COOKING FRESH | Winter 2011-12

The pursuit of authentic, local flavors has inspired Jim Weaver’s career as a chef and restaurant owner. Now it’s the focus of his first book.

Back in 1999, I was privileged to be among the small group Jim convened to consider establishing Slow Food Central New Jersey. For a decade following that initial gathering, I served as a chapter official. So when the opportunity arose, I jumped at the chance to catch up with him to ask what led to his interest in farm-to-table eating, what is it that he is most proud of, and what’s next.

The folks at Rutgers Press approached me in either late 2008 or the spring of 2009. I always have liked to write; it’s a creative outlet. But that was right as the recession hit, so I told them that I had to put it on the back burner. They gave me a year, but then once I got into the process I realized it would take even longer. I am so grateful they gave me the extra time to do what was needed.

At first, I wanted to write everything about everything. The editors helped me focus by limiting the story geographically to Slow Food activities in New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania, the Hudson Valley, and New York City. But I wanted the story to be real, to be relatable. To do that I needed to focus on the people involved—the friends, farmers and colleagues who helped me realize my vision. Like Danny Cohen, whose Cape May oysters leave people clamoring for more, and George Rude, who’s helping bring back heritage turkeys at Griggstown [Quail Farm]. Doing the research, reconnecting with these people, that was the most fun.

What led you to take up what we now term the “locavore” cause, or the farm-to-table movement, in the first place?

My whole career, from a chef ’s point of view, has been to do something different. This began when I was 22 years old and Frank Panico told me he wanted his restaurant [Panico’s in New Brunswick] to be the best Italian restaurant in New Jersey. I asked myself, what makes a restaurant the best Italian restaurant? At that time, they were all the same, serving the same food. Some just did it on white tablecloths, some served pizza as well. I started to do research on real Italian food—beyond chicken parm and veal piccata.

So I developed a menu that was off the charts—pesto sauce, for example, was unheard of [around these parts]. When Frank looked at it he was like, uh-oh. He didn’t recognize anything on there. So we compromised. A few months later, when it was time to change the menu again he said, “You were right; go ahead, do whatever you want.” I did, and we wound up number one!

Ten years later—1998—and Tre Piani opened, still with that same style. As a chef I wanted to source the best ingredients, but these were being shipped out of state. The only product available was cheaper, inferior and older. At the time I was living in East Windsor and every day I’d pass farms with great produce. But when I approached the farmers about selling to me and my restaurant, I got stonewalled. They told me, “I’ve had some bad experiences with restaurants, especially in getting paid.” I understood, but I was frustrated.

Then one day I received a Slow Food brochure in the mail. I found it inspiring. It answered everything that had ever bugged me about bland, artificially pumped-up food, not to mention the outrageously expensive, complex, Rube Goldberg mass food system. It suggested a way to make things better without going the political route. It’s a movement for anyone who wants to support authentic food, grown and enjoyed as close to its source as possible. I told myself, “I’m going to start a chapter.” Little did I know how much Slow Food would change my life.

I’ve found that if you’re not quite sure what you’re doing, surround yourself with professionals. I can take credit for having the nerve [to attempt it in the first place], and I admit I didn’t know enough about what I was doing to worry about making a mistake. It’s about getting the right people together. Our first meeting included a local farmer, a professional food writer, a wine expert, an agricultural marketing professional and an extension agent from Rutgers. It was a four-hour lunch at Tre Piani. By the end, we had the sense that we had just launched something pretty historic.

We mounted our first public Slow Food event in August 1999. We called it Har-Fest, held it at Tre Piani, and invited local restaurant chefs to provide free tastings of food using seasonal, local, New Jersey products. On hand were local beekeepers, cranberry producers, tomato growers and cheese makers. The event took on a life of its own; the crowd swelled to about 500 people; we signed up more than 50 members that day.

After Har-Fest, we still had no idea what repercussions our success would mean for the movement. By the end of that year, our membership had risen to well over 100. I was later told that the success of our chapter—the sixth in the U.S.—helped convince the Italian [international] organization to invest in Slow Food USA, which was formed in 2001, as early as they did. They figured if something like that could happen in New Jersey … Well, Slow Food exploded and we were instrumental in that. There are now 165 chapters in the U.S.

I was lucky enough to be born in New Vernon, one of the wealthiest towns in the state. I really had a blessed, carefree childhood. My father was an architect, and we lived in the woods in a house he had designed and built. My family ate well; we had quality food, not junk food. The occasional box of Frosted Flakes was a special treat. We were a close-knit family and had many friends, and the house was designed for entertaining. We gave the best parties, and from that I think I developed a fondness for entertaining—more than cooking, actually.

I went to New Hampshire College [now Southern New Hampshire University], and tried a couple of architecture classes, but didn’t like them. When it came time to declare a major, I went with hotel and restaurant management—but not really on purpose, I just had to declare something! Then I kind of got into it. I was cooking in a little place in Manchester, fell in love with cooking, and followed my heart.

For Slow Food on the national and international levels, so much has changed. It’s not quite as personal as it was. Slow Food is rightly focused on how to bring quality food to the masses at a reasonable price. That’s the key for the Slow Food of tomorrow: making a sustainable food system happen, rather than, for example, maintaining subsidies for big companies producing foods that make people sick. Closer to home, times change and circumstances change. The recession hit and for everyone it became about survival, about just staying in business. One of the things our chapter is currently focusing on is expanding the number of winter indoor farmers’ markets that we organize each year.

As for Tre Piani, well, we’re an independent mom-and-pop operation, and we’re still standing. A lot of my competition is not. Being located out here on Route 1, we depend on the surrounding corporations, but they’re cutting back, too. Customers—both business people and families—want comfort fare, not funky new concoctions using new exotic herbs from halfway around the world. Tre Piani has always been about community, about doing great food for the price, so I’m just going to keep on doing what I’m doing.

[My wife] Kim and I are known for our busman’s holidays. We share a passion for travel and food. But it’s hard to get away from the restaurant. This recession put the kibosh on everybody’s plans! It’s like a big timeout, where we’re all waiting to see what’s going to happen next.

Perhaps it’s that I’m really an outdoors person, though I spend so much time indoors. I enjoy winter sports like hockey, and I used to be an avid skier—I even used to race.

I would like nothing better than hiking the Appalachian Trail for a couple of weeks straight, going from cabin to cabin.

I have been blessed with countless incredible meals. I guess I have to say that my most memorable were two that I had on my first trip to Italy in 1991, as I was also involved in the cooking.

The first was on my first day in Italy. I was met by friends at the airport in Milan, and we went directly to [their] cousin’s restaurant, La Guzzina. The chef specialized in seafood and showed me many dishes, which we ate all day, along with many bottles of wine and probably six espressos, as I had not slept since two nights prior. He then asked me to cook something for him. In New Jersey at that time, [cooking] was about creative new dishes, flavors and exotic ingredients. I decided to do Cajun blackened tuna and shrimp, as it was one of the few new methods created in the U.S. I asked for a cast-iron skillet, which I heated on high heat for about 30 minutes while the chef worried I was crazy. I made a spice mix and finally cooked the fish. They all loved it and actually had it on the menu for years.

Near the end of the trip, I was able to spend the day alone in a friend’s apartment where we were staying in Rome. We decided I would cook a meal that night for my friends, his friends and family. I spent the morning shopping, especially the Campo de’ Fiori market, and spent the rest of the day cooking. I had the windows wide open overlooking Vatican City, the stereo cranking and [I] focused on a 10-course meal with wines to match. I made homemade pasta, local greens, duck galantine and a few other dishes. That was the moment I realized how much I love Italy and the genuine passion and understanding I have for food, cooking and flavors.

Seeing the energy grow after establishing the [Slow Food] chapter. I never made a lot of money, but I have a legacy, and I think that’s cool. I turned a passion [hospitality] into a career and then used it to legitimize the Slow Food movement and bring it back into the community.

Pat Tanner is a food writer, restaurant reviewer, radio host, and blogger (dinewithpat.com). A co-founder of Slow Food Central Jersey, she edits the Zagat New Jersey guide and is a restaurant critic for New Jersey Monthly. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Food Network magazine, and other NJ publications.

Ever the locavore, Weaver creates the recipes below with “sea scallops from Viking Village, organic Berkshire pork from Double Brook Farm in Hopewell, and all the produce acquired through Tri-County Cooperative.”

ON LOCAVORE ADVENTURES:
One Chef ’s Slow Food Journey
(Rutgers University Press, 2012)

It’s easy to forget that not all that long ago—1999 to be precise— seasonal, outdoor farmers’ markets were a rarity in our state; supermarkets rarely stocked local produce; restaurant chefs sourced New Jersey produce only after it had traveled out of state to a regional wholesale market; and one restaurant, the legendary Ryland Inn, made national news by having its own garden. Jim Weaver, inspired by the Italian Slow Food movement, decided that paradigm could be changed. In his book, Weaver shares his personal story and the stories of the local farmers, food producers, chefs and others with whom he built a local slow food culture. As Josh Viertel, president of Slow Food USA, attests, “We are working to build a different world—one where food and farming are sources of health and well-being for all people and the planet; one where food can be good, clean and fair. Jim Weaver sees that a different world is already partially built. Through telling that story, he paints a picture of what is possible.”

EXCERPT FROM LOCAVORE ADVENTURES:

“When Jack [Rabin, a research scientist and associate director at The Rutgers New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station] was a young researcher, the established paradigm... was still set on just one thing: “We need tomatoes that won’t turn into a bag of mush between California and Chicago!” In pursuit of that goal, in the 1940s and 50s research got very narrow minded. Jack groans good-naturedly as he tells one of the stories, now part of agricultural research lore:

A celebrated researcher in California arranged to have tomato fields near a hardtop road. Researchers would pluck the tomatoes, walk over to the road, and drop them on the pavement... “Those that didn’t break, that’s a better tomato!”… Flavor was not a factor!

It was very different in 1934, when the Rutgers Tomato was introduced by Rutgers research scientist and breeder Lyman Schermerhorn. His variety became celebrated both as a quality eating tomato and as the ideal canning tomato… But how did Schermerhorn manage to pack everything—both durability and flavor—into one tomato?

Jack got right to the point: “He was also eating the damn things!”” —from “On the Hunt for a Hot Tomato,” Chapter Four

Editor’s note: New Jersey is now home to five local chapters of Slow Food USA: Central New Jersey, Northern New Jersey, South Jersey Shore, Rutgers University and Princeton. For more information and to get involved, visit slowfoodusa.org.