One of the Southeast’s Most Accomplished Chefs Shares Her 10 Favorite Ingredients and Why She Chose Them

Michelle Bernstein of Michy’s and Sra. Martinez (photo by Michael Pisarri, courtesy Michelle Bernstein)
At her Miami restaurants Michy’s and Sra. Martinez, Michelle Bernstein seamlessly combines a world of influences—French, Italian, Cuban, South American, and modern American—into a cohesive personal style. (Full disclosure: I coauthored Michelle’s book Cuisine a Latina, and she’s a friend.)
Because Bernstein is so skilled at explaining exactly what appeals to her about ingredients, as both a chef and an eater, we couldn’t think of a better toque to ask to submit to our next Toqueland Ten. (Our first three featured Harold Dieterle, Emily Luchetti, and Sean Baker.)
Herewith, Michelle’s revealing picks:
1. FENNEL. “My mother would shave fennel on salads when I was growing up,” says Bernstein, whose mom was a key culinary influence. “Later, I learned to beautifully braise and caramelize it in restaurants.” For this chef, there’s nothing with more applications: “I think it goes in, on, or under anything. It’s super versatile and my safe go to: Sometimes I can’t come up with a dish, but I have a beautiful piece of fish, or whatever, and I’m just kind of stuck. At those times, my safety is fennel.” Her customers don’t always recognize the vegetable: “When I hard braise it with a tiny pinch of sugar to help the caramelization process and then add wine and chicken stock, then bring it down and finish it with a little bit of butter so it’s super-glazy, salty, and sweet, and it has that good balance, that’s when people say, ‘What is that delicious vegetable that I’m going crazy over?’”
2. (REALLY GOOD) SPANISH EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL. “I love Arbequina olives and I love using that really good Spanish extra virgin olive oil as a finish to a plate, giving whatever it is you’re finishing that little bit of spiciness, that good mouthfeel, that glaze.” Where most chefs don’t actually cook with the top-shelf oil, Bernstein makes exceptions: “I do spend a lot on my Spanish extra virgin oil, and [generally speaking] it’s too costly to use it to sauté. But if I’m going to make a great piece of chicken or piece of fish, I’m going to sauté it in that stuff.”
3. MALDON SEA SALT. “At home, I probably overuse Maldon sea salt on pretty much everything. Everything. I’m so in love with it. I love the crunch it’s got. I love salt anyway, so having flakes of it in people’s mouths when they eat my food, as a finisher. .. I almost feel like I’m cheating giving them that extra mouthfeel with something I’m purchasing. It goes great on our foie gras torchon at the restaurant but also goes great on a piece of celery that I might be eating at my house.”
4. CITRUS. How’s this for a childhood memory informing adult taste: “I’m a Florida girl and, in Disney World, they have a part that’s run by the citrus commission. When I was a kid, my father did some work with the citrus commission, and every time we would go there, we would be the VIPs of what they called the Orange Bowl, and they would give us . .. it was almost an orange ice wrapped around soft serve vanilla ice cream. I knew right then that orange was probably my favorite fruit on the face of the Earth.”
More generally, says Bernstein, “citrus opens up your palate to everything. Just yesterday, I got in a box of Buddha’s hand and I made some pots de crème with it and fell in love with a whole new type of citrus. I grow kaffir lime, as well as Calamansi at my house. I use the leaves. I use the juice. I use the skin. It’s one of those things that you can use everything, inside and out, almost the whole plant and it’s just awesome. How can you not love it?” Extra added benefit for professionals and home cooks alike: “It’s something that you can smell before it gets to the table.”
5. ISLAND CREEK OYSTERS. The first time Bernstein tasted these oysters, from Duxbury, Massachusetts, “I think I ate a half dozen.. . they taste like the ocean. They couldn’t be brinier, or fresher. They just have the most delicious mouthfeel and taste.” How has she used them? “I’ve poached them with truffles. I fry them. I do ceviches with them. I make sauces pureeing them with potato to make gratins. Their liquor is more addictive than any alcohol I’ve ever had. That just does it for me. Talking about them right now, I’m literally salivating.”
6. AJI AMARILLO. Of the Peruvian yellow chile pepper, Bernstein says, “I used to think that it was just to put into ceviches and puree with seafood until we made a celeriac slaw using it in an aioli, and mixed it with a nage of lobster and shrimp the other day for a warm, Latin-style bouillabaisse. I realized how much depth that chile pepper really has. If anybody thinks that we just use it for heat, they should think again, because the amount of flavor, the perfume . .. it’s got so many different angles to it, it’s unbelievable. And of course it has the color of the sun. It makes everything so pretty. I wish I could grow it.”
7. ISRAELI COUS COUS. Bernstein uses this one so much that, “Every time I mention it my chefs and cooks roll their eyes.” Along with fennel, this is a go-to for her: “It’s another one of those safeties. If I can’t come up with any other good thing to put on a plate with something . .. if it’s the last minute, or I’m too tired, or just weeded, it’s Israeli cous cous. [Editor’s Note: Kudos to Michelle for the creative use of weeded as a verb. We’d never heard that one before. When asked if she coined this adaptation of “in the weeds,” she laughs and says, “I don’t know. All I know is that I’m perpetually weeded.” Now that’s an honest chef!]
How many ways can one use this ingredient? We don’t know, but here’s a good running start: “When you toast it, it turns into a totally different animal. If you cook it, as a risotto, and you make an intense, let’s say mushroom broth, that cous cous tastes more intensely like mushrooms than rice in a risotto.. .You can make them into a pudding, a delicious cous cous pudding, like rice pudding. It soaks up the flavor of everything. It keeps its integrity, so if you don’t cook it to hell, you taste little round pearls in your mouth. Sometimes when I’m home and I’m tired and I just feel like some starch, I’ll toast it up, really caramelize it up, and add some ghee (see #8, below), and whatever stock I have around, or water, throw some vegetables in it, and it looks like I worked really hard.”
8. GHEE. I’ve used ghee in the past and I really respected it without knowing what its true benefits were. Until I read about this farm that’s doing totally organic, super intensely slow-food-style ghee. I bought, like, ten jars of it within the last three months, and they are really big-ass jars. I’m giving the jars little by little to the restaurant, but always keeping a jar at home. Oh. My. God. The smell. It is probably one of the greatest smells I’ve ever encountered in the kitchen, even better than foie gras if that’s possible. It sears incredibly, you can use it over super high heat, you can use it over low heat, you can braise with it. I haven’t fried with it; that might be almost too intense.”
9. MISHMISH. Bernstein recently met Lior Lev Sercarz, proprietor of La Boîte à Epices, who creates spice blends adored by many chefs. According to Michelle, they have both been recruited, along with other chefs, to consult to Lean Cuisine and inspire that company’s culinary team. “Lior not only brought his spices to Lean Cuisine and infused their food with flavor, but also has given his spice mixes to all the chefs as gifts. I just ordered from him for the fourth time. I started off very small and he said, ‘Just wait until you get addicted.’ He was right.
“I think my favorite spice mix is Mishmish. It’s this sweet, almost honey-smelling beautiful, incredibly fragrant spice.” [Editor’s Note: The mixture features crystalline honey, saffron, and lemon.] “I hate to single one out because it really depends what you’re cooking and I love that he actually gives little pointers on what you should cook with each of his spices. But my goodness gracious. I’ve never had spices like his. I’ve never had spice mixes like his in my life. I thought I had always bought the best until I met Lior. His spices turn simple dishes into something truly memorable.”
10. SEA URCHIN. Another favorite driven by an intense taste memory: “The first time I had sea urchin I was in France. We were in the ocean, diving, and someone pulled it out. It was like a movie: they cut it open and slathered it on some hot French bread with butter. It was my first taste of heaven, my first taste of French seafood, and made me realize what I was missing.”
Today, Bernstein says she tries sea urchin, “everywhere I go. It was the first thing I ate when I went to Tokyo, in the markets. .. Most masters of sushi think the only really good sea urchin comes from Japan but I happen to think that there’s good sea urchin in a lot of places. I’ve had soups made out of it. I’ve had stews made out of it. And now, I puree it into sauces to thicken them and give them that seafood flavor. I’ve obviously served it raw on top of ceviches and tiraditos that we make. I can’t get enough. I think it goes with bone marrow. I’ve had it in sandwiches. In every possible way, shape and form.”
– Andrew
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