MANSFIELD — Earlier this week I was making a nuisance of myself in a basement kitchen underneath the Barrington One Building on Park Avenue West, drinking beer at 10:30 a.m. and eating a late breakfast with local chef Rus Welch.
This is the ‘Entrepreneur’s Kitchen’ that opened earlier this summer and Rus, along with other movers and shakers in the local food scene, uses this new shared facility as his home base.
I got a quick walking tour of the kitchen. It covers 1,500 sq feet and feels luxuriously spacious.
“And it’s affordable,” Rus told me. “$15 an hour here after my ($100) monthly fee. I know a chef in New York who pays $10,000 a month for a space that’s a fraction of this size.”
That’s crazy, I said.
“Yeah. But the people there will pay $20 for a bowl of soup.”
I first got to try Rus’s cooking when, through a case of mistaken identity or a clerical error of some kind, or perhaps just a fortuitous wrong turn, I got into the VIP section at a downtown event he was catering. Naturally I did what anyone does in that situation and sampled as much of the free food and drink as I could before getting thrown out.
The varied menu items were strikingly unusual – and more importantly, delicious – so I decided to keep an eye out for future ‘Chef Rus’ events.
This led me to his ‘Campfire Cooking’ outdoor class at the NECIC Teaching Garden on Blust Avenue. Here he gave a live demonstration, grilling many of the vegetables that were actually grown in the garden, letting the local kids all have a turn.
They loved it.
Even this simple fare (tomatoes, onions and squash) was prepared and served in a very tasty manner, and this convinced me to actually pay for one of Rus’s meals. Accordingly, I signed up for the next ‘Moveable Feast.’
The Moveable Feasts are occasional supper club events that Rus and his business and cooking partner Susan Vander Maas (owner of Doc’s Deli) host at various locations around the Mansfield area. Tickets are typically in the $50-$60 range, and this includes multiple courses with accompanying wines.
The one I attended was held at the Cypress Hill Winery downtown and Rus was in fine form as both chef and showman, talking us through each course, explaining his choice of ingredients and revealing details of his preparation.
He wasn’t above the odd stunt to hold our attention, either. At one point he froze a sunflower with liquid nitrogen and smashed it to the ground.
So now, back in the Entrepreneur’s Kitchen, Rus was busy preparing us breakfast as I asked him about his background.
Rus was born in Tiffin, Ohio, but he left at the age of two when his family moved to India.
“We actually ended up in Birmingham, England for two years while we waited for the visas to be approved,” Rus told me. “Only dad had dual citizenship – his mother was from India and his father was from Louisiana.”
Once in India the family lived in Ghaziabad, near New Delhi.
“My parents were social workers and collectively made $6,000 a year,” Rus explained, which was enough to make them comfortably middle-class.
“We even had a cook,” he continued. “He was from Nepal, and he was my caretaker and best friend. I would help him in the kitchen as soon as I was old enough to reach things. It’s really my first memory of being in a kitchen.”
By the time Rus was 11 he was back in Ohio again, this time in Columbus where his dad was attending graduate school.
I asked him if his parents cooked.
“Oh yes, all the Welches cook,” Rus told me, and explained that his father’s background led him to favor the cuisines of both India and the southern U.S.
After leaving school, Rus moved around Ohio and worked as a photographer for 15 years.
“I photographed food, food packaging, fashion … mostly fashion.”
But it was the food part that got him involved with cooks and cooking.
In Youngstown, Rus hooked up with chef Adam Lee and together they formed “The Sprouted Table,” hosting pop-up food events somewhat like the Moveable Feast.
“It was truly a pop-up because people bought tickets before they knew where it would be held. We announced that closer to the time.”
Rus told me that it was working with Adam Lee that got him interested in where the food that he was cooking came from.
“Whenever I hear you talk about food,” I told Rus, “it’s clear that you care deeply about the provenance of your ingredients.”
Rus agreed, and I was secretly very pleased with myself for using the word ‘provenance,’ which I don’t believe I’ve ever said before. I looked it up later and was delighted to find I’d used it correctly.
By now our breakfast had arrived, almost effortlessly it seemed. I’d barely noticed him cooking it.
There was plenty to spare, and the morning feast caught the attention of local businesswoman Korinna Goettel as she passed through the kitchen after a meeting. She introduced herself and Rus persuaded her to grab a plate and join in.
Rus explained what he’d cooked up for us.
“This is ‘boudin noir,’ or blood sausage – black pudding as you would know it in England. That’s sausage made with the blood of a pig,” Rus said.
“A pig that I killed,” he added helpfully.
Korinna had already had a few mouthfuls by this point and luckily had found it delicious.
“Well, I’ve never had blood sausage and that was the best way to serve it to me,” she said. “Just put it down in front of me without me knowing!”
“As far as I’m concerned,” said Rus, “the more it still looks like what it was, the happier I am! Seriously though, eating should be without guilt. I gave up chicken wings because the chickens are treated so badly. The animals I deal with, and kill, are treated well.”
Rus talked us through the rest of the ingredients. We had some tasso ham – that’s pig shoulder, a Louisiana specialty. Also some fish – cod – a fried egg, mung lentils, and a traditional Indian breakfast dish called ‘upma’ – “kind of a white pudding,” Rus explained.
It was an interesting mix, and it certainly worked for me. Not because of the novelty, but because it all tasted good.
“I hate the word ‘fusion’ (to describe a cooking style),” Rus told me. “I choose ingredients that I think will taste good together – that’s all it is. The reason Indian food works so well is it’s the original fusion food. There’s really no such thing as ‘authentic Indian food’ because it evolved through interaction with visiting traders over the course of two millennia.”
I asked Rus when folks would next get a chance to try his cooking. He told me he has some private catering work lined up, but the next Moveable Feast will likely be at the Kingwood Center for Valentine’s Day.
Before then, Rus will also be hosting a ‘Holiday Comfort Food Cooking Class’ on Nov. 5 at the Entrepreneur’s Kitchen. Tickets are $48 and attendees will get an inside look at Rus’s techniques and secrets along with cooking demonstrations and a chance to sample the food.
As much as I’d like to attend the Valentine’s Day event, it would break a tradition for me. My first Valentine’s Day with my now-wife was in London in 2000. I’d neglected to book a table on the busiest restaurant night of the year and we ended up eating take-out falafel in the rain.
This became our yearly tradition, so what at the time seemed like a colossal screw-up has actually saved me a small fortune over the years, and turned out to be one of the smarter financial decisions of my life.
Check out the Moveable Feast facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/amfsupperclub/
See here for details of the Holiday Comfort Food Cooking Class: http://mindbodyalign.com/holiday-comfort-food-cooking-class/
