\/strong><\/a>. It\u2019s the perfect lunch, not too filling, but it packs in flavor. At\u00a0<\/em>Le Pigeon<\/em><\/strong><\/a>, it\u2019s the\u00a0savory pie\u00a0if we have savory pie. Right now, we have a chicken and escargot pie on the menu.\u00a0(Editor\u2019s note: At the date of publishing, the savory pie on offer is a buffalo sweetbread pie.)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Name the top restaurants and dishes\u00a0that you think every visitor in\u00a0Portland\u00a0should try.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Any of the\u00a0vegetable plates\u00a0at\u00a0<\/em>Ava Gene\u2019s<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0Burgers\u00a0at\u00a0<\/em>Tilt<\/em><\/strong><\/a>\u00a0<\/em>(with jalapenos). The\u00a0peanut butter cup sundae\u00a0at\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>Imperial<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0Steak\u00a0and\u00a0Caesar salad\u00a0at\u00a0<\/em>Gino\u2019s<\/em><\/strong><\/a>. The\u00a0clam chowder\u00a0at\u00a0<\/em>Ox<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Describe your perfect \u201cdining out day\u201d in Portland.<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Breakfast at\u00a0<\/em>Elmer\u2019s<\/em><\/strong><\/a>. Lunch at\u00a0<\/em>Little Big Burger<\/em><\/strong><\/a>. Dinner at\u00a0<\/em>Ava Gene\u2019s<\/em><\/strong><\/a>, followed by a walk next door to\u00a0<\/em>Salt & Straw<\/em><\/strong><\/a>\u00a0<\/em>for ice cream.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n What\u2019s your favorite neighborhood to dine out at?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Sellwood. It\u2019s super chill, people are walking around with families, and it feels like a small town. I used to live over there. The restaurant scene in downtown Portland has also gotten so much better over the past few years.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n What other cuisines do you enjoy eating or cooking, and where do you go for these foods?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\nTransforming Portland into \u201cThe\u201d Food City<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nForty Under 40<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nMore Than 10 Years in the Restaurant Business<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
<\/a>What\u2019s Next for Gabriel Rucker?<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n