My new project - YellowHouse

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JohnnyChance

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I have been a cook/chef for the past 10 years and my best friend Ed has been one for the last 6 or so. I work at a great restaurant where I enjoy the type of food, the ingredients and the people there. It is not my menu, but I am not creatively stifled. Sure, there are some things I would change, but for the most part, I love it there. My poor friend Ed on the other hand, he works for an awful hack of a chef, management, and owners. Ed did not go to culinary school and kinda wound up cooking by chance, but he truly loves food and is a great chef. We used to work together at the place he still works, I was able to escape 3+ years ago, but he is still trapped there (and not for lack of trying).

Ed and I used to live together in a (yellow) house that had an amazing back yard which was great for all sorts of entertaining, from giant restaurant people keg parties to classier and more intimate dinner parties. It had a terrible kitchen (the counter space consisted of only 12" of space on either side of the sink), but we made it work.

Anyway, for the past 18 months we have been talking about hosting dinners, not just for our close friends and family, but friends of friends and hopefully through word of mouth, complete strangers. This is not a new concept, you may know it as a supper club, or Gypsy or Ghetto Gourmet, just to name a few. As best I can tell, there is no such thing in my area. So that is basically what we are doing, starting small with some friends and family, friends of friends, and people we have told about it and have been interested.

So far we have 3 locations lined up, and we are going to try to hit all of them by end of summer/early fall. The first one will be July 30th with a family style menu of some recipes from our wheelhouse. Walk before your run, we will save the extravagant coursed dinners for future events. We had a bunch of awful names picked out before Ed realized we should just name it after the place we lived together, started on this project, and had events at already.

That is all I have so far, but in the near future I will have plenty of menu/recipe details and photographs. If you are interested in attending, getting junk emails from us, or cooking with us please send us an email at yellowhousefood AT gmail.com or follow us on twitter @yellowhousefood.

Wish us luck!
 
Good luck John! Sounds like a fun project, looking forward to seeing more.
 
In Oslo we have a restaurant that have only one dish on the menu.
http://www.fyrhusetkuba.no/Fyrhusetkuba.no/The_Boiling_Pot.html

They have 3 shuffleboards for entertainment, lots of beer and the dish Boiling Pot - made of crabs, shrimps, sausage, potato and corn.

If you dont have to much space you can make an insane great boiling pot, that everybody wants to taste. This way its cheap to get started, and you can become famous at once. Low price as well, and have private arrangements for companies and special events ;)

Just meant as an input to your plan my friend :)
At least keep as few dishes as posible on the menu. Be great at what you know, dont be avarage on everything .)
 
I did some research:

It all started in 2005, after they got the idea from Austin, Texas. There this dish was served on newspapers, but in Norway this is not allowed.

Im going to try this place out. Oslo is a small town, with only 600 000 citizens. Norwegians do not eat as often out as people in the south of Europe, and Norwegians are hard to understand.

Anyway: This place makes it barely around, so I guess the consept would work in a larger city than Oslo with a other culture as well.
 
Hey, the one in Austin was an offshoot, owned by the guys in Rockport! I had several friends who worked at both places!

That is a crazy coincidence!
 
In Oslo we have a restaurant that have only one dish on the menu.
http://www.fyrhusetkuba.no/Fyrhusetkuba.no/The_Boiling_Pot.html

They have 3 shuffleboards for entertainment, lots of beer and the dish Boiling Pot - made of crabs, shrimps, sausage, potato and corn.

If you dont have to much space you can make an insane great boiling pot, that everybody wants to taste. This way its cheap to get started, and you can become famous at once. Low price as well, and have private arrangements for companies and special events ;)

Just meant as an input to your plan my friend :)
At least keep as few dishes as posible on the menu. Be great at what you know, dont be avarage on everything .)

It isn't a restaurant, just a dinner party like you would have for friends. Instead of friends, it is a group of strangers who sign up to attend the dinner via email. Each event will have a different menu.
 
That sounds like a really fun project!
 
First menu is done!

menu_july30_2011.jpg
 
Haha, my friend Ed wrote that. Evoo was kitchen shorthand long before RR popularized it.

No choices! You get everything!
 
We had our first dinner last night, and it went great! Better than I even hoped. Everything was awesome, the food, the decor, the atmosphere. Our guests were genuinely blown away, and I am stoked it went so well. Can't wait for the next one!

Photo onslaught:

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Cryovac'd beets for sous vide.

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Local grape tomatoes to be roasted for the lamb roulade.

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Staging glassware the night before.

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Ready for war.

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Ed on the grill.

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Lamb leg roulade on the grill.

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Appetizer table.

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Ginger and thyme sun-tea.

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Pickled vegetables.

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Charcuterie and bread.

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Duck pastrami that I made. Came out fckin' awesome!

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Grilled corn, duck fat confit sous vide fingerling potatoes, and sous vide yellow and red beets.

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"Dining room".

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Guests!

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Dinner is served, everyone is eating.

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The lighting was perfect. Industrial fixtures and edison bulbs gave just enough light and a warm glow.

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See what I am talkin about?

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Hurricane vases lighting the porch by the entrance.

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"Farmer's Cow" Black Raspberry and Chocolate Chip Ice Cream with Chocolate Beach Stones, Fresh Berries and Honey~Lavender Infused Whipped Cream.

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Brooklyn Brown Ale and '04-'05 Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout.

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Everyone get the hell out! I have dishes to do!

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Prep list says we are finished.

I have some more photos from a guest I still have to upload.
 
That looks pretty freaking awesome! Congrats on your first!
 
More!

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Ed and myself setting up the app table.

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Getting ready for service. Slicing the cured salmon.

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Haha, I love these lights!

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Eddie!

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Me, Ed.

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Us again.

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Haha, Pikachu was the bathroom attendant for the evening.

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Ed torching the Burnt Rosemary Oranges.
 
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Slicing and serving the salmon tableside.

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Contentment.

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Coffee Service!
 
I hope your guests fully appreciated what you two men did. I'm seriously thinking of arranging an overnight road trip to yellow house for my wine group.

Or would you guys consider a busman's holiday to the Philly area?

Bravo!
 
We had two people from Pennsylvania for this dinner, and they begged us to have one back home so some of their friends could experience it too. So it is possible!

And yes, everyone seemed very appreciative.
 
Dang. That looks like a great event. The food looks stunning, though to be honest I kind of expected that. What I didn't expect were all the nice aesthetic touches. The Edison bulbs, the nice plates, the slate slabs for the charcuterie... Congratulations on putting together an evening that I'm sure all your guests will be talking about for a long long time. And that members here will be drooling over for longer!
 
Hat's off to whom ever is drinking the PBR!

Ed and I have been talking about doing a dinner like this forever. It never happened because we never picked a date. About 2 months ago we said "fck it" and just decided on one. We wanted it to be on a saturday, and this was the only one we both weren't busy with work. It was meant to be I suppose, as July 30th is also the birthday of our best friend, Jay Camp, who died two years ago this past May. He was the best cook either of us have ever worked with and all around a great guy. Ed and I were roommates at the time, and Jay had come over for a small bbq. He was spending the night, but for whatever reason, decided to head home in the middle of the night. He fell asleep on the highway and his car crashed.

His drink of choice was a PBR and a shot of Jack. We offered them to anyone who wanted to join us, and then toasted to Jay.
 
Wait a second... did you REDACT a knife from that photo?!?! Are you holding out on us Johnny?
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Tat is one of those new onyx lives!
 
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