Not too many years ago, you might go to your favorite restaurant for years and never know who was churnin' out that great grub.
Today, a meal is much more than a refueling for the bod. It's often the evening's entertainment -- and sometimes a spectator sport. We don't just watch "Iron Chef" and Emeril, we want their Anchorage counterparts to pop out of their kitchens, circulate in the dining room and share their secrets.
But even if your favorite chef is one of those eager entrepreneurs who love to meet-and-greet, your instinct tells you that there are boundaries. You can talk local produce. Joke about "amuse" courses. Oooh together over a sparkling white superbly paired with a pomegranate-seeded salad. But can you -- should you -- dare you ask The Toqued One for a recipe?
"You can certainly ask," says etiquette maven Judith Martin, aka Miss Manners, "provided you know how to take no for an answer."
In a recent e-mail message, Miss Manners explained that the issue is the same at a fine restaurant or at a dinner party at a private home.
"There can be many reasons for such a refusal, from the friend who doesn't want that special treat available elsewhere to the great chef who doesn't use recipes -- or who expects you to get them by buying his book or watching his show."
Brett Knipmeyer, the chef-owner at Kinley's Restaurant, said he's happy to chat about his food with restaurant patrons, and he recently taught a cooking class that featured some of Kinley's dishes.
"But I really don't cook from recipes," he explained, though the basics of a sauce or stock may get committed to paper the first week it's developed or tested in his kitchen.
"We make stocks and soups from scratch -- that's one thing that sets apart a quality kitchen," he said. "But people at home can't cook that way."
Steve Sandquist, executive chef at Hotel Captain Cook, agreed, noting that his specials often require preparation a day ahead. While teaching in the same cooking-school series recently, Sandquist demonstrated a menu he serves at home, not in the hotel's rooftop restaurant.
"Nobody really wants to hear 'First, get 50 pounds of veal bones and boil them,'?" Knipmeyer said. "Most people want to know what brand of broth to buy."
So when chefs like Knipmeyer chat with their guests, they are more likely to share a technique, an elusive ingredient or a sequence of preparation than they are to whip printed recipes out of their apron pockets.
That preserves some secrecy, too, but the furtive preparation parodied in movies such as "Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?" isn't much like real life. Knipmeyer, for one, isn't worried that a customer who can duplicate his food at home will stop coming to the restaurant.
"Anything that raises people's consciousness is good for me," he said.
• Play dining reviewer Mike Peters can be reached at mpeters@adn.com. Breanna Cooper contributed to this story.
Cook like a pro
Here are celebrity chefs' recipes you don't need to ask for.
Alaska restaurants and chefs with published cookbooks: "The Double Musky Inn Cookbook" (Girdwood); "Winterlake Lodge Cookbook" (on the Iditarod Trail in the Alaska Range); Al Levinsohn's "What's Cooking, Alaska?" (Anchorage)
Alaska recipe collections: "The New Alaska Cookbook" (by Kim Severson, 2001) includes more than 120 recipes from Alaska chefs.
Alaska recipes online: Chef Jack Amon's Line-Caught Alaska King Salmon with Potato Crust and Roasted Pepper Coulis recipe is available at marxcafe.com
Alaska recipes on TV: Recipes prepared on "What's Cookin'?" chef Al Levinsohn's Wednesday segment on Channel 2's "Morning Edition," are online; about a dozen are archived with video. (ktuu.com)
Recipes of the stars: The Food Network offers bios and recipes from its celebrity chefs at www.foodnetwork.com/food/hosts_celebrity_chefs.
By Mike Peters
mpeters@adn.com