My names Greg Baxtrom, chef and owner
of Olmsted restaurant here in Brooklyn.
My background is mostly fine dining but what we've done here
at Olmsted was strip away all the unnecessary things
from fine dining and try to make it a really approachable
neighborhood restaurant.
At Olmsted nothing is more than $24.
So we try to grow as much as we can here at the restaurant
so we have everything from our 50 foot grow wall,
that grows sunflower sprouts, wheat grass.
Outside we have eight quail that give us quail eggs,
craw fish in a claw foot tub, we grow any herb or
fruit or vegetable you can think of outside.
Typically buying local, buying organic is expensive
and if we were to do that we would have to pass that price
onto our customers. Here we shop smart.
One of my favorite things about being a chef
is taking everyday ingredients and
presenting it in a delicious but creative way.
The carrot crepe is the most popular dish at Olmsted.
It's a little stew of carrots and clams, we cover it with
this crepe, and we build a little fruit salad.
Another one of our most popular dishes
is the delicata squash rings.
Beer battered delicata squash, green tomato keptchup
and then we encrust it with the furikake.
It's basically like a really fancy onion ring.
Our most popular dessert is the frozen yogurt.
It's very simple, it's just two layers of frozen yogurt
and honey that kinda tastes like whipped cream.
Owning a restaurant is not easy,
it's a lot of hard work, it's a lot of long hours.
To be on anyone's list of favorite restaurants
is super humbling and it really validates
the hard work that goes into it.
(applause) Delicata squash is a really great vegetable
that is seasonal so that's why it would go away for a while.
But it's great because you eat the whole thing.
Right you can eat the skin and everything
And you don't have to peel it.
And so it already takes the shape of an onion ring.
So we just make a beer batter and fry it like ...
Like an onion ring, right.
So then to make it a little bit fancier
and a little bit nicer, we make ketchup,
instead of out of regular tomatoes we use green tomatoes.
I love green tomatoes
So in the summer we just make a ton of it and we can it.
And can it, and you've got it as a go to.
And its' really not that difficult to make.
It's just tomatoes, sugar, garlic and onions.
And you stew it down with some vinegar.
Like this kind here?
Yes. So this is about already cooked,
all you do is blend it and you cook it for 20 minutes.
It's really really simple
Can we have some of it
or do you need to blend that one up
like I said, you just take the clean chopped up tomatoes,
you throw in the shallot, you throw in the garlic,
the clove and allspice
and then these liquids we'll throw into the pot.
And so you just rip it on high.
That simple.
Because you're going to blend it again later anyway.
(applause) Right
So it's not... so you literally just put that
and then it's glucose, sugar and distilled vinegar.
Glucose, vinegar and a little Sugar
Yup that's it. And in 20 minutes, that's it.
Then you just blend it.
And then boom!
You blend it again so that way it's really smooth.
And then you refrigerate it and
then it gets nice and shiny again.
Is that what makes the stuff stick?
Ya so, all we do like I said,
we just take a little apple corer
and we core out the seeds of the squash.
And then we just take a little mandeloin
and then you have your little hockey pucks.
Tasty hockey pucks though.
Ya, so then we just make beer batter.
What do we do to the Batter?
So it's all purpose flour, corn starch.
Makes it extra crunchy.
Exactly. Onion and garlic powder, cayenne, salt.
That's all.
Easy.
And then you mix. So you mix all your dry ingredients.
And then you have a couple of liquids. Beer.
Beer!
Don't waste it all! (laughing)
Dez is like "where's my glass of beer?"
So sparkling water, also helps with the crunch.
And then one egg. SO pretty straight forward,
it's not super complicated.
All you have to do is dredge them in a little flour
Dredge, throw in there. We've got some fried.
Do we have a whipped up,
do you got any of your jam there. Good good.
Ketchup, ya the green tomato ketchup.
So all you do, so then after they come out of the fryer,
they take about 4 or 5 minutes on each side,
you just drizzle it over the top, almost like a donut icing.
I told you isn't this crazy!
It's the ugliest donut ever, it's great.
So furikake is usually something you sprinkle
over some sushi rice to give it a little crunch.
In this case we make a fall-ikake.
Sage and pumpkin seeds and wild rice.
And so if you want to keep doing that I'll just...
And I love the presentation here kind of on the tree.
So these are Norweign stick trees that your going to be...
They're actual trees
Oh that's a tree!
Ya and it's an actual branch.
So this is like cooking and arts and crafts for Rachel
right now, she's putting all the...
I'm really enjoying this immensely. This is so fun.
And that's really it, I mean it's three things but
This part here you could do with the kids at home.
Ya, its a fun interactive..
That's how we hang
But it's a vegetable. (applause)