The Chef, the Pickle and the Beats

Chef Roger Feely crafts unique flavours by blending fresh ingredients, world music and global exploration. The son of Irish immigrants, growing up on the South Side of Chicago, Roger became fascinated with giardiniera, “meat-rolls” and mexican food. Today he’s an experimental chef, taking his community and customers on a journey all the way back to where the seeds are planted. Roger is a man possessed when he’s in the kitchen, on the guitar or talking to friends about a recipe.

Julian sat down with Roger at Luke’s Local kitchen in South San Francisco to learn more about the chef behind the vision, and how he’s Making Good.

Julian: So what kind of chef are you?

Roger: I’m not really a chef in the traditional sense, I kind of cook outside of the box.

I do different events that bring together the culinary world and the musical world and I try to incorporate an element of education whether it is sustainable agriculture or building awareness around different cultures. I just want to get people thinking about where their food came from and what it all means.

J: Have you been this way forever?

R: Fortunately, I recognized my passion for food at a very early age. My parents used to work a lot because they wanted us to live in a neighborhood that had really good schools and as the older of three, I would come home from school and I would be the guy who had to cook.

I had no idea what I was doing. Back then there weren’t very many cooking shows. So in order to learn about cooking I kind of just made stuff up as I went. I used to be really into Mexican food when I was young because it had really bold flavors compared to what I grew up eating. Especially those really spicy, hot pickled peppers. Oh man..mmmmm!

J: Who were the people you worked with along the way? Did you have to fight to find them?

R: I was actually in the culinary program at high school — a work study program where I would leave an hour or two before the end of the school day and go to work. The chef at the pizzeria would grade me. I was really into it and I got to create my own pizzas playing with all the topping combinations.

After that I had many chefs and restaurant owners take me under their wing. The people I worked alongside weren’t always chefs though, often it was just people that happened to stumble across the food industry, it was the the people who owned the restaurants — — they were always encouraging me to take my love for cooking to the next level.

J: You have talked to me about this idea of exploration as part of your cooking process - tell me about that.

R: Well I love exploring new places whether it is somewhere in my own town, across the globe or even in my own house. I love the process of exploring — taking pictures and making videos. I’m passionate about documenting the way the food is prepared, grown and travels from seed to table. When I see a piece of corn, I see all of it — the place, the pictures, and the process. People like to know where their food comes from so I want to tell them.

I also like to let the food speak for itself. Maybe I give a little flourish here and there by maybe carving a beet in a unique way but a beet is still a beet. I think that people really appreciate that.

J: Word on the street is that you used to spin some pretty mean sets back in the day, does that ever sneak into the cuisine?

R: The music and the documenting go hand in hand. I’ll write about ingredients and about different dishes. I try to make the songs come from the same part of the world where the dish comes from, or the theme of the songs is in line with the food. Check out my Ginger Cardamom playlist on spotify. Thats the music.

J: How does you being a cook affect the world and has that understanding evolved over your life?

R: I used to think that the world would not function if everyone did what they really loved. But I have since realized that every service has someone who is passionate about it in someway or another. I’m coming to believe that it is not this utopian idea — you can do what you love.

Someone like me — i have a passion for tickling taste buds. Because I love it I’m doing more of a service to the world than people who are doing it just for money. If I were doing it for the money, I certainly wouldn’t be doing what I do today. I would be processing mass quantities of the cheapest chocolate from Africa, using the cheapest flavor and worst ingredients without a care for people’s health all for the money. That’s not me.

J:Has this grown into something you have to do? Do you ever get tired of the work?

R: It never feels like a duty I have to do, it just all flows together and I feel that way through cooking, through creating events, playing music, and documenting the route that an ingredient takes from seed to table. I just never draw a line between passion, work and a the broader world. I’m fortunate enough to have it where it’s all one natural flow.