At Home with the Secret Vegan Supper Club Chef
What other odd jobs have you had?
Well, my fashion line and the gallery space. Now this. I just like to make stuff.
And did you build the huts [in the loft] yourself?
Yeah, I built the huts and the tables. When I did that I actually didn’t know how to build anything, but I got here and realized—well, I need to build things! I didn’t know how to build a loft, but I eventually figured it out. I had done some installation art, so I knew a little, then I thought it would be cool to have a little house inside the house and I was going to make little clouds and trees and weird things, but that part hasn’t really happened.
I like the old piano.
I pretend to play piano. We found it under the free stuff on craigslist and it turned out to already be in this building. So we wheeled it up. It’s really out of tune.
What’s your favorite thing about living in this neighborhood.
I think it’s really interesting how many cultures and jammed together right here. We’re at the corner of Clinton Hill, Bed Stuy and South Williamsburg. So it depends on who you’re talking to. I’ll say Clinton Hill because it seems easier to get to and they’ll actually come out.
What’s all this stuff you’ve prepped here?
Well, that’s a balsamic beet reduction. This is an apple-tamarind chutney. A tomato-masala jam. Seared asparagus. Roasted baby eggplants. [Points to peas.] Those are just peas.
Do you have a full house tonight?
Thirteen people. A full house is 26. I used to do 40 in a space much smaller than this.
And what is it about inviting strangers into your house that you’re most interested in?
Well, with the fashion line or something like that you don’t really get the satisfaction of seeing people interacting with the work, but with this you get to see all sides of it. You see people come in and sit beside someone they don’t know, which people are really uncomfortable with sometimes. Especially at my first place, which was in this tiny little attic apartment. And my kitchen was really tiny. Just a little bit of counter and you basically had to shut yourself in. I don’t know if any of the guests ever knew what they were getting into. They’d walk up the stairs and then you see them realize, ‘Oh, I’m in someone’s house.’ So they’d get weird for a minute and then after 10 minutes everyone is talking and making friends and that’s so cool.
What have you learned from it personally?
Well, I’ve learned a lot about cooking… And what else? I mean, a lot of things. It’s like having your own art show every night. I sometimes get worried that people aren’t talking or having a good time. And that’s just when I have to trust that what I’ve made is good. It’s ok—you know I can always worry about one thing being just slightly too wilt-y or something not being exactly right or something else that could have been better. But it’s always better to just let go of it. Usually whatever it is that I have been worried about ends up turning out great. But there have definitely been some disasters.
What kind of disasters?
At my old place in Vancouver I only had one burner that worked and I had this other hot plate. So I was making this big pot of pasta [Mérida says “pass-tah” in the traditional Canadian manner.] [Ed. note: that’s the correct way.]
Pass-tah?
Pass-tah.
Pass-tah?
Oh, right. Pasta… Pass-tah… Pasta. [laughs] And the water didn’t boil for two hours and I didn’t even realize. I had started it before the supper and it was another 45 minutes before the water was kind of boiling. But even then people were fine with waiting.