your life?

I remember that distinctly.

I was about 11 years old, and

I was making breakfast.

I was not wearing a shirt at the time.

So I'm frying eggs, and

basting it with hot oil, and it's splattering, and

it just sprayed across my whole chest.

So I burned both my nipples.

So what do you associate with cooking,

you associate sexual things?

Cooking is always sexual.

Look at the dining room, half your tables

are trying to get some play for the evening so

your job as a chef is to facilitate lovemaking.

I'm Michael Hung,

I"m the executive chef of Faith and

Flower in downtown Los Angeles.

Faith and Flower is kind of a mix up of,

you know, throwback design and

decor that looks to the 1920s and old Hollywood.

But we're pairing it with modern California rustic

style of cuisine.

I've put together a really great team of

hardworking, talented chefs.

Our front of house staff is totally generous and

warm and engaged with our guests and I think that

has really clicked with the population down here.

The menu is really a reflection of

Los Angeles.

It kind of hits a lot of global notes and I think

that kind of reflects Los Angeles because LA is

a city that has a lot of great ethnic good and

we're trying to draw from that culture.

Downtown over the past four or five years

has really started to emerge as a destination.

I mean, we're in the Southpark

area of downtown so we're kind of

the front-runner of restaurants in this area.

A lot of the food I do is a marriage

between my formal culinary training and

a lot of stuff that I ate when I was a kid.

So before I became a chef I was working in IT and

also in finance positions in New York City.

I was really not happy

with the work I was doing.

And one day my brother told me he

enrolled in culinary school.

You know, when he told me that,

it kind of like clicked in my brain that that's

something I always wanted to do also.

The day I heard that I kinda just got

enrolled in the school and, you know,

quit my job that day.

I've been in San Francisco for

nine years in coastal luxury management and,

and Dave Bernahl brought me down here.

Dave kind of gave me his vision about restaurants

and, and business as a whole, so

I think that was the major draw for me.

You know, we received quite a few awards for

best new restaurant, Thrillist had us as

best new restaurant in the country.

It's not just the kitchen that's getting accolades,

it's the, the bar program.

Mike Lay is an outstanding bartender,

super creative.

You know, I think we've worked incredibly hard

and I think that our hard work and, and

what we're trying to do, and trying to make our

guests happy has really kind of shown in,

in the rewards that we're getting.

Last night it was myself, David Bernahl from CLM.

Dave is one of the majority owners

of Faith & Flower.

Stephane Bombet who is also one of the partners

in the restaurant.

And a good chef friend of our Chris Oh,

who has the Seoul Sausage company and

numerous other restaurants so we kind of

split for a little bit and headed over to Torein

which was one of Stefan's other restaurants.

We're headed on a gas-tastic journey

tonight.

Yeah. Because you're cooking

front row later tonight.

Yes. And Chris Morningstar

is gonna to rock some front row.

He's probably going to rock some front row.

And- Potentially Bruce.

Bruce is gonna rock the foie gras.

Probably.

Just for context.

My toe hurts already.

Just for context they just

repealed the foie gras ban in California.

So everybody is very excited to be serving it

in mass quantities.

Well, right now we are headed to Terrine

restaurant right outside of Beverly Hills.

And the chef is a good friend of ours,

Chris Morningstar.

And they just recently opened about a month ago.

Oh, yeah. This is beautiful.

The Terrine is California styled raw.

It was very French influenced.

Hi, thank you for coming, thank you very much.

You missed,

you missed the car ride over boys that's all.

Did you guys open a bottle in the car?

We already got a bottle of Ketel One open over

there, what are you talking about.

I just order the food, foie gras, foie gras, and

foie gras.

No, we got to get this party

started though dude.

We got to get some shots at least.

We're going to be out for at least eight hours.

Eight hours?

Oh, I don't know if I can make until the end.

Fuck. You just certainly

celebrate a little in your belly now.

I know.

They of course, rolled out a lot of,

you know, tureens for us, and French pates.

One of the best chicken liver

mousses I've ever had.

He had a foie gras taurine,

he had kielbasa sausage, which was awesome.

Congratulations.

Love you guys. Thank you,

thanking you for joining me tonight guys.

Yeah, Michael.

This is good tasting.

Bone marrow, fried beef cheeks, beets, and

horseradish.

This is Kris' take on salad nicoise,

instead of being seared tuna it's veal tongue.

Right.

How many seats do you have out here?

Outside 62.

How many in there?

I think 60. It only rains what

15 days a year at the most?

How do you say make it rain in french Duvon?

That's what we need to know.

If you translate it, it would be.

That sounds good, that sounds good, no,

that sounds good.

We're gonna tonight.

It's very, it's a very African expression.

Yes it is.

No, that would be a weird thing to say.

I don't know. It's starting

to catch already.

Gentlemen, shall we continue?

So, your entrees for the evening.

Sadie's best fish and

chips with a local house-made tartar sauce.

A salad flam base with local trickery.

You have the agnolotti with a truffled rice

filling, truffle and hazelnuts, and

wood mushrooms.

We also have the rossini which is super classical

dish with petite filet mignon, on top,

spinach and just a classic bordelaise sauce.

You know that's really the strength of Terrine

is that you have all these great classical

dishes that are just executed, you know, to,

to perfection.

From there, we went to Union Pasadena to go see

Bruce Common who's an awesome chef.

For most of us, it's our first time, so

we are very excited.

Are we close?

How far are we?

We're maybe 35 miles.

Sorry Bruce.

How are you?

Sorry we're late.

It's okay.

How's your juice cleanse going?

I think it's ending today.

Bruce Kalman, he is doing regional Italian cuisine.

He is really pushing the envelope of what

good food is here in Los Angeles.

I respect him highly as a chef and

I respect his workmanship.

So it made sense for

us to go to Union last night.

I'm excited.

It's my first time here.

I'm the worst person to ask for recommendations

because I'm gonna recommend everything.

I'm gonna start sending out a couple things while

you guys are trying to figure out what to eat.

Bruce asked us if

we wanted him to take it easy on us.

And we kind of made the mistake of saying no.

You know, give it to us all.

And he literally gave it to us all.

This is a house made sriracha.

Yeah. Boris,

I'm gonna take so much pictures tonight.

So this is the seared foie gras duck sausage.

Then we have a foie tureen.

Oh.

And this a duck liver mousse with pickled

huckleberries.

David all brought some great wines.

He brought vintage champagne as well

as a couple white burgundy's.

We enjoyed those over there.

You have the munchies yet or what?

You know his pastas were amazing.

I mean he does all handmade pastas,

really clean flavors so that was wonderful.

Let me take multi pictures.

That's so good though.

Let's get after it, dude.

Fucking meatballs, dude.

Best fucking thing tonight.

Bruce gets his own grits milled locally just

outside of town in Pasadena which is really

awesome.

So, you know, to, to get that quality of product.

And, he paired that up with some wild mushrooms

and a Padron Jimenez sherry vinegar.

And, that was you know, super delicious.

The polenta fresh-tasting.

Still tasted of corn.

That's insane.

That's insane.

Potato, leek tortelli

with a homemade walnut pesto.

Those are our squid ink garganelli,

lobster, braised fennel and black truffle butter.

Oh my god.

This is the cavatelli with wild boar sausage,

roasted broccoli and beans.

Here's our money maker.

Oh, oh.

Spaghetti alla chitarra, san marzano tomato,

calabrian chili, a little garlic,

parmigiano reggiano, basil.

We had five pastas.

We had about four appetizers.

We had three,

like, really large share format entrees and

then like three or four side dishes as well.

This is braised collard greens with black barley.

Shit I think he's bringing us more food.

Oh my gosh.

This is basically the belly,

the belly wrapped around the.

How do you dial 911?

Because I don't think I can eat anything anymore.

That's the pork shank.

Oh my God.

That's the ten hour braised short rib.

Damn. And

it's stuffed with the.

Cuz you didn't get enough food yet, so.

I was really hoping it would be a small plate.