Perfect Pairing: Christopher Kostow + Guest Chefs
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
Photo Credit: Bonjwing Lee
This past December, chef Christopher Kostow gathered 14 chefs from famed restaurants both in California and abroad for The Restaurant at Meadowood’s sixth annual 12 Days of Christmas series held at the Napa Valley resort in St. Helena. Each chef cooked with Kostow for one night only at the Michelin-starred restaurant, and Kostow helmed the kitchen on the final night of the fundraiser for the Holly Cranston Memorial Fund and Napa Emergency Women’s Services. In addition, each meal was paired with wines from 12 local vintners who poured flights of their favorite vintages for guests. “The event gives us a chance to work with old friends as well as meet new chefs that we find inspiring,” Kostow says. “My team and I get to be challenged and cook in a style sometimes out of our comfort zone. For example, this year Andy Ricker of Pok Pok created a family style Thai meal.”
In addition to Ricker, whose restaurants in Portland and New York have developed cult followings, the impressive roster of chefs included such California-based talents as Matthew Accarrino of SPQR in San Francisco, Nicolaus Balla and Cortney Burns of Bar Tartine in San Francisco, and David Kinch of Manresa in Los Gatos.
Menus stayed true to the individual whims of each chef, while also taking advantage of the bounty of the famed wine region. “I think the bay area is the most exciting area in the country right now for restaurants,” Kostow says. “It has such a concentration of creativity, along with an abundance of chefs who share an understanding of the products and growers in the region.” All the ingredients for the multi-course menus were sourced from the same local purveyors The Restaurant at Meadowood uses. Of course there are sometimes special ingredients that must be procured from other places, but the chefs do their best to stay local. Prior to each dinner, Kostow walked each chef through the restaurant’s greenhouse to gather herbs and additional produce for garnish. “We also have a forager who gets incredible ingredients from the area around Meadowood,” says Kostow. “We let chefs know what’s available to see if they want to incorporate anything into their menus.”
The whole process started months before the holiday season with a chat between Kostow and the visiting chefs. “I’ll call each chef and begin a dialogue about the dinner,” he says. “They’ll choose four to five courses they want to make, and then my team and I will fill in the rest. We’ll go back and forth about what dishes work with the theme of the meal, develop the recipes and then test them in our kitchen.” The whole process leading up to the dinners took months, but the fruits of chef’s labors at the Meadowood benefit could only be tasted on one of 12 memorable December nights in Napa Valley.
by Alexis deBoschnek
Pictured: Sam Levy
Photo by Bonjwing Lee
