Anita Lo

Chef-owner, Annisa
New York, New York

In 2009, Chef Anita Lo had a terrible year.

In February, her restaurant Bar Q went out of business. A few

months later, her mother passed away. And then, in July, her

flagship restaurant, Annisa, a West Village staple and critical

darling, burned down to the ground after an electrical fire. “It was a

really bad year,” she tells me when she recounts the story.

But Lo didn’t give in to the misfortune. Instead, she used the

time between the fire and the restaurant’s reopening (almost a year

later) to develop new dishes, to reflect on her career, and to travel.

“You don’t have a choice,” she tells me in Annisa’s basement,

where there’s a second kitchen and a walk-in refrigerator. “That’s

life.”

Lo wears a perpetual game face; she seems ready for anything

and everything, as if she knows disaster’s likely to strike again any

second and this time she’ll be prepared. When we start cooking

together, she also seems to invite danger: she cooks a Japanese

eggplant on an open flame.

“Isn’t that hazardous?” I ask.

“There are hazards to cooking,” she responds matter-of-factly.

The Japanese eggplant is part of a dish that reflects Lo’s style: