This is an audio transcript of the FT Weekend podcast episode: Food & Drink mini-series: Ayesha Nurdjaja on finding flavour

Lilah Raptopoulos
Hi, FT Weekend listeners, this is Lilah. Welcome to the second episode of our four-part mini-series on Food and Drink. Today, I can’t wait to introduce you to Ayesha Nurdjaja. She is the executive chef of two beloved New York restaurants, Shuka and Shukette, and she’s an absolute expert at flavour. So, she joined me in the New York studio to teach us how to taste.

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Lilah Raptopoulos
OK. This is FT Weekend, the podcast, special edition. I’m Lilah Raptopoulos. Here’s Ayesha.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Lilah Raptopoulos
Ayesha, hi. Welcome to the show.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Hi. Thank you for having me.

Lilah Raptopoulos
So you’re the executive chef and partner of one of my favourite restaurants in New York, Shuka. It’s around the corner from the New York newsroom and the journalists here go all the time.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Oh, it’s amazing. Thank you!

Lilah Raptopoulos
And also one of my new favourite restaurants, Shukette, both in Manhattan, both on the West Side, and I’d love to learn from you about flavour. But to start, I’m curious if we can go to Gravesend, Brooklyn, where you’re from, and learn a little bit about what it was like in the kitchen for you growing up?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Sure. I have to say I was a very lucky kid growing up. My dad was a chef. He was a chef of a ship that transported liquid natural gas from America to Asian countries. My mom was Italian and my father’s Indonesian. So, it was like a battle of Chopped every night. (Laughter) And my mother to this day is probably one of the best cooks that I know.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Wow.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And my dad introduced spice and flavours and things that my mother was never used to. And I think from a young age I say that it spiked my battle with a little bit of turmeric . . . (laughter) and I had like this thirst of knowledge about spices, how they transport, like, and what they do to food and flavour. And that’s what we’re here to talk about today.

Lilah Raptopoulos
How would you describe the food you cook? I’m Greek and Armenian. It’s very familiar to me, but it also feels kind of Lebanese, kind of Syrian, kind of Israeli. How do you, how do you describe your food?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Probably in the beginning of college when you’re like, you have a mind of your own and you’re like, I’m going to try that. I always gravitated towards that type of food.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mm-hmm.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
My grandmother lived in Cobble Hill growing up, and she just went to the butcher every day and she went to the store every day and we would go to Atlantic Avenue and go to Damascus and Sahadi’s and try kibbeh and shawarma and their hummus. And she was an adventurous eater for someone who was born in 1921.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mmm.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And I think maybe, between that and my father, just the spices, I just always gravitated towards like those types of restaurants, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, and when I got a chance to travel, those are the places I wanted to go. Like the . . . people talk about Greek salad, unless you’re in Greece eating those tomatoes, those cucumbers, the red onion, that olive oil, I mean . . .

Lilah Raptopoulos
It’s impossible to make anywhere else.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
It’s so . . . Right and it’s so delicious. Your skin feels good. You feel good.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Uh-huh.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
It tastes like something you’ve never had before. And then as I travelled, you know, I had the chance to go to Israel, I’ve been to Morocco and to Tunisia, you realise that it’s the same seasonality, using the same ingredients, but they’re doing it their way.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Right.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And I think when we talk about Shuka and Shukette, it’s really my travels, my experiences on when you taste something, you’re always like, wow! I wonder what it would be like if I did this, this and this. You know, I think that those are the cogs that work in a chef’s head.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. So when you say you taste something as a chef and you think, OK, what if I did it this way? What would it taste like? What would be an example of something that when you were travelling you were like, oh, if I did this my way?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I’m trying to think . . . When I was in, do you ever have pan tumaca in Spain? It’s like the grated tomato. They usually take a crusty piece of good delicious bread . . . 

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mm-hmm.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And then they take a garlic clove and they scratch it on the bread so it gets in the nooks and crannies and then on the side they take a tomato and they grate it like on a box grater and add olive oil and salt and put that right on top of the piece of bread.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Right.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Sometimes you’ll find anchovies on top of it and sometimes serrano ham. When I tried . . . the first time I tasted that, I was like, wow this grated tomato thing is amazing. Like, what else could you put it in? And then when I went to Israel, they had it like a sauce. Like a dipping sauce.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mmm.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Well, they were pairing it with meats. So when I came back and I was at Shuka and Shukette, I was like, how can I get this on the menu? Can I put it just as a dipping sauce? So we mixed it with tahini. Right now we’re serving a doner kebab with that on the bottom. But I think it’s like, how do you build upon these flavours? All these things that are really simple.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
It’s just sort of, you know, what you want to put out there to say that’s your own.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Right. Right. That sounds so good. (Laughter) So I have so many questions for you. But, just quickly, I’d love to hear your story. Like how did you go from trying new foods growing up to executive chef of Shuka and now Shukette?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Sure. I think it started when I moved out. I was 19 years old and I used to watch Lidia Bastianich on television and on PBS when I was home, like my parents cooked and it was my first time. Then I moved out, my first time that I would cook for myself. I used to watch her on TV and I used to watch her hands and her gold bracelets and how everything she touched just looks so simple. At that time, like every parent, my parents wanted me to be a lawyer and I got into law school and I was working in a law firm and one day I just realised like I was not feeling fulfilled.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
So people say to you, do what you love. So I went home that day and on a piece of paper, I wrote diamonds (laughter), music and cooking, in that order. And the next day I walked into then, I went to the New York School of Gemology and I was like, how do you study diamonds? And the woman’s like, that’s not how it works. And I was like, forget that.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Right.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And when I said music, like I wanted to be, that I still aspire to be like, you know, a really famous DJ.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Like doing the pool parties, that like the Wynn in Las Vegas.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Totally.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
But like, was that a career? It could have been, but I didn’t believe in myself and didn’t know much about it. And third, I went to ICE when it was on 23rd and 6th Avenue.

Lilah Raptopoulos
So that’s Institute of Culinary . . . Education.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Education. Yes. And there was something about it. I was like, I can do this. I want to try this. And I called my mother and she was like, you’re insane. And I was like, OK, great. But I was gonna keep, I kept my job and I worked 9 to 5. I went to school from 6 to 10.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Wow.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And on the weekends, I worked at Felidia as an extern. I started there mopping the floor to like peeling carrots and doing dishes. And when I graduated from school, I got a job there and that was like my lifetime achievement, you know what I mean? Here I was watching her on TV, and now I’m cooking in her kitchen.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
And it was the best, hardest job that I have ever had.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I used to . . . The thing that I love most about your food is it feels kind of like — this is an interpretation — but it feels kind of like maximalist cooking to me. Like in maximalist design, you kind of go into a room and it’s like cosy and approachable and welcoming and also like, there are a few different patterns together. So it seems busy, but somehow, like, it all makes sense and you’re like, how did they do that? How does it, like? I love that aesthetic and I feel that way about your food. Like, it’s just like there’s so much flavour in it, there are so many spices, and then you taste it and you’re like, where? What is that thing that makes it so good? And so I want to know your secrets. (Laughter) Whatever you’re willing to do.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Yeah, of course. Of course. There are no secrets. I tell everybody all the time, you love it, I’ll give you my recipe because everybody makes things different. And no two things are ever the same in this life. But I think it’s trying to have a minimalist approach while layering flavours. So I think a lot of times, when I think about it, I think of like flavours that go good together. I think if you notice in my cuisine, I do use a lot of spices, but I also use a lot of herbs.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yes.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I think herbs and spices go in tandem. A lot of times when I describe my food, it’s almost like music.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mm-hmm.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Because you have to have high notes and low notes, but then you have to have that harmony in between that makes that thing go. So if you taste that apricot and it’s not as sweet as you want it to be, what can you do as a vehicle to keep that acidity high but also bring sweetness to it? So first thing that comes to me is honey.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
So what are we doing with the honey now? Is the honey gonna be sweet honey? Is it gonna be a savoury honey? How can we make it herbaceous? How can we make it bright? I always like the bites of foods to feel like the 4th of July in your mouth.

Lilah Raptopoulos
For sure.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
You know, these, like, small mini explosions of flavour where each of those bites is different. Anyone that’s dined with me knows I am the left side of the menu kind of girl. I want it all. I wanna taste it, and I don’t want to commit to an entrée. So when I thought about Shuka and Shukette, it was like, how do we, how could we eat in this convivial style and have all these little bites that feel like composed dishes but that you don’t have to be bogged down to that commitment of an entrée?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
So I also think about that when I’m creating.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
You know?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, yeah. At Shukette there were sort of these incredible dips, like a labneh dip that kind of changed my life. And bread would come out and then bigger dishes were coming out and then sauces were coming out alongside those dishes. And I felt sort of like, I had a little bit of control of like, OK, I’ve got the bread, I’ve got this labneh. It’s so good. I’ve got this like, this lamb that’s really like, how do I? I’m gonna dip this and this and this and this and so everything felt different. That’s all on purpose, I imagine? What’s the . . .?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Yeah, I call it the rip and dip.

Lilah Raptopoulos
OK.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
That’s what I call it. And, you know when you go to a restaurant, you know how you have your first course and then they brush the table off and they clean and they reset you and stuff.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Shuka and Shukette is more of the kind of thing where you’re like, no, no, no, don’t take that.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Right.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Because that sauce, like, for instance, you had that garlic sauce, the toum.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yes.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
That is delicious with . . . you can put that on the labneh. It goes on the chicken . . . 

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
It goes . . . that and the bread with a little bit of the hot sauce on this, the shatta, you’re done. That’s a meal in itself.

Lilah Raptopoulos
(Laughter) Right.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
So really, all the food is that . . . is meant to be with each other and none of it is meant to be like, singularly, you could only have this bite and that bite alone.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I guess I’m curious, Ayesha, like how you develop your palate and like how we can develop ours, basically . . .

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Sure.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Like as we’re going out in restaurants and we taste something we love, like, how do you teach people to kind of like taste, like to recognise what in it is exactly what they’re loving and that kind of thing?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I think there’s multiple ways of doing it, but what’s most important is to be open.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
You know. Everybody, there’s people like, I don’t eat peas or I don’t eat asparagus and maybe you’ve had a bad crossing with them before. But when it comes to vegetables and salads and other things, I think you just have to be open to it. I think when you’re eating out, like especially in restaurants, like share, where you can taste different things and then take what you loved from that and try to replicate it at home.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Mimic the flavours of the things that you like in that dish and cook them and see like, kind of like, how you can push it. When it comes to regular food, like, push your palate, push your acidity, kind of, push those boundaries of what it is in that food that you like.

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Lilah Raptopoulos
OK. So I have a quick speed round for you.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Yes, my favourite.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Just a few fun questions. OK. What are a few things everyone should have in their kitchen?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Peanut butter (laughter), sea salt and a range of beverages — alcoholic and non. (Laughter) Not just water and red wine. Like you need like a few flavoured seltzers and good Scotch. Kraft macaroni and cheese, though, I think is a, is a go-to (laughter) for that one bad night that you have and you need a hug and no one’s around — it’ll give it to you.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, for sure. Most under-appreciated spice?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I would say cumin because people think it’s very strong in flavour, but a little bit goes a long way.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mm-hmm. What is a secret in cooking that makes everything taste better?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
To do it when you’re in a good mood (laughter), and to do with an open heart because angry food tastes angry.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Mm-hmm.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I know it sounds, like, kooky and stuff like that, but a lot of times when I see a cook like upset or whatever, I’m always like: “Go, wash your face, regroup and come back.” Sometimes a good reset for myself is like when I’m like overworking a dish, like I want to get this scallop dish on the menu, but it’s not coming out right, I just take two eggs and make perfect — my version of perfect scrambled eggs for me to eat — and then sometimes that’s a reset.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Wow.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
But you gotta take a moment because you really have to cook from the heart.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, yeah. That’s a really good one. Last-minute meal you can throw together, where you can experiment a little and not totally mess it up?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I think it’s like the pantry passed around.

Lilah Raptopoulos
OK.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Right. You get whatever you have in there and then you have anchovies, a little bit of lemon zest, some chilli of some sort. If you have something fresh, like a pepper or — which I hate, peppers, I don’t know why I said that — but even like a tomato and toss that together, that always works.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Why do you hate peppers?

Ayesha Nurdjaja
I just, I don’t know. They repeat on me. Unless they’re spicy, I don’t find any, like, bell peppers I don’t find use for.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Ayesha, thank you so much. This is such a pleasure.

Ayesha Nurdjaja
Oh, my pleasure. Thank you so much.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Lilah Raptopoulos
Thank you for listening to FT Weekend, the podcast from the Financial Times. Next Wednesday we are talking with FT wine critic Jancis Robinson. Jancis is one of the world’s top wine experts. She’s been writing about wine for 45 years. She was actually on our show a few months ago. I put a link to that episode in the show notes if you wanna listen. She’s a total legend. This time, she is coming on to help us navigate wine trends, from orange wine to biodynamic wine to indigenous grapes. She’s gonna tell us what to explore and what to avoid. If you like this episode, please do share it with your friends and tag us or say hi on social. You can find us on Twitter @ftweekendpod, and I’m on Instagram and Twitter @lilahrap. This show is produced by Molly Nugent, executive produced by Topher Forhecz and Cheryl Brumley and engineered by Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco with original music by Metaphor Music. Special thanks to Alastair Mackie.

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