Ali Bouzari
Ali Bouzari is a culinary scientist, author, educator, and co-founder of Pilot R&D, a culinary research and development company, and Render, a new food company that collaborates with the best restaurant chefs in the country to reinvent the way food lovers eat. As a chef with a Ph.D. in food biochemistry, Ali has helped to lead the charge in changing the way we think about cooking by teaching and developing curriculum at top universities, from ivy league schools to the Culinary Institute of America, and collaborating with the country’s most innovative restaurants including State Bird Provisions, Benu, Eleven Madison Park, The Restaurant at Meadowood, and the Thomas Keller Restaurant Group. He has been featured on Forbes' and Zagat's 30 Under 30 lists, as a contributor to Popular Science, Eater, and WIRED, and as a guest expert on NPR, TEDx, and Iron Chef America. His book, Ingredient: Unveiling the Essential Elements of Food, won the 2017 IACP award for Best Reference Book. Ali also writes a monthly column, Housemade, for the San Francisco Chronicle, diving into the behind-the-scenes brilliance of restaurant dishes. Follow Ali Bouzari on Twitter.
Recipes and Stories by Ali Bouzari
The language of wine is a mix of science and poetry
We all know someone who is just not the best conversationalist when they start talking about wine. They might name drop, they might use obscure terms and, frankly, sometimes it's an incredible bore. And if you don’t speak winespeak, it can seem like the whole language around wine is meant to keep people out. Wine critic Esther Mobley covers the California wine, beer and spirits beat for The San Francisco Chronicle. Our contributor Ali Bouzari went to her for some answers about the madness and method of the way we talk about wine, and get some wine suggestions.Chef Dan Felder on research and development, bringing new life to classic dishes
Food, spirituality and healing: Chef Sarah Kirnon's personal connection to Haiti
Chef Sarah Kirnon leads the kitchen of the popular Caribbean restaurant Miss Ollie's in Oakland. She is from London and her family is from Barbados. But lately, she’s felt more and more at home in her travels to Haiti, a place she says is seriously misunderstood in the U.S. because most American media only discusses the nation as a disaster site, or for its poverty, or as some fantasy horror movie come to life. To the contrary, Sarah says Haiti is a place where she found a deep family connection to food and spirituality. She talks with contributor Ali Bouzarri about what’s inspired her there, as a chef and a person.Chef Shola Olunloyo brings Nigerian food to the forefront
Nigerian-born chef Shola Olunloyo showcases his native food by interweaving it with other global cuisines by way of his experimental Studiokitchen project and pop-up dinners. He and contributor Ali Bouzari talk about Nigerian ingredients and techniques to help American home cooks bring the flavors of the West African nation into their kitchen.Why we should be eating more purple sea urchins
In some places, sea urchins are overfished. But, that's not the case off the coast of California where there's such an overabundance of purple sea urchins that it has become both an aquacultural red flag and a call to chefs and home cooks to experiment.