James Beard finalist, Valentine chef Crystal Kass draws inspiration from Arizona ingredients

On Chef Talk, The Show sits down with a chef – from fine dining rooms to nightclub kitchens – to find out what makes them tick.

The winners of the James Beard Awards, known as the Oscars of the food world, will be announced next month, and a few Arizona chefs have made the final choice.

René Andrade of Bacanora is in the running for Best Chef: Southwest, and Crystal Kass of Valentine is in the running for Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker.

The Show recently had the opportunity to visit Kass’s kitchen to find out what inspires him.

Crystal Kass’ pastries and desserts aren’t overly complicated or overwhelming. These are explorations of texture – and sometimes even temperature. And they are often inspired by the desert that surrounds us.

She has a shelf in her kitchen in the back of Valentine that is full of native ingredients – flowers and seeds, from amaranth and red fife to mesquite flour and chili peppers. She said she always monitors what is seasonal in the Sonoran Desert.

“Blackberry season is just around the corner. Usually as a team we go to Holiday Farms and pick blackberries. I think that will happen next month. So you may see something with blackberries on the menu, whether this either make a jam or use them fresh or make a granita.

Kass didn’t start out in the food world, however. She grew up in Chicago and studied kinesiology in college, but said she realized it wasn’t what she wanted to do. She went to French pastry school instead.

So why did she choose pastries? A lot of it is about fond childhood memories.

“Honestly…I just love food and, and I grew up around food, like my grandmother was always in the kitchen, my mom was always in the kitchen, cooking, cooking,” said Kass. “And for me, it’s really something that makes me think of family. And I just want to cook for other people and put love into it, I guess if you will. Because my mom, every Every time I come home she’s always like, “Are you hungry? Can I make something to eat?” It’s like that’s her love language. it’s my love language. And baking just appealed to me because I love sweets and you know, that’s something that I started doing, was baking with my mom. .

Kass said she also loves the creativity involved in baking.

“…I like to be creative and try to put my spin on things,” she said.

And being a pastry chef involves a lot of precision – a lot of very exact measurements and mathematical precision. Kass said it also fit his personality well.

“I like to say that my personality is very precise. I like to be on time. I don’t like to be late and also very meticulous like in my family life. So everything I use must be returned in place right away. If I’m cooking at home, like I have to wipe down the kitchen right away. No dirty dishes in the sink,” said. And so I just think that this profession, whether it’s influenced my personality now or vice versa, but I think I’m very organized and precise in my personal life as well.”

As for what drives her to create, Kass said warm and cool textures are a source of inspiration in her work.

“So mixing the two together like something hot paired with something cold also, you know, something smooth and creamy versus something very crunchy. I think the texture is very big,” he said. she declared. “So whenever I try to create a dish, I want to incorporate as many textural components as possible.”

She uses many unusual ingredients in her recipes, including Sonoran wheat, blue corn flour, and mesquite flower. Kass opened up about an unusual ingredient that was an “aha moment” for her.

“I think there’s one dessert that stands out where, you know, I was reading a cookbook and I saw that this pastry chef had used hay in a custard,” said. “She brewed it… in my head I was like, ‘You know, I wonder what that would taste like.’ So, you know, Donnie bought some hay from one of our farms and I used it in a dessert and the first time I tried it, it was like this “aha moment.”

Kass said she toasted the hay and it had a nutty, earthy flavor she didn’t expect.

“…it was so good. It works so well. And I paired it with blackberries, strawberries and cocoa nibs and I love that flavor together. It worked so well.”

This year is the second time Kass has been nominated for a James Beard Award, and it’s her first time as a finalist — and she said she still can’t believe it.

“Honestly? I’m still in shock. I still don’t believe it’s real. You know, I think I won’t realize it’s real until I’m there at the ceremony of all people these great chefs and pastry chefs, I’m just, you know, super excited for the team and for where we’re going and I’m so happy that Valentine is getting the recognition that I think they deserve because everyone. here is doing a great job and we’re a really good team and I’m also excited that, you know, Arizona is on the map as well.”

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