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Chefs Talk Chop: Heartbeet and Mamnoon's Henry Tiles


The Hungry No More salad at Heartbeet Organic Superfoods Cafe, where Henry and I worked together

Chefs talk Chop is my series where tastemakers share their hacks, experiences, and aspirations, in and outside of the kitchen. Featured this week is Henry Tiles, a manager at Heartbeet Organic Superfoods Cafe and former line cook at Mamnoon in Seattle.

While closing up at Heartbeet, I had a chance to ask Henry how cooking in a restaurant guided his home cooking. Mamnoon is featured as Zagat’s Top 50 Restaurants in Seattle, Seattle Met’s Best Restaurants, and Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown. Henry operates with the discipline of a former line cook, responding with “heard,” “correct,” and “corner” to communicate with the zero ambiguity needed in a restaurant kitchen. With all this acclaim, I wanted to poach (see what I did there?) Henry for tips that restaurant cooks take for granted that should be applied when cooking anywhere.

1. Don’t be afraid to use salt and fat.

Restaurant chefs season - which means to taste and potentially add salt- along the way while cooking. This allows the salt to break down the food to enhance flavor, rather than just adding a salty element at the end. The same goes for fat.

2. Don’t be afraid of your knives.

If you play soccer, you’ll scrape your knee; if you prepare food, you’ll knick yourself. Don’t let that stop you from holding the knife properly and cooking with abandon.

3. Be open to trying any food a chef offers to make you. . .

. . . even if you haven’t liked that food in the past. Though Henry doesn’t like eggs, he is still open to finding “that one fried rice recipe” that makes him a believer. Food is creative and interpretive, so a past experience does not necessarily dictate a future one.

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