The recently installed executive chef of Canlis in Seattle remembers her roots and cooks with her heart.
When Aisha Ibrahim was young , her mother engraft a garden in the yard of their West Virginia home , where they had emigrated to in 1991 . ( There were few Asian grocery stores less than a two - hour drive away . )
The grease was dotted with verdant farsighted beans and water Spinacia oleracea for the sour tamarind soup sinigang , or slender Asian aubergine destined for mom - made tortang talong , an omelet in which the aubergine is the savory , charred star . Ibrahim was just six years old and accept in Iligan City in the Filipino state of Mindanao , a southern stretch of island with hustle public markets .
“ My other memories in the Philippines were about the food market , ” she return . “ My parents purchased a chicken once and we took attention of it for a few week and then they slaughtered it — same affair happened with a goat — it was shocking . ” But it ’s lesson like this one that engrained in Ibrahim too soon on : This is where food for thought comes from .
Chef Aisha Ibrahim commands the Canlis kitchen with heart.|Photo by Chona Kasinger for Thrillist
As a world - trotting chef whose culinary journey has taken her to Michelin - asterisk eatery in Spain and later Thailand , Ibrahim landed atCanlisa year ago . It ’s the first time inthe Seattle dining founding ’s 70 - yr history that a woman has helm the kitchen as the executive chef — a faggot , fair sex of color at that . It ’s here , in this corner air pocket of the Pacific Northwest at a eating place that overlooks the western bound of Lake Union , that Ibrahim can research a unexampled bounty of ingredient for her ever - changing fine dining menu . She admits , however , that she misses the food market she used to frequent .
After finish culinary school and rise in the fine dining ranks in San Francisco ( stints atCommisandManresa , to namecheck a twosome ) , Ibrahim began to palpate pulled to far - flung property beyond the West Coast .
“ I ’m finding quilt in asseverate the nicety of special things that get me back to my childhood . ”
Ibrahim breaks down a whole kampachi.|Photo by Chona Kasinger for Thrillist
Ibrahim made a pitstop in Japan , then go to Basque state where she worked under the youngest Michelin - asterisk chef in Spain at Azurmendi . Ibrahim ’s last cookery gig before Canlis was as the chef de culinary art at Aziamendi , Azurmendi ’s luxury babe eatery , just northerly of Phuket , Thailand . It was there in Southeast Asia where alert markets gripped her imagination .
“ Our cultism to product was hard-core , ” Ibrahim remembers of those day sourcing ingredient in 2015 . Friday morning were market days . “ You wake up before the Lord’s Day mount . Get your coffee ready . Hop on the minibike — it ’s Thailand , you cycle to the market , ” she says . Ibrahim and her partner , Samantha Beaird , who also now put to work at Canlis , would point to Kad Chin Haw , a Chinese Muslim farmers ’ securities industry next to the oldest mosque in Chiang Mai .
“ It forever ruined my idea of a market place . You ’ve gotCalifornia markets — and you ’ve let rugged market and you ’re haggling over first - of - the - time of year plum , ” Ibrahim read . It totally shifted the way she design and builds menus today .
Ibrahim sitting in the Canlis dining room, the very one whose diners report feeling so welcome in as she’s taken the helm as executive chef.|Photo by Chona Kasinger for Thrillist
now at Canlis , Ibrahim does n’t have just - picked lichi or long neck opening alligator pear at her fingertip . But she does get to meld Seattle ’s premium — pristine oysters , uncivilized leeks and Walla Walla onions , dark chocolate water ice with spruce backsheesh — with her background and inheritance . “ At first , I was definitely feeling conflicted about the attention around my identity , ” she recognise . That was until Ibrahim consider the Canlis dining elbow room abruptly filled with the most diverse hurl of diners : nonbinary node , the Filipino residential district , the fairy community . ( Even iconic manner and sports power match Megan Rapino and Sue Bird , who are Canlis neighbors , had never dined there until she come on control panel . )
“ I ’m finding ease in verify the nuance of special affair that bring me back to my childhood , ” Ibrahim says . She ’s finding her groove . She ’s honoring her roots . From West Virginia gardens to markets in Thailand to Seattle , Ibrahim ’s food is the pith of her biography — so far . “ I was fortunate with two parent who both cultivate and cooked for us , ” she tell . “ I do n’t think my parent realized they were leading me on this way of life . ”
Last year , she invited her parents to dine at Canlis . On the menu was Ibrahim ’s favoriteFilipino dish : tortang talong , the very same she grew up run through with Solanum melongena from her mom ’s garden . But with very well - tuned twists . Charred then peeled eggplants would take a dip in a whipped egg bathtub . “ We ’d cook it very slowly in brown butter and we ’d smoke that , ” she explains . Then they took Fagopyrum esculentum harvested in Skagit Valley , north of Seattle , and made a smoke buckwheat pick season with a 300 - year - onetime tamari soy sauce and served with caviare .
The view from Canlis overlooks Lake Union, with Gas Works Park in the mid-distance.|Photo by Chona Kasinger for Thrillist
“ It ’s crispy with lots of texture and it ’s almost custardy , ” remember Ibrahim . No , this is n’t mamma ’s omelet any longer . But it ’s without a doubt , a peach that is a special ode to Ibrahim ’s mother . “ We named it after my mom , ” she says . “ It was the most emotionally intense second being capable to serve my mammy a saucer that ’s because of her . ”
Thinly sliced halibut in a grilled halibut dashi, daikon, smoked halibut bone oil, wild chrysanthemum oil and lemon balm oil.|Photo by Chona Kasinger for Thrillist
