Three Creative Lessons from Top Chef Graham Elliot
This is the last in a series of blog posts featuring conversations with creative thinkers who have influenced my view of the world. I met Top Chef Graham Elliot when he hosted the launch of Capital One's new Savor card over a spectacular meal in New York. Elliot grew up traveling the world as a "Navy brat," which is evident in the award-winning cuisine at his celebrated restaurants and his show "Going Off the Menu." Here are his stories about inventiveness, inspiration and the experiences that are the heart and soul of his work.
- Creative inspiration comes from people and experiences, not just ingredients.
"When I was a kid, my dad was a diver, and he would would go out and catch a lobster and that would be what I got to eat for my birthday. I remember living in San Diego when I was maybe three and getting a gigantic spiny lobster. They look like a humongous cockroach but I thought it was the most cool, scary, amazing thing. Then, a couple years later my Dad goes out and gets a bunch of fresh abalone. It’s this gigantic snail type thing and we’re cooking that up. I think I have always been excited by the weirder the better."
2. The best creative muses are the people who matter most in our lives.
"I’ve had the opportunity to cook for all my heroes, whether it’s Tony Hawk or the singer of the band that saved my life in high school when I was going through a breakup -- Morrissey. I died, I totally died. But at the same time, the coolest was cooking for my parents. My parents came in when I was in my first chef job and I [made them] like twenty courses. You know, you’re trying to please your dad and blow him away. And my dad is so funny, because he’s not a big foodie. On his birthday, this is what he’d do – he would make, like, a Betty Crocker Yellow cake. But he wouldn’t bake it. He would pour it in a giant pitcher and throughout the day, he would enjoy a little glass of cake batter. So for his dessert course, I made a little birthday cake soufflé thing, and then at the table, I poured cake batter all around it like a soup. He still talks about it, and that was, you know, twelve or thirteen years ago."
3. Creativity is a uniting force in divisive times.
"Food is beautiful. It’s something that, you know, you break bread and you’re sharing, and you’re having this experience with people that doesn’t only touch on sustenance of ‘I’m going to put it on a fork and eat it.’ It’s that you can go to the Middle East, you can go to South America, you can go to any part of the United States, and you sit with somebody and they invite you to their home usually, and they’ve made something. It’s cooking something delicious with whatever they have. Whatever part of the country, whatever color, spectrum... People are creative and proud of what they can do with what they have... Ham rocks and pig snouts. The venison someone shot. Velveeta. Dim sum and chicken feet [are] just as cool as filet mignon and truffles. You bond, and these memories are created. It’s like if we can share all that, you can kind of fix all the other things. Like a culinary United Nations!"