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Good Eats:
Interview with Rocco Agostino, The Silver Spoon...
THE SILVER SPOON
ROCCO RECOMMENDS
OF INTEREST
When it comes to food, there exist two schools of people. The first group, of which I am a reluctant leader, loves food but will probably and inadvertently give you food poisoning with something as simple to prepare as Kool-Aid. The second group not only loves food, but will also make everyone around them love food, and have the power to bring forth world peace with just a skillfully made scrambled egg.
It’s the latter group that truly inspires. Food, to them, is not just a means of self-preservation, but something malleable, something that can be molded and manipulated into a divine experience. And it’s exactly this divine experience that led me to Rocco Agostino.
As owner and head chef of The Silver Spoon restaurant, Agostino approaches his dishes like an artist might approach a blank canvas – bursting with ideas, always striving for new creations. There’s no such thing as perfection, but Agostino’s cooking comes damn close. It’s invigorating to see someone so devoted, so enthusiastic about their life’s work, so driven by their passion, that they seemingly appear flawless.
“I think what I enjoy most is the creation of a dish: getting the new product in, putting it together to taste good and to look good, and to see the reaction on people's faces when they get to taste it,” Agostino, 37, says. “I think that's where I get my satisfaction from.”
For Augustino, this fulfillment came at an early age. “I mean, I’ve always enjoyed cooking. I grew up with my mom cooking in the kitchen,” he recalls fondly, adding, “I was [always] putting on dinners for friends. I put on a dinner for eight of my friends and I did a three-course meal where each course was from a different country and I had matching wine and matching music from each of those countries.” It’s clear that even as a teenager entertaining his friends, Agostino had a natural flair for presentation.
When questioned about his interest in cooking, the young chef admits that, like most people in their early twenties, he wasn’t sure if a minor hobby could be parlayed into a career. But after a brief stint in real estate, he recalls the moment that would change his life. “I was at dinner with my parents, and we were just talking and saying how I was thinking of maybe getting into cooking. My dad's a quiet guy, and he was the one who said you're never too old to do what you want to do. That was sort of a little kick in my ass. That week, I started going out looking for jobs.”
This was just the beginning. Agostino recounts the myriad of jobs he took on in order to gain experience in the kitchen, which ranged from dishwashing at a Woodbridge restaurant to gathering enough gusto to approach the late Raffaello Ferrari, a famous Torontonian chef who helmed Centro, Terra Restaurant, and Kit Kat, among others. Eventually, he ended up at Ferro, the popular Italian eatery on St. Clair Avenue, where he worked for six years. “When I started there, there was a chef but he left a year later and I sort of took over the position. It was great – busy restaurant. The only thing I didn’t like, as far as restaurants are concerned, is that it started off as a hundred-seat restaurant with three pool tables and then they started taking out the pool tables, one by one, and adding more seats. So it worked up to a good amount of seats and nothing happened to the kitchen so it was the same amount of people in the kitchen in the same amount of kitchen but you're increasing the volume. It started to get harder and harder.”
During this time, he put himself through the Stratford Chefs School, an intense, two-year culinary program that has the likes of renowned chef Jamie Kennedy and Canadian Living food editor Elizabeth Baird sitting on its Board of Directors. “I really enjoyed it because of how they teach it,” Agostino says of the program. “They teach it sort of in a restaurant setting and as far as the instructors are concerned, they're really good, they have the credentials, they're chefs that have been in the industry for twenty, thirty years. I guess what they've taught me is to sort of elevate the cooking...and enjoy it.”
When we discuss The Silver Spoon, there’s a spark of excitement bursting from the usually calm and soft-spoken Agostino, who refers to the restaurant as his baby. A true labour of love, The Silver Spoon opened in 2000 on a quiet, nondescript strip on Roncesvalles Avenue, a budding area still on the fringe of the must-dine neighbourhoods of Toronto. But Agostino had a vision, and that vision turned out to be one of the best fine dining restaurants in the area.
Asked about the hardest part of opening a restaurant, Agostino can’t pinpoint it, but cites perseverance, passion, and dedication as the cornerstones of his success in such a capricious industry. “It's an ongoing process with a restaurant. It’s always hard. When I say that, I mean, you're going to have your ups and your downs and busy days and slow days. We take the good and the bad, and some days are going to be harder than others.
“It’s a hard business. It’s very long hours. Depending on where you are, location plays a big part. You know, I fell in love with Roncesvalles, and when we opened up eight years ago, yeah, you're going to struggle. Even now people don't really know Roncesvalles. You have to be very passionate about it, you have to enjoy it; otherwise it will eat you up.”
Much like its fare, the sophisticated and cozy décor of the restaurant is what makes it one of the neighbourhood’s best date spots. “The hardest part is to sort of do the touch ups and cosmetics to make [the space] your own,” Augustino says. But with all elements in place, a restaurant still needs a name. “There's an Italian cookbook which is sort of the Bible to Italian cooking, and it's called ‘the silver spoon’ in the English version,” he explains of the restaurant’s namesake. “In Italian it's called Il Cucchiaio d’Argento, and I got that as a gift from my cousin when I was in Italy. It's a great book to use as a reference and to get inspired by.”
The Silver Spoon menu is deceptively simple, much like its creator, but what it lacks in volume, it more than makes up in tantalizing flavour. Using only the freshest ingredients from local grocers and farms, Agostino designs a crisp, balanced menu with influences from his Italian upbringing (as well as a six-month stint working in Rome) and French culinary background. “To have a menu that has fifty items on it, I don't agree with. To sort of keep everything fresh with fifty items, it just doesn't make any sense. I think we have about twenty-four items on the menu and I think that's reasonable. We offer a good variety to people coming into the restaurant.”
So how does he decide what’s on the menu? “I do try to make food as simple but as flavourful as possible. I try to use as few ingredients as possible so as not to complicate the dish – not having five different flavours happening at once but just having a concentrated dish where there are three elements to it.” But he’s also not afraid to experiment, often pushing the envelope when it comes to ingenuity. When bombarded with questions about what he will and will not try, Agostino succinctly says, “As far as food is concerned, I’ll always try something once.”
His artistry and deft hand in the kitchen often shine through, but like any artist in a subjective field, Agostino also has to deal with the critics, of which he speaks candidly. “I read the reviews. It's criticism, so you have to take it with a grain of salt. Everybody has different tastes and you're never going to please everybody. You have to understand that also and try to do your best. And criticism is good. I mean, if someone says they didn't like something, then you look at it and see that maybe they were right, maybe they were wrong. Change it, don't change it, you go from there. I’d like people to – and I’ve had people come up – and say, ‘I had a great meal, but…’ I appreciate that.”
Naturally, the topic of cooking shows come up. Would he ever do one? “As far as a cooking show, I think yeah, why not? Maybe something that involved drinking and sex because that's what sells, right?,” he jokes. “If it had to be anything, I’d try to make it as fun as possible.” But before that, Agostino reveals that a book may be in the works. “I'm doing some research with regards to a cookbook and hopefully something will come out of it.”
And he has nothing but accolades for his peers. “As far as chefs are concerned, there are some really incredible chefs here in the city, in Toronto. Jamie Kennedy is a forefather of the local organic. There’s also Chris McDonald, who's an amazing chef. Charlie Trotter was also one of my first sort inspirations. He’s a chef in Chicago. I got to eat at his restaurant – this is going back a good twelve years ago – and it was just an absolutely incredible experience to be there. I got to shake his hand.” He pauses, smiling. “It was good.”
With days often lasting well over twelve hours at The Silver Spoon (and fourteen on most weekends), Agostino has to pause when asked what other projects he’d consider. “I'd really love to have a bed and breakfast someplace. I don't know where, but I’d really like to do that at some point. The Silver Spoon is the baby, so it'll be nice to keep. I'd probably break it up – The Silver Spoon is The Silver Spoon. Maybe do something not as much as fine dining like The Silver Spoon…maybe something simpler.”
What’s so striking about Agostino is that, despite his obvious talent and admirable passion for food, he’s humble about it. A major theme that permeates throughout our conversation is his strive for perfection and his willingness to work for it. Those fortunate enough to see Agostino in the kitchen will recognize the focus, the ease, and the precision that have made him a natural chef.
Augostino’s life philosophy, uncomplicated and to the point, doesn’t differ much from his food philosophy – which is probably why he’s been such a successful chef. “Enjoy eating! And come to The Silver Spoon! Live, love and eat!” ¤ C.Ho.