Chef Laurence Louie held a flattened piece of dough in his palm, scooped a pile of roasted pork on top and pinched the sides of the dough to seal it into a ball. Pinch, pleat. Pinch, pleat.
The making of dozens of bao buns is a daily ritual for Louie and his team at his Quincy restaurant Rubato HK Café. He said the steamed buns with sweet or savory fillings are a mainstay of Rubato’s menu, a homage to the food he grew up eating. And when Louie was cast on season 23 of “Top Chef,” he wanted to cook what he knew and represent the community that raised him.
“So much of why I think cooking has spoken to me is because that’s a language in itself to be able to express caring, love, support, my own identity and all these things captured into — like a bao,” Louie said.
Louie said he basically grew up in Rubato, working the cash register as a teen back when it was a bakery called Contempo. His mom, Joyce Chang, opened it because she and her rock band, of the same name, needed a place to practice. The building had a basement.
When Chang retired, she asked Louie if he wanted to take over. But Louie didn’t always want to be a chef.
“I think being a second-generation Chinese American, like having gone to college and university and got my master’s, like cheffing was not like in that realm of possibilities,” Louie said.
It was through his work as a community organizer in Chinatown, however, where he became hooked on food and its power to unite a community, he said.
“It just felt like almost like a superpower to be able to cook food and be like, ‘Oh, you need this, like — you need food for like 600 people for a fundraiser?’ Like, ‘I think I can do that.’ ”
He said his skills as a chef built his confidence until “it just felt right.”
As his mother retired, he decided to take over the space. He launched Rubato to offer his unique take on traditional Chinese comfort dishes.
Not everything changed though. His mother’s rock band still practices in the basement.
“I think we owe that legacy a lot of respect,” Louie said. “So for me, it’s really about how do we take what my mother built … and be able to honor that in ways that, you know, like could I see her coming to this restaurant? Could I see her friends coming here?”
Louie runs Rubato with his wife, Rary Ratsifa. The couple have a 2-year-old son named Ivo. He was about 18 months old when Louie left to film “Top Chef.” He said he was nervous to leave him.
“My biggest fear was, like, is he gonna remember me?” Louie said.
While Louie admitted the separation was tough, Ratsifa said it was worth it.
“Just being able to see him pursue cooking and seeing him be so graceful, humble, knowing that my son is gonna see this, you know, like, he’s gonna have a role model,” Rastifa said.
Being a “Top Chef” finalist is just the latest entry on Louie’s resume. He was also nominated for a James Beard award for best chef in the Northeast.
Louie also previously won on other Food Network shows, including “Chopped” and “Beat Bobby Flay,” which as the title implies, means he beat acclaimed chef Bobby Flay in a head-to-head cooking competition.
Today, he’s planning pop-up meals around Boston where he’ll cook the meal he made for “Top Chef” judges in the finale episode. It’ll include a pork and century egg congee, dim sum with sticky rice and a roasted duck breast.
Louie said the awards are meaningful, but he still believes food has power to build community, and he said he wants to keep that idea at the center of all he does.
“Maybe as a younger chef I used to stay up and think about, you know, 50 ways to prepare a carrot,” Louie said. “But now I think it’s more about what is the best way that we can capture this moment that I’m remembering from my childhood so that people with shared experiences can also live that with me and, and see what we’re doing here.
“That’s the mark I wanna leave on the world.”
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
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