Curtis Duffy

Chef-owner, Grace
Chicago, Illinois

When chef Curtis Duffy focuses, he’s quiet and intense. After

greeting me in the entry-way of Avenues (his former restaurant),

he asks me to wait a few minutes and then goes to a table to

concentrate on his own work.

Because of his focus, Duffy creates food that puts him at the

very forefront of his profession. His dishes are wildly imaginative:

White Chocolate–Covered Sudachi Spheres, and Cassia Bud with

Tropical Notes and African Blue Basil, to name a couple. He’s

worked with some of the country’s greatest chefs, including

Charlie Trotter and Grant Achatz, with whom Duffy helped open

Alinea in 2005, a restaurant Gourmet once called the best in the

United States.

When Duffy finally finishes his work, I can tell his mind has

now shifted to the task at hand: teaching me how to cook the way

that he cooks. The first dish we make together, a corn soup that’s

anything but simple, has more elements in it than I have

ingredients in my kitchen at home. The finished dish contains corn

shoots, coriander blossoms, a plum puree, diced peaches, freeze-

dried corn, finger limes (a peculiar ingredient that produces what

looks like lime caviar), a corn-flavored sponge cake made in the