Food of The Bear (TV series)

Dishes prepared in-universe From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Food is central to the storytelling and relationship-building on the series The Bear, an episodic television dramedy based on the world of U.S. restaurants after the COVID-19 pandemic. The two main characters, Carmy Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney Adamu (Ayo Edebiri), are highly trained, experienced, elite chefs who work together to save the Berzatto family restaurant, a failing Italian beef sandwich joint, and launch a new high-end dining destination called The Bear. [2]

Mikey's family-meal spaghetti sauce calls for two 28 oz cans of San Marzano tomatoes, 10 cloves of garlic, and basil steeped in olive oil[1]

Season one centers on street food and quick-service "sandwiches, doughnuts, and hot dogs."[3] The beef sandwiches nod to Chicago's history as the "meat capital of the United States" during the 19th and 20th centuries, when cowboys drove cattle from western ranch lands to the meatpacking districts that employed thousands of men at Fulton Market and at the Union Stock Yards in the South Side.[4] The city's stockyards later inspired the name of the Chicago Bulls basketball team.[5] But "just as the Original Beef of Chicagoland was transformed from a sauce-splattered sandwich bar into the show's titular fine-dining venture, so too has Chicago evolved from a meatpacking capital to one of America’s pioneering food cities," and in seasons two through four, Carmy and Sydney aspire to make their mark on the city's changing culinary landscape.[6] On the whole, the show "positions individual dishes as signifiers of family histories and vessels of the characters' creative anxiety, as well as staple elements of Chicago's urban culture."[7] Or, in the words of a high school sophomore interviewed for a Oak Park and River Forest High School newspaper feature on The Bear shooting in Oak Park, "Love comes more from making something you know someone would love than, like, making a big extravagant meal."[8]

Culinary production

The show's culinary producer, Courtney "Coco" Storer, is an experienced chef and the sister of series creator Christopher Storer.[9] C. J. Capace is culinary co-producer.[10] The culinary production team includes chefs Brian Lockwood and Justin Selk, Nicole Biyani, Danielle Stefanick, Gabriel Wallace, and Jeffrey Thomas.[10] Castmember Chris Zucchero is second-generation owner of the restaurant that inspired the Original Beef.[10] Executive producer and castmember Matty Matheson is also an experienced chef and cookbook author.[11] Other chefs, restaurateurs, and suppliers who contributed dishes, ingredients, background knowledge, or filming locations include Dave Beran, Sarah Mispagel-Lustbader, Malcolm Livingston II, Curtis Duffy and Amy Cordell of Ever and After, Rob Levitt of Publican Quality Meats, Tim Flores and Genie Kwon of Kasama, produce liaison Samantha Rogers, Ana Posey and Dave Posey of Elske and Creepies, Rosio Sanchez, René Redzepi of Noma, Daniel Boulud, Thomas Keller, Donnie Madia, Alpana Singh, and others.[10]

The team creates a culinary reference guide for every episode, in part because, "The show itself is tracking a Michelin-level restaurant, which is...very precise in how they set things up and also the tools that they use over things that they don't."[2] The Bear restaurant set at Cinespace in Chicago is "outfitted with working gas stovetops and professional ovens so the cast can react to real heat and all its effects: They feel hot and sweaty and can smell onions caramelizing (or burning), or a sauce boiling over."[12]

In season one particularly, star White was put to work using the knife skills he learned in pre-production culinary training. According to cinematographer Andrew Wehde, "The actors would stay with us and do the cooking and chopping for the camera. And because we just kept shooting inserts and giving all that information to editorial, it created a lot of that kinetic energy in the show...Our approach on The Bear was that everything was made fresh on set and done by the actors, even down to the point that Jeremy Allen White, who's our lead, would cut celery and carrots and onions, and prep the bins for the scene, while we spent 10 or 15 minutes setting up a scene. If he needed to cook something in the scene, he would start precooking. He was in that character, cooking, while we would set the shots."[13]

Chef's knives

"The Bear was, first of all, a lot of fun, and that series in general—wow. Kudos to them for meticulously and thoroughly understanding the language, the movement, the stress, the anxiety, the pressure of running a restaurant like that. I thought they nailed it. The terminology, everything about it was just like—they did their homework."

— Three Michelin star Chicago chef Grant Achatz, November 2024[14]

Italian beef sandwiches topped with giardiniera

An Italian beef sandwich is a very regional, Chicago-specific sandwich, with significantly less fame with than a Philadelphia cheesesteak or a Cuban sandwich from Florida.[15] Native Chicagoans refer to them simply as beefs.[16] The Italian beef experience, according to Chicagoan Lucas Kwan Peterson, writing in the Los Angeles Times, is "a 6–8 in (15–20 cm) long sandwich filled with thin-sliced marinated meat on a French roll drenched in juice and swaddled tightly in waxed paper or insulated foil wrap," and it should feel heavier than it looks as a result of absorbing the liquid jus and the oil from the toppings.[17] Beef was readily accessible in Chicago, as the city had the Union stockyards and was "home to America's meat packing industry until the 1920s."[18] As retold by Chicago native Kevin Pang in Esquire magazine:[19]

Italian beefs came from Neapolitan immigrants who moved to Chicago a century ago...Cooks would take a medicine-ball portion of beef bottom round, seasoned aggressively with garlic, basil, and oregano; roast it in a pan of its juices; then slice it so thin one could practically see through it. These meat shavings were piled onto a roll and topped with a spicy bricolage of pickled vegetables known as giardiniera (sometimes boiled sweet peppers), and the whole sandwich got dunked in the pan juices. Suddenly, 15 pounds of cheap beef would feed 50 people."[19]

Another description characterized it as sort of like a roast-beef sandwich, but also sort of like a French dip, because of the importance of beef broth, also known as "gravy or au jus".[20] The jus is typically a "thin, broth-like gravy reminiscent of oregano and bouillon cubes."[17] The beef is typically seasoned with oregano, basil, red pepper, black pepper, and either fresh garlic or garlic powder and then "roasted slowly, partially submerged in beef stock."[21] The beef should be fully cooked, then cooled, shaved, very thinly, not chopped.[17][21]

According to the Chicago Tribune, if the sandwich is "dipped," it "often comes out looking like a water-logged roll of paper towels."[15] Requests for "wet" get jus spooned over the top.[21] The bread has to be "chewy and firm" to hold up against the dipping.[17] On the show Marcus (Lionel Boyce) originally bakes the rolls in-house but in real Chicago, they are often ordered from Turano, Gonnella, or D'amato's bakeries.[15][21] Typical topping options include either sweet peppers (green bell, red bell, or Melrose peppers), or hot peppers, also known as the aforementioned giardiniera (described as "pickled mix of vegetables and chiles submerged in oil"), and in recent years "shredded cheese and tomato sauce have become increasingly popular."[15] Italian beef sandwiches are commonly accompanied by French fries and/or a "cup of Italian ice served with a plastic straw that has a spoon on one end."[17] Some of this food culture developed around Taylor Street in Chicago's Little Italy.[19] Chris Zucchero's recommended sandwich order is "'hot, sweet, and juicy'—that's the Italian beef sandwich with hot peppers, which is the giardiniera, sweet peppers, which is bell peppers, and dipped. That's the way to get it."[22] Writing in 2022, Peterson said of the Italian beef:[17]

"For whatever reason, Italian beef is one of those hyper-local foods...that has never quite translated outside its home...you can certainly find Italian beef outside of Chicago...but over the years, I've slowed down in my pursuit of a truly great one. Fairly or not, it's tough to compete with memory...But it's just as well, as Chicagoans are fanatically protective of their foods. Chicago-style dogs with nearly every vegetable under the sun piled on top of them? Cheese and caramel popcorn eaten together? Deep-dish pizza derided by none other than Anthony Bourdain himself? We Chicagoans hear what you say about us and our food. We hear every little gibe and good-natured insult. And in true Midwest fashion, we squish all of it into a tight little ball and push it way down inside, to be released later at an inappropriate time."[17]

Famous Italian beef spots in Chicago other than Zucchero's Mr. Beef (which inspired the show's Original Beef of Chicagoland sandwich joint), include Al's #1 Italian (originally opened in 1938 as a front for a gambling operation), Tony's Italian Deli & Subs in Edison Park, Johnnie's in Elmwood Park, the Portillo's chain, and the Buona chain.[19][15][23] One Chicago writer described the fare at Johnnie's in deeply nostalgic language:[24]

The sandwich is a magnificent creation made more glorious by its evanescence; weighted with marinated beef and piles of oily peppers, its bun soaked with aromatic gravy, it will fall apart before you can eat half of it, but by that time its essence—of garlic, of peppers, of memories of dinners after school plays and lunches after softball games and evenings when you're too tired to cook—has soaked through the whole thing, making it into a soggy Proustian gut volcano of past and present joy, and even once it's devoured, you can still enjoy little aftershocks of pleasure as you down the fries that have absorbed some of its soul.[24]

This section is an excerpt from Omelette (The Bear) § Nonna's giardiniera.[edit]

A set of four index cards taped to the bookshelf in the Bear office reveal the recipe for "giardiniera by Nonna."[25] Nonna means grandmother.[26] Giardiniera is the typical topping for an Italian beef sandwich.[15]

Chicago-style hot dogs, and Marcus' chocolate cake

This section is an excerpt from Dogs (The Bear) § Food.[edit]
  • The "you're a child asshole, Richie" discourse,[27] and Carmy's hunt for a bottle of ketchup in the kitchen fridge is related to the local standard for a Chicago-style hot dog, which Chef Berzatto is disrupting for the sake of the clientele at this children's birthday party. As per the Chicago Food Encyclopedia, published 2017 by the University of Illinois Press, "Chicago-style hot dogs are defined by an elaborate style of toppings. An all-beef hot dog, preferably natural casing, heated in a hot water bath, placed on a steamed bun (poppy seed or plain), then topped with a smear of yellow mustard, a trail of bright green relish, chopped fresh onions, sliced tomatoes, dill pickle spears, mildly hot pickled 'sport' peppers and, optionally, a sprinkling of celery salt. French fries are an expected accompaniment, and never, ever is ketchup allowed on the hot dog, though it might be available for the fries."[28]
  • Carmy made Ecto-Cooler punch for the party. The original Ecto-Cooler was a special flavor of fruit-flavored soft drink Hi-C that was released in association with The Real Ghostbusters TV cartoon that ran from 1986 to 1991.[29] Ecto-Cooler was made with tangerine and orange fruit juice concentrate.[29] One recipe for homemade Ecto-Cooler calls for tangerine juice, orange juice, crystallized instant lemonade mix, instant orange-drink mix, and sugar.[30]
  • Back at the restaurant, Tina works on mashed potatoes with backup from Sydney. The Original Beef uses a bouquet garni of thyme, rosemary, and bay to flavor the heavy cream for the mash.[31][32][33] Syd advises Tina to use a "salt bed," which is intended to "absorb excess moisture in the potatoes, yielding beautifully fluffy results once cooked."[33] In a mainstream restaurant kitchen, the potatoes would be boiled or steamed, but the roasted-on-salt technique was enforced when Matty Matheson worked for an "old-school French chef" at Le Sélect Bistro in Toronto.[34]
  • Marcus is experimenting with donuts, and his notes on donuts include references to "Dominique Ansel's cronut, but also hints at creations from Pierre Hermé and Christina Tosi."[35] Marcus' chocolate cake was created by the show's pastry consultant Sarah Mispagel-Lustbader, who serves a version of it at her Chicago bakery Loaf Lounge.[36] The cake has a chocolate mousse filling and takes about 12 hours to prepare and chill for service.[37] Marcus' cake evolves over the season starting out with a more "rustic frosting job" that he refines into a "mirror glaze" by the season finale, "Braciole."[36] Ebon Moss-Bachrach told an interviewer that his favorite story beat from season one is in this episode: "...when we shot it, I watched this happen and my heart just melted, and when I watch it on TV, I feel the same way...Richie and Carmy come back after the crazy birthday party. There's some cake and ice cream that Marcus serves up, and Richie and Carmy are so beat, and everyone is so exhausted. Carmy takes one bite of cake and says to Marcus, 'Chef, this is delicious,' and Marcus gives him this thumbs up. The thumbs up comes straight out of his heart. Maybe I'm just sentimental or something, but that encapsulated so much of this season for me."[38]

Carmy's lemon chicken piccata, and Sydney's étouffée stock

This section is an excerpt from Sheridan (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

When Sydney enters the kitchen she immediately understands what Carmy is already working on and asks "Can I?" Carmy approves, so she begins hammering chicken breasts with a meat tenderizer while he makes conversation about having looked at her COGS, which are reports about "costs of goods sold."[39] Later, using the chicken in question, Carmy shows the cooks how to make lemon chicken piccata for the updated dinner menu.[40] This is "mom's chicken" that Sugar was making for dinner in episode two, "Hands."[40] Carmy uses the term monter (from beurre monté) and then switches to simpler language. Translated literally from the French monter means "to mount," but it's used in "culinary English" to mean "to thicken," specifically by slowly whisking in butter.[41] Piccata is the Italian word "for a very thin, usually flattened, slice of meat or fish."[42] Veal piccata was the original form, chicken piccata came later.[43] Chicken piccata is a family dish from the Storer household.[44][45]

The stock that Sydney asks Carmy to help her strain is an étouffée stock for use in her forthcoming risotto dish.[46][39] Per The New Food Lover's Companion, étouffée is a traditional "thick, spicy" Creole-cuisine or Cajun-cuisine stew made from crayfish and vegetables, usually served over rice.[47]

Sydney's cola-braised short ribs and risotto

This section is an excerpt from Ceres (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

Sydney presents the cola-braised short ribs and risotto dish she conceptualized at the end of "Sheridan." Carmy rejects Sydney's proposed addition to the dinner menu as "not ready."[48] Short ribs are a cut of beef, usually derived the chuck and short plate cuts, which consists "of layers of fat and meat and contain pieces of the rib bone. They're very tough and require long, slow, moist-heat cooking."[49] According to Food & Wine, "On television and in real life, nothing is cozier than a Dutch oven filled with braised, fall-off-the-bone tender short ribs served over risotto. Here, per Sydney's creativity, classic wine and stock braising liquid get a surprising addition from cola, which balances the savory with a touch of complex sweetness to create a smooth, rich sauce."[50] Braising is a cooking technique in which meat is "first browned in fat, then cooked, tightly covered, in a small amount of liquid at low heat for a lengthy period of time" which develops flavor and makes the protein tender.[51] Risotto is a labor-intensive, delectable, creamy "Italian rice specialty made by stirring hot stock into a mixture of rice (and often chopped onions) that has been sautéed in butter. The stock is added 1⁄2 cup at a time and the mixture is stirred continually while it cooks until all the liquid is absorbed before more stock is added."[52] Sydney's risotto recipe uses an étouffée stock as a flavor base; this is what she was working on when she asked Carmy to help her strain her stock in the "Sheridan" episode.[46]

Mikey's braciole and family-meal spaghetti sauce

This section is an excerpt from Braciole (The Bear) § Food.[edit]
  • The title of the episode, "Braciole," refers to a dish that Carmy tells his studio audience that Mikey usually made with beef. Mikey, with backup by Carmy, prepares braciole in the flashback scene in "Ceres." The Bear's culinary producer, Courtney Storer, created a recipe for Mikey's braciole that calls for three pounds of flank steak that has been "butterflied and pounded thin," ideally by the butcher or meat counter man at point of purchase.[53] The recipe also calls for "homemade breadcrumbs (toasted in butter, olive oil, herbs, cheese, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper)."[53] As noted by the New York Times in 2024, "Michael can be seen nestling meat" into a 7 U.S. qt (6.6 L) blue Cuisinart-brand enameled cast iron Dutch oven.[54] Storer told an interviewer in 2022 that braciole is "this living, breathing dish. It takes all day to make. You have to be patient" and shared that executive producer Joanna Calo told her that she thought the finished dish "'...looks like a bleeding heart'."[55]
  • Sydney invites Marcus over to the apartment she shares with her dad; she cooks him a pan-seared Chilean sea bass with an "Alain Passard-inspired" tomato confit.[56][57][46] One food writer described Syd's plate as a "glamorous, summer-ready dish."[58] Passard serves tomate confite aux douze saveurs (lit. 'tomato confit with 12 flavors'), a "spice-and-caramel-braised" tomato dessert, at his restaurant L'Arpège in Paris.[59][60] They talk about going to restaurants only on special occasions when they were kids; Marcus and Lionel Boyce share an affection for the bacon at Michael Jordan's Steak House.[61]
  • Later, Carmy finds a copy of Syd's notebook, left behind at the restaurant, and he reads through her recipes for the risotto and cola-braised ribs. Her recipe specifies the use of Coca-Cola, a brand with which The Bear has a product placement deal.[62][57] Her recipe for the ribs is readable but the ingredients and measurements for the risotto are mostly obscured by the camera angle and Carmy's hand.[63][57] Mikey's braciole, Sydney's cola ribs, and Alain Passard's tomato confit all use the same culinary technique, braising, which Carmy described in the pilot "System," when he told Richie, "The only beef I could get was bone-in, which you have to braise, alright? It takes two hours longer."[64]
  • Syd is developing a recipe with sautéd and/or roasted shallots and a carrot purée that she notes might go with sea bass or honey-glazed pork chops. The distraction of Carmy's text causes her to burn her shallots.
  • Mikey also left behind a recipe for spaghetti sauce on the 3" x 5" index card that amounted to his suicide note,[65] which one recipe developer theorized was "inspired by two pretty iconic tomato sauces: Scarpetta's spaghetti with tomato and basil, and Marcella Hazan's tomato sauce with onion and butter."[66] Mikey's recipe calls for San Marzano tomatoes which are a "paste tomato" rather than a slicing tomato, and according to food writer Amanda Blum, "They grow elongated to a pointed tip. Yield is the name of the game with paste tomatoes, to make sauce, salsa, and paste. But even in the realm of paste tomatoes, the San Marzano is prized among gardeners for the taste."[67] Pomodoro San Marzano dell’Agro Sarnese-Nocerino have protected designation of origin status in Italy.[67] Most San Marzano tomato products sold in the United States come from New Jersey.[67] Even though Carmy postponed using the San Marzanos for spaghetti sauce, the canned tomatoes would also have been useful as ingredients in a braised beef or short ribs dish.[67]


I love you dude.
Let it rip

Family Meal Spaghetti

–10 Garlic Cloves
–Basil Steeped in Oil
–San Marzano Tomatoes
2 28 oz cans (the smaller cans
                        taste better)

Chaos

The notion of a "chaos menu" comes up between Carmy and Sydney multiple times in season two, namely in "Pasta," "Pop," and "Bolognese." According to Mashed's Samantha Sied, chaos cooking is "focusing on merging food from different cultures, as in fusion cooking, chaos is weird and subversive, prompting you to lighten up about cooking."[68] As explained by The Takeout's Danny Palumbo, "'Chaos' might not be the most flattering way to describe a chef's cooking, as it implies a sort of thoughtlessness. Diners don't want their food to be some dashed-off, wacky experiment" but simultaneously, "the problem with labeling food as fusion, though, is that it flattens each cuisine into a linear, self-contained concept. Thing + Thing. Mexican and Italian. Korean and Filipino. The world today is much more diverse and multidirectional, and we have a cooking style to reflect that, with chefs drawing inspiration from dozens of different cultural highways."[69] One 2022 article on chaos cooking in Eater argued that "part of the driving force behind many of these menus is chefs of color pushing back against the expectation that they must only cook the food of their families."[70]

In the words of Tasting Table, at the end of episode two ("Pasta"), "From the looks of what they have, though, it seems more like dissonance is the order of the day: oceanic hamachi crudo, beef tenderloin in cherry vinegar, smoked bone marrow with frozen grapes, sardines swimming in spicy piri-piri sauce, and an ice cream sundae featuring veal stock."[71] (To be fair to the chefs, "veal-stock sundae...sounds delicious" was meant to be a joke.) In episode three "Sundae," when Sydney is giving herself anxiety reading about failed Chicago restaurants, one place she reads about is Funkenhausen,[72] which embodied "chaos cooking," in that case by "combining aspects of German and Southern cuisine."[73] Syd and Carmy's joint brainstorming is slow-going, in part because chaos cooking requires not just confidence and technical skill, but a shared vision of how to merge disparate concepts, styles, ingredients, techniques, and culinary habits, so, "Despite their shared enthusiasm for kitchen experimentation, things don't always go smoothly with Carmy and Syd's menu-making methods. One sauce that the two try is way too acidic, so much spitting out and various obscenities ensue. In another instance, grapefruit is burned and over-salted (accompanied by more spitting and swearing), while a plate of stuffed pasta is also a fail. As we watch the chefs work through the menu, sometimes it seems they do more spitting than swallowing, and we wonder how they'll ever pull things together in time for the restaurant's grand opening."[74]

Bouquet garni of basil, oregano, rosemary, and thyme; the passage of time a bundle of dried culinary thyme hangs over Carmy's apartment kitchen sink in season two

As the season progresses food plays a heavy role in the dynamic between Sydney and Carmy and Claire Dunlap (Molly Gordon): "When opening up about her failed business Sydney admitted that the final nail in the coffin was when she forgot to cook pasta for a really important dish. Later on Carmy cooks this dish for Claire, his new girlfriend. Every meal we see Claire eating was in reality one of Sydney's creations (another example: the frozen grape dish served in the finale)."[75] When the idea of a "chaos menu" appeared in the season two scripts, Courtney Storer and Matty Matheson did not entirely know what to make of it. Per Matheson to Vulture, "Thing is, it takes a long time to develop your true culinary voice. And I think young chefs spin a wheel of ingredient, ingredient, ingredient, and don't understand what really does go together. What we wanted to do was take the idea of Michelin, the idea of ego, chaos, all of those things, and debunk it. You don't want to shoot for the stars. What you want to do is go inward. Chaos menu is definitely a little nudge, a little 'Fuck you,' to young ego."[76]

Luca's "minty Snickers bar" cake at Noma

This section is an excerpt from Honeydew (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

Seven Fishes

This section is an excerpt from Fishes (The Bear) § Repast.[edit]
  • Fishes: Donna's "labor-intensive" meal plan involved branzino, lobsters, oysters Rockefeller, artichokes, meatballs, gravy, roasted peppers, potatoes, and bread.[80][81][82][83][84] Coco Storer trained actress Curtis how to rip the heads off the lobsters, which were blanched in advance by Rob Levitt of Publican Quality Meats.[83][85] Chris Witaske quipped in 2025 that the eighth-fish tuna casserole was his "mom's recipe."[86] In an interview with Vulture, Courtney Storer and Matty Matheson listed the "seven" seafood dishes prepared for that year's Berzatto family Christmas Eve dinner:[76]
  1. Appetizer: shrimp cocktail
  2. Appetizer: smoked-fish dip
  3. Appetizer: "raw crab and prawns"
  4. Main: branzino
  5. Main: steamed lobsters with drawn butter
  6. Main: crab claws
  7. Main: baked clams
  8. Main: "a marinated-mussels situation"
  9. Main: baked cod
  10. Optional: tuna casserole (discouraged)
  • Dessert: The episode ends with one of Mikey's chucked forks quivering out of tray stacked with cannoli. Carmy, Sydney, and Marcus later reimagine a savory version, but the typical recipe is sweet and involves "crisp and flaky pastry dough...shaped into a tube and filled with rich citrus-scented ricotta-mascarpone filling."[87]

  • "Is who gay? Ma. Ma. Ma. Ma! Why are you doing the seven fishes thing? Nobody ever eats this shit."

  • Sprite: Carmy makes homemade "Sprite," a Coca-Cola Company brand of uncaffeinated carbonated beverage, to help resolve Tiffany's morning sickness. The ingredients for lemon-lime soda are sparkling water (it looks like he uses S.Pellegrino), lemon juice or flavoring, lime juice or flavoring, and sweetener.[88]
  • Bananas: Later, Jimmy tells Tiff how he used to get frozen bananas with his father when he was young, "On the drive out here, we actually passed the stand my dad used to take me to get them. I swear to God I could smell him. It's weird, right, we remember smells; cologne. Anyways, it's kind of been sitting with me. Sitting on my chest. All of a sudden, after all these years, I'm missing that fat fuck? And here you are, you're eating a banana. It's kind of funny." In the words of British GQ, "As well as being an unexpected moment of vulnerability for the typically straight-talking businessman, the fleeting scene is a poignant reminder not only of the emotional weight food can hold, particularly during grief, but how it can nourish us by connecting us to those we've lost, no matter how much time has passed."[89]

Sydney's omelette for Sugar

This section is an excerpt from Omelette (The Bear) § Sydney's omelette.[edit]

Syd's omelette is based on a classic French omelette.[90][91] A French omelette is prepared differently than omelettes served in the United States, where the show is set.[92]

French omelettes are different from American omelettes in two primary ways. First, they are very thin, and they cook very quickly. American omelettes tend to be thick and fluffy, stuffed with toppings and add-ins, but a French omelette is thin and elegant. The second difference is the toppings. American omelettes include a bevy of options, but the French version traditionally only includes eggs, butter, and perhaps some cheese, but not always. The point of a French omelette is to highlight the creamy, perfectly cooked eggs without any distraction from other ingredients.[92]

According to restaurateur Abe Beame, Syd's omelette technique is "more or less flawless, although, if I may nitpick, the pan doesn't seem hot enough because the butter isn't 'singing' as it should when it first hits the pan, and she pipes a thin tube of Boursin onto the setting eggs, a major no-no (but almost certainly delicious, based on Ludo Lefevbre's omelet recipe). Extra point for rubbing butter onto the rolled omelet on the plate, and the textural chip crumble with chive garnish spoke directly to my Jewish palate. More food-based intimacy in season 3, please."[93][94][95]

Boursin is a so-called "Gournay cheese" invented by Norman cheese maker François Boursin in 1957.[96] It's a soft, creamy, spreadable cow's milk cheese—not dissimilar from mascarpone, goat's milk chèvre, or Brie—that was "inspired by the common French party treat called fromage frais."[97] The original flavor is garlic-and-fines herbes.[96] Chef Lefevbre recommends the cracked black pepper flavor of Boursin for an omelette.[98] Lacking Boursin, scallion-blend cream cheese from a bagel shop is a viable substitute.[99]

Sydney possibly used Ruffles-brand potato chips for the topping, since she mentioned using chips that have "ridges," but any crumbled-up potato chip would work.[99] While preparing for the episode, Edebiri and culinary producer Courtney Storer experimented with 14 varieties of potato chips and settled on a salt-and-vinegar-flavor chip, in part to contrast with the sour cream and onion flavor inside the omelet.[100] One food writer commented that the use of crumbled potato chips recalled the use of potato in tortilla española.[101]

After season two premiered, many recipe developers took up the challenge of recreating Sydney's omelette.[98][102][103][104]

Friends & Family Night

This section is an excerpt from Omelette (The Bear) § The Bear's menu.[edit]

BOARD LIST: 1. Welcome broth 2. Focaccia 3. Crudo 4. Cannoli 5. Seven fishes 6. Bolognese 7. Gricia 8. T-bone 9. Caviar 10. Cherry donut 11. Honey bun[105]

PAPER LIST: 1. Focaccia / lardo / prosciutto 2. Welcome broth / grapes 3. Tuna crudo / white bean 4. Cannoli 5. Seven fishes 6. Cavatelli / sausage 7. Bucatini gricia 8. Italian beef T-bone 9. Fior di latte / caviar 10. Zeppole / cherry zabaione 11. To-go honey bun[106]

This section is an excerpt from The Bear (The Bear episode) § Food.[edit]

Compared to Mikey's spaghetti, which was the main dish served in the season-one finale, "The food in the restaurant has become lighter and more delicate. The shift is not only emphasized by the menu choices but also by the way the food is handled and presented. Rather than just serving food to the customers, the restaurant now meticulously prepares and presents the food, using tweezers to craft several courses. As the final dishes show, the food in The Bear represents the changes taking place concurrently in both the restaurant and the neighborhood, highlighting the underlying relationship between food and gentrification."[107]

  • Carmy personally serves Claire and Kelly the welcome broth, poured tableside into teacups.[108][109] When Syd and Carmy workshopped this dish together, it was described as "frozen Concord grapes with beef consommé and smoked bone marrow".[110][111][109]
  • The focaccia was baked by Mindy Segal.[112][10]
  • Under the supervision of culinary producer Coco Storer, the simplified seven fishes dish was designed by Tim Flores and Genie Kwon of Chicago's Kasama, with a "beautiful fumé with saffron" to accompany prawns, octopus calamari, mussels, scallops, little clams, and amberjack.[113][109][76] The Carabinero prawns (Aristaeopsis edwardsiana) were chosen because they are "red and really vibrant and kind of looked like the lobster in Seven Fishes."[76]
  • The T-bone steak is "cooked to what looks like a perfect medium rare and sliced off the bone, which sticks up vertically".[109]
  • A savory reframing of the traditional dessert cannoli was Christopher Storer's idea, and culinary producer Courtney Storer designed the dish, named in honor of Mikey Berzatto, which was made of a Parmesan tuile shell stuffed with mostarda and onion jam and coated in pistachios.[113] Richie also tells Marcus to "86 the mostarda" for Syd's dad, because "Emmanuel doesn't do cherries."[114]
  • The idea for Mom's honeybun came from Lionel Boyce.[115]
  • "Syd's donut" was made with zeppole dough with a fermented cherry glaze.[115][116] The donut is an "extremely personal and heartfelt dish".[109] Its official (but temporary) name is "Sydney's Donut (after Carm destroyed it like a little bitch)".[109] The name is a callback to "Review," a bad day in the kitchen when Marcus was fixated on doughnuts, Carmy flew into a tyrannical rage, and Syd and Marcus quit simultaneously.[108]
  • Marcus' Copenhagen sundae is gelato al fior di latte  [it] with a "melon reduction on the bottom and fresh caviar."[76] This dessert is served in American Beauty floral-pattern china.[109]
  • Chester complains about the wine, and Richie barks back, "That's a Cru Beaujolais!"[117]
  • Emmanuel Adamu does not drink alcohol and gets a special delivery of the "Bear Pop Service."[114]
  • Richie sent a chocolate-covered banana to Jimmy for dessert, recalling a conversation they had five years ago at Seven Fishes when Tiff could only eat a banana because of morning sickness and Jimmy reminisced about getting chocolate-covered bananas with his dad at a roadside stand.[118]

Pro tip from The Globe and Mail of Canada about Bear-style frozen bananas: Add a big spoonful of peanut butter or a small spoonful of coconut oil to the melted chocolate for a better dip and a "snappier" chocolate shell.[119]

Carmy's blood orange hamachi

This section is an excerpt from Tomorrow (The Bear) § Carmy's blood orange hamachi.[edit]

A key element of "Tomorrow" is Carmy creating and plating the paupiette of hamachi with blood orange sauce, which is more than likely "the best meal" Sydney ever had that she described in passing to both Marcus in season one's "Braciole" and Carmy's mom, Donna Berzatto, in the season four wedding episode "Bears."[120][121]

Paupiette is a classic French form of fish cookery whereby a thin slice of fish (for instance, tuna, sole, whiting, or even anchovy) is stuffed, rolled, and tied up with a string before being poached in stock.[122][123] Hamachi describes young Japanese amberjack (Seriola quinqueradiata), also known as yellowtail, farm-raised and prized for use in sushi and sashimi. The smaller fish are the hamachi, larger ones are called buri but it is unusual for even the bigger fish to get larger than 20 lb (9.1 kg).[124] Hamachi is expensive and said to be worth it because of its "smooth, almost-melting mouthfeel."[125]

Blood oranges

Carmy is first depicted juicing blood oranges during his time working for Chef Terry at Ever. Blood oranges are a type of citrus fruit with reddish flesh and skins that produce a deep red, almost maroon, sweet-tart juice. They primarily grow in California and around the Mediterranean region.[126]

Carmy's first iteration of the dish used dill, which Fields rejected with the edict "never repeat ingredients," which in turn seemed to influence Carmy's season three dictate to the Bear restaurant staff that they were going to change the menu every day.[127] "No repetitions" is one of the rules of a Thomas Keller kitchen.[128] At the French Laundry, the nine-course menu changes daily and "No ingredient can be featured more than once on each night's menu, with the exception...of truffles, caviar, and foie gras."[128] Criticism from Fields of an early version of the hamachi plate comes "after Carmy adds two sauces to a pretty austere dish, this chef rips into him, saying it's trash and quipping, 'You basically made nachos.'"[129]

The dish that was served to Sydney in New York was a one-off, served on the pretext that the diner had an food allergy, fennel soubise being a key element of the plate. (Soubise is an onion-purée sauce derivative of béchamel.)[125] Syd has worked with several forms of fennel multiple times since joining the crew of the Beef, including for the first family meal she prepared on her first day, and she thus almost certainly does not have such a food sensitivity.[46][a]

Jeremy Allen White told the Daily Beast in June 2024, "There is this connection between these two people that existed before they even met...Then, that gets you thinking about, like, what a beautiful thing it is to prepare food for someone. How you're connected forever, in some way, dining in these restaurants."[131]

The Bear menus, June–July 2023

This section is an excerpt from Tomorrow (The Bear) § Carmy's menu revisions.[edit]
  • Carmy scratches several dishes off the list of offerings at the soft opening, including the welcome broth, focaccia, lettuces, bucatini gricia, and the seven fishes.
  • Carmy creates and labels several sauces: saffron fumet, demi, brown butter, nettle purée, squash velouté.
  • He creates a floral bouquet of sheeted slow-roasted carrot and salmon roe nestled into a tart shell laid with a bed of carrot pureé, garnished with carrot greens and what looks like either wild fennel or dill blossoms.[132][133]
  • According to culinary producer Courtney Storer, the dish with the peas "recognizes his relationship with Chef Terry and [how he] loves her, and it makes...his plate...an homage to her."[134]
  • He iterates the welcome broth into a mirepoix consommé, which demands a fortune in brunoise-cut carrots, onion, and celery.[135] (Culinary penance: Twelve rosaries, a Hail Mary, and a thousand thousand perfect cuts, etc.) (Technique, technique, technique.)
  • One of the dishes Carmy makes to present to Syd when she comes back to the restaurant on Monday is raviolo al'uovo with pancetta dust.[125] According to Epicurious magazine, raviolo al'uovo is a fragile but "sophisticated and sexy" dish featuring a "lovely golden egg yolk nestled in a bed of creamy ricotta cheese, all wrapped up in a tender blanket of pasta. Cut these lovelies open, and the yolk flows out of the center."[136] The Bear commissioned a "simple" but elegant wooden pasta mold specifically for this dish.[137]
This section is an excerpt from Doors (The Bear) § Food (and wine).[edit]

The restaurant is serving very expensive and flavorful Wagyu beef imported from Japan, and Carmy is running through all the French sauces, including bordelaise and bernaise, et al.[138] "Rib cap" is a cut of beef, "taken from the top part of a rib-eye. The muscles there are not used as often as other parts of the cow, giving it a tender texture—though unlike a tenderloin, it also boasts flavor-boosting marbling."[138] Carmy's very expensive "dystopian butter" from "Orwell, Vermont" is produced by Animal Farm Creamery (cf. Animal Farm by George Orwell), which is actually located in Orwell-adjacent Shoreham, Vermont.[139][140] In an apparent callback to Chef Terry and Richie's kitchen scene in "Forks," Carmy is peeling mushrooms while he and Jimmy argue; the show's edible mushrooms come from Four Star Mushrooms, which runs an indoor mushroom farm in Chicago.[10][141]

Pasta shapes served at the newly opened Bear include cavatelli and agnolotti. Cavatelli are "short, narrow, ripple-edged shells"; the name agnolotti is supposed to mean "priest's caps" and describes a "small, crescent-shaped, stuffed ravioli-style" pasta.[142] Chef Brian Lockwood, added to the culinary production team as a consulting chef for season three, contributed a ravioli with peas and parmesan mousse to the Bear's menu.[143]

Marcus' desserts include "princess cake, coconut gelato, caviar sundae." Princess cake (prinsesstårta) is a hemispherical Swedish dessert that typically features "layers of sponge cake and custard or pastry cream, topped with a green marzipan icing."[138] The caviar sundae is a four-ingredient dessert (vanilla ice cream, olive oil, caviar, sea salt) inspired by a dish made famous at Restaurant 108 in Copenhagen.[144][145][146]

Edible flowers

Other dishes mentioned or appearing on menus and expo tickets include a hamachi-grapefruit dish, asparagus with quail egg and potato, duck with apricot, beef tenderloin with cherry jus, chocolate velouté, carrot tart, scallop, pear and brie, something with mushrooms, something with edible flowers (nasturtium leaves and pansies), spring onion, bottarga, halibut, pork belly, lamb, yellowfin, artichoke, spaghettata, venison chop, rabbit, tomato sorbetto, and chocolate cake. One of the more esoteric dishes served at the Bear during the period depicted in "Doors," bottarga, is a "dried roe sac."[147]

According to one wine website, "Sweeps (Corey Hendrix) is shown struggling to open a bottle whose cork appears to be already 75 percent extracted. A handpull would have finished it, but he unsuccessfully goes after it with a wine key, chipping away bits of cork and swearing under his breath."[148]

Tina's home cooking

This section is an excerpt from Napkins (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

Carmy's sauce, and Syd's "meal train" for Nat

This section is an excerpt from Apologies (The Bear) § Food.[edit]
  • Late at night, after service, Carmy works on a dish for the Bear menu; whether or not he is aware of it, Sydney seemingly plays the role of his artistic muse and model.[153] According to one writer, "For Carmy, food is not only an art form, but his love language, [and] subconsciously or not, he draws inspiration from Syd."[153] The white speckles in the purple sauce on Carmy's plate "distinctly resemble Syd's polka-dot headscarf. This similarity reiterates, through an artistic lens, the influence Syd has on Carmy."[153] After Sydney says good night, he chucks the whole dish in the bin, as he did in episode 5, "Children." In the words of Americana UK, "Let me be the first to say I would eat that duck out of the trash, as long as it was on top. Period. It looks incredible."[154]
  • Sydney brings food to postpartum Natalie so Nat can focus on recovering from labor and taking care of the baby.[155] Syd made beef ragù alla bolognese and noodles, beef stew, minestrone soup, and the lasagna with "crispy edges" that Nat particularly likes.[155]

Ever funeral afterparty

This section is an excerpt from Forever (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

Syd's scallop, and "snow day" treats

This section is an excerpt from Scallop (The Bear) § Food (and wine).[edit]
  • One recipe developer attempting to recreate Sydney's reduced-component scallop dish theorized that the ingredients in the orange ginger compound butter could have been marmalade, minced orange zest, and minced fresh ginger, combined with either Kerrygold or Animal Farm Creamery butter (the "Orwellian butter" from season three).[158][159] Another recipe involved creating basil oil, and the ingredients for the compound butter were orange zest, orange juice, ginger paste, garlic paste, and heavy cream.[160] Tasting Table noted that "Sydney talks about an orange and ginger compound butter, but the final dish she delivers is largely obscured by some kind of pale foam."[160] One television critic described the production value of Syd's cook as "certainly lovely. But the scene doesn't feel as tactile or emotionally potent as when, say, she whipped up an omelette for a pregnant, tired Nat," arguing that the show had silenced the emotional voice of food, which had once been "a unique gateway into understanding these characters' mindsets and passions," replacing it with a less-satisfying predominantly-aesthetic approach to cooking.[161]
  • Sweeps suggested a Chenin blanc to pair with Marcus' strawberry panna cotta.[162] Panna cotta, which means "cooked cream" in Italian, is a light custard, typically served cold.[163] Chenin blanc grapes, which are grown in California and France's Loire Valley, produce a "intense, spicy, slightly sweet wine."[164] It has been described as a "shapeshifter" or "chameleon" grape that produces an array of wines but a sweet chenin blanc wine is considered an excellent match to a fruit-centric dish.[165]
  • The Chicago snow experience is served with Swiss Miss instant hot chocolate with marshmallows.[166]

Sydney's Hamburger Helper beef bowl for T.J. and Chantel

This section is an excerpt from Worms (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

The main dish prepared during the episode is an elevated but kid-friendly beef bowl made with the Cheeseburger Macaroni variety of Hamburger Helper.[167][168][169] According to The Today Show's food reporter Joseph Lamour, "Like previous seasons' standout dishes...this one combines haute cuisine with accessible ingredients."[168] All Hamburger Helper varieties are essentially a meal kit offering a "blend of spices and pasta...meant to be prepared with ground beef."[170] When interviewed by Rolling Stone about the episode, Boyce picked Hamburger Helper as his preferred "instant-comfort nostalgia food," specifically the beef stroganoff and mac and cheese varieties.[171]

Hamburger Helper became popular in American homes in the 1970s when, "strained by inflation and soaring beef prices, [people] looked to turn a pound of ground beef into an entire meal."[167] Ground beef is a comparably economical form of this protein, depending on which part of the cow it came from and the fat percentage: "The least expensive product is sold as regular ground beef or regular hamburger. It's usually made with trimmings of the less expensive cuts such as brisket and shank, and can contain up to 30 percent fat."[172]

According to Edebiri, "Sydney's canonically bad with kids," but she manages to connect with T.J. through the process of constructing this dish.[173] Syd (with help from T.J.) adds double-concentrated tomato paste, diced yellow onion, shredded cheese, toasted panko bread crumbs, and replaced some of the milk with heavy cream "for a richer sauce."[170][174] Food Republic's Cara J. Suppa said Syd's cheese looked like it was probably white cheddar or mozzarella, but recommended substituting Parmigiano Reggiano for maximum umami, and suggested that ketchup works as a substitute if tomato paste is unavailable, with the sugar in ketchup adding another flavor dimension to the dish.[175] Other versions of Syd's dish used an aged Irish cheddar,[169] and added finely minced fresh parsley, oregano, and basil to season the sauce and to finish the dish.[168] Chantel intended to add hot sauce.[170][176]

The Kitchn's Perry Santanachote replicated Syd's amendments and determined that the resulting dish "looked like something I'd expect to be served at a restaurant—or proudly offer to guests at my own table. And once I dug in, it was every bit as satisfying: deeply savory and beefy, creamy and comforting. The tomato paste brought a hit of umami and mellowed the artificial yellow from the powdered cheese, making the dish look more natural. The real cheese added a tangy edge, but it was the parsley and panko that were my favorite additions, adding a fresh, green note and satisfying crunch."[174] Today food correspondent Lamour also made a version and reported, "This is the very first time in my 42 years of life that I have eaten Hamburger Helper—and I am officially a convert. Each spoonful was rich, but not not too rich. The herbs gave it a fresh bite and the panko added a buttery crunch...Plus, the dish is attractive. You could make this for a dinner party and get compliments from people who would have no idea that a glove with eyes was involved in its creation."[168] (Hamburger Helper's advertising "mascot," named Lefty, is a puffy white glove with a face on its palm.)[167]

The inclusion of Hamburger Helper in the series was not a paid product placement.[167]

The title of the episode, "Worms," refers to favorite-treat gummy worms that Syd buys at the market.[177]

Marcus' magic

After beginning a study of culinary legerdemain in "Legacy" and "Apologies," Marcus creates a "concoction of dehydrated pear, violet caramel, and shiso" with an edible bowl that he presents to Carmy and Luca in "Sophie."[161]

Grapes

This section is an excerpt from Green (The Bear) § Wine pairings.[edit]

The Bear sommelier, Gary Woods, appears to have mastered wine pairings. One wine website described them as "perfect,"[178] another called them "spot on."[179] According to Molly Harris of the website TastingTable.com, on the last day of service before Computer's doomsday clock runs out:[178]

"...the show's wine list includes one white wine, one rosé, and two robust reds...Starting with the lightest wines on the menu, Sweeps mentions two, the white and rosé, by the Napa, California-based winery, Hourglass. These include their sauvignon blanc, a blend of sauvignon blanc and Sémillon, and their rosé, which is not currently available as it's a limited release. Next up is a cerrati Barolo, also called cerrati Nebbiolo, by Tenuta Cucco, a winery in the Piedmont region of Italy. Both Sydney and Sweeps call this a 'heavy' wine, while the resident sommelier explains that it's a 'beautiful' wine as well. Last mentioned is the Pastourelle de Clerc Milon bottle, a Pauillac Bordeaux that blends cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet franc, petit verdot, and carmenère. These wines are so perfect because of their range. In his prep rundown with Sydney, he names the white and rosé wines with the caviar component, topped with lilacs, that the chef mentions. These wines are light enough to work well with lighter dishes like fish, Sydney's popular scallop dish, and the delicate caviar and lilac ingredients. Meanwhile, the red wines are heavier options that can stand up to dishes like steak and lamb."[178]

Nebbiolo, an Italian Piedmont red wine grape

The episode shows Sweeps shelving two bottles of Serego Alighieri 'Vaio Armaron' Amarone della Valpolicella on the shelf, one dated 1988 and the other 2001.[179] Sweeps is also working, with encouragement from Ted and Neil Fak, on distinguishing aged wines, which "aren't generally on a beginning sommelier's radar."[179] Wine Enthusiast criticized the "blind" tasting as a gaffe, because examining a wine's color is often key to determining vintage.[179]

Pamela Vachon of Wine Enthusiast posited that this is a relatively new sommelier's imposter syndrome showing:[179]

"Imposter syndrome is a recurring theme all season. Carmy realizes that he's being outshined by his prodigal sous and pastry chefs. Tina struggles to break the three-minute pasta barrier. Richie searches for some elegant monologue to motivate his front-of-house team. ('On my signal, unleash hell!') Or, as comic relief goon Neil Fak puts it in a rare moment of introspection: 'This place is fancy. The people that come in here are fancy. I’m not fancy.'...Imposter syndrome may be at play for Sweeps and other characters in this season's The Bear, but so is over-delivery—like a great value $50 wine—all of them punching above their weight class in the quest to protect a restaurant that they believe is worth fighting for."[179]

In this episode Computer tells Natalie that alcohol sales are a highlight of the restaurant's current financial situation. Profit margins on restaurant food are often only four to five percent, which means that a restaurant's higher-margin beverage program contributes a great deal to any potential profits above gross revenue.[180]

Donna's roasted peppers, and Carmy's French Laundry roast chicken

This section is an excerpt from Tonnato (The Bear) § Food.[edit]

Donna described a dish of roasted red peppers that she was served while vacationing in Italy with Carmy's dad. Carmy identified the accompanying sauce as tonnato. Per Donna, it looked disgusting but was delicious.[181] Tonnato "refers culinarily to dishes that are somehow prepared with or accompanied by tuna."[182] The most well-known use of tonnato is in a veal dish called vitello tonnato.[182] Tonnato sauce is most commonly known from Piedmontese cuisine (vicinity of Milan, northern Italy, near the Alps), and is often used as a topping for cooked vegetables like asparagus and green beans.[181] Donna is presumably describing peperone tonnato, also known as peperoni tonnati, which is "charred red peppers in a mayonnaise-y tuna sauce".[183] One recipe from a restaurant in Milan calls for Carmagnola peppers, anchovies in Cantabrian oil, and Pantelleria capers.[184] A variation is tonnato–pepper rolls, or involtini di peperoni con crema al tonno.[185]

The contents of Donna's fridge seem to include a whole chicken, what is likely Italian sausage, and a pint glass, chilling for later use. Carmy makes roast chicken for Donna, the way he was trained by Thomas Keller at the French Laundry in Yountville, California. In the Bouchon cookbook, Keller recommends brining the chicken for restaurant prep but not for home cooks. Key steps are patting the chicken completely dry, and trussing the chicken with butcher's twine. The trussing stage is where the pope's nose comes into play.[186][187] Per Keller, season the chicken generously with salt and black pepper, face the breast up and the legs to the back of the oven, and finish by adding fresh thyme leaves to the pan, "and baste the birds several times with the juices and thyme leaves."[188] Roast for 10 minutes per 1 pound (0.45 kg) at 475 °F (246 °C).[188][189] The show did not depict Carmy's cooking process, just the final dish, which at least one reviewer felt was a missed opportunity for a "great, dramatic, full-circle moment".[161]

See also

Notes

  1. [a]
    Fennel was symbolically treated as a female aphrodisiac in Greco-Roman mythology, while Italian language and culture since the Renaissance period associate fennel with male homosexuality, possibly due to potentially feminizing phytoestrogens in fennel.[130]

References

Sources

Further reading

External links

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