01x01 - Evan Funke

[bunniefuu]

[soft music playing]

[Evan] Few people realize

what it actually takes

to be really good at making pasta.

It's very tough on your body.

You're standing in one place,

repetitively making thousands

and thousands and thousands

of things with your hands.

It's tough on your joints.

It's hard.

And that's why I chose it.

Less and less people

are willing to pay the time cost

associated with real mastery.

[music continues]

[Evan] I wanted to do something difficult.

I found it.

And

I never looked back.

[theme music plays]

[music stops]

[man] Los Angeles is one of the greatest

food cities on the planet.

But I will tell you, they don't eat pasta.

They don't eat gluten.

They're zealots about it.

So it's unexpected

that in the capital of gluten aversion,

you have one of the great pasta makers

in the world.

[upbeat music plays]

[Jeff] The thing to understand

about Evan Funke

is that he has chosen

the most difficult path.

He has chosen making pasta by hand,

without a machine.

You have to roll out every sheet,

and it requires perfection.

When you go to Funke,

his restaurant in Beverly Hills,

he's a gladiator

right in the middle of the restaurant,

rolling sheets of dough.

It creates a sense of reverence

for what he's doing.

He is making pasta in that moment

that you might eat moments later.

And that's an extraordinary thing.

Lasagna,

tagliatelle Bolognese,

tortellini in brodo.

His obsession goes extremely deep.

And he's passionate about sharing credit

with the people

he's learned these dishes from.

He understands that handmade pasta

is a tradition that's been passed down

and that he's one of the latest custodians

carrying this tradition along.

It's a beautiful thing to see.

It's a beautiful thing to taste.

[music continues]

[music fading]

[bells tolling]

[in Italian] Young people

no longer make dough manually.

Now everybody uses the kneading machine,

so it's different.

Yes. Handmade pasta is different.

[Evan in English]

When you start with flour and eggs,

and you put them together…

it's not just pasta.

[soft music playing]

[Evan] This is religion.

[music intensifies]

[Evan] Every shape you see

in the grocery store

has an ancestral shape

that was at one time made by hand,

from flour and water, by a woman.

You're eating history.

Today, a lot of the handmade shapes

are dying with the true masters.

Less and less young people are willing

to really become a master of it.

I want to be a protector.

One little tiny conduit

in thousands of years of tradition.

I want to offer myself

as a godson to these people,

because they've given me

something extremely special.

[music fading]

[Evan] I grew up in Los Angeles.

My dad was in the movie business.

And my mom was a constant source

of endless love.

My parents said, "Do what you want."

"Do what inspires you."

They were saying,

"I don't care what you do,

but whatever you do,

you better do it well."

[piano music playing]

[Evan] There was always music,

and there was always art.

So it was a very creative household.

My brother Jens plays,

like, 13 instruments, all self-taught.

My sister has a glorious singing voice.

I wanted that,

but I was never good at anything.

High school was a disaster for me.

I was overweight, self-conscious,

and uncomfortable in my own skin.

I didn't know what I wanted to do.

I sold vitamins at GNC.

I was a massage therapist.

I worked at a gym.

I tried so many things,

searching for this all-in-one solution.

I was really, really lost.

[music fades]

[woman in Italian]

I think trofie have gained popularity

because they represent the perfect shape.

And this shape retains the pesto well

and allows perfect cooking.

Is the dough good,

or do you make it softer?

No, it's perfect.

-Perfect? Okay.

-Yes.

Because it depends,

one can make it stiffer

or a little softer.

No, no.

[woman] You roll it

on the kneading trough,

and when it comes back,

you press it well, right?

Everyone makes them differently.

For example, I use this part of my hand.

And you, Giusy, do you use this one?

The palm always, you too.

[Evan in English]

Pasta shapes are really personal.

It's your fingerprint.

Sofia, she's been making trofie

her whole life.

And some of the most beautiful pasta

I have ever seen being made

were made by her.

[soft music playing]

[Evan] Leading up to the point

where I met Sofia,

trofie, for me, was really hard.

How do you shape it into a corkscrew

that's tapered at each end?

Watching her make trofie,

I found she's utilizing the entirety

of the spine of her hand.

Starting at the very base of the palm

and ending at the very tip,

within a very short distance.

Super elegant,

but also looks kind of violent…

like a captured cyclone.

If you look at me at face value,

I don't think many people would say,

"He could probably

make something delicate."

But seeing her make pasta,

my shape changed.

And it hasn't gone back.

[music continues]

[Evan] Sofia totally changed my whole idea

of what trofie should be.

Now, it's an extension of her,

captured in each little one.

[music fading]

[Evan] After high school,

I was really dissatisfied

with where my life was going.

My girlfriend at the time,

she was a great cook,

and I would cook with her.

She said,

"You clearly are natural at cooking."

"Why don't you go to culinary school?"

And I was like, "Oh."

"That's a great idea."

[soft music playing]

[people chattering]

-[Evan] Hands, please!

-[man] Yes, Chef!

-One busa.

-[man] Busa.

-One lemon.

-[man] Lemon.

-One tag.

-[man] Tag.

Heads up on a ribby mid-well.

[Evan] Three months into culinary school,

I got a job with Wolfgang Puck at Spago.

And that kitchen

produced some of the best cooks

that California's ever seen.

[music intensifies]

[Evan] When I walked in that kitchen,

it was charged

with kinetic energy, passion, and fear.

Everyone was propelled at top speed,

every day.

I was scared shitless.

I didn't speak. I listened.

I took copious notes.

And I learned.

I threw my mind, body, and soul

into working for Wolfgang.

It was insane.

Just go.

Go as hard as you possibly can, every day.

Go hard.

And I loved it.

[music fades]

[Evan] I left Spago as a sous-chef.

I talked my way

into becoming the chef de cuisine

at a hotel in Beverly Hills.

It was run by a chef

whose family was from Bologna.

The chef could make pasta.

But he wouldn't teach me anything,

and it pissed me off.

So I was like, "All right, f*ck you.

I'm gonna go learn from the source."

[upbeat music plays]

[Evan] I started to look for places

in Italy to learn pasta.

And I stumbled

on La Vecchia Scuola Bolognese.

It was run by Alessandra Spisni,

who is one of the best sfoglini

in the world.

[in Italian] Fresh pasta

is a system that was the invention

of our great-grandmothers

to put on the table

and make people happy by spending little.

[in English] I got on the phone

and got Alessandra.

She said,

"Okay, we'll see you when you get here."

"Great."

[music fades]

[people chattering]

[Evan] I arrive in Bologna.

I don't know the language.

I rang the doorbell at La Vecchia Scuola.

Alessandra, she opened the door,

and she goes, "Buongiorno!"

Like, big, boisterous welcome.

I was like, "This is it."

[in Italian] So let's start

from the dough, right?

Make the fountain.

Make a hole that contains the eggs.

[piano music playing]

[Evan in English] Alessandra teaches

with this overflowing warmth.

Make mistakes.

Roll it. Have a good time. Dance.

[in Italian] Are they doing well?

-Yes.

-They are doing well.

If they don't do it right,

we tell them off.

Because they have to learn quickly,

or the mistakes start multiplying in life.

You need hands for the dough, not metal.

You need your heart in it.

You have to feel the dough.

That's why you need heart.

Here, flour, eggs and air,

but you need heart.

[music continues]

[Evan in English]

Alessandra was this fountain

of everything that I wanted to know.

She recognized that I was so interested

in the cooking processes,

and all of a sudden,

she started giving me tasks

to help her in the kitchen.

And I'm like, "Oh sh*t."

Everyone was receiving instruction,

but I was receiving

this additional attention

that was more than I expected.

And I just gave myself to the whole thing.

[music ends]

[people chattering]

[Evan] I wanted the craft

of handmade pasta

to be the focal point

of everything that I did from here on out.

[indistinct chattering]

[Evan] But the rolling of the sfoglia

was really awkward for me.

And I kept, like, doing this

and gripping it

and rolling over my fingers.

[wood banging]

[Evan] And I didn't have a mattarello.

I wanted one so desperately.

[banging continues]

[Evan] So Alessandra gave me an address

to go buy a mattarello.

I go inside,

and it smelled of freshly cut wood

and dust

and machinery

and oil.

And out comes Maestro Occhi.

And he's like…

-[banging continues]

-[soft music playing]

[Evan] I picked one out.

I looked at the wood,

and the wood grain was so beautiful.

And I knew that this wasn't just a stick.

This was, like, something special.

[music ends]

[Evan]

I fell into this rhythm of waking up,

making pasta as much as possible.

And I kept making dough

after dough after dough after dough,

seeking out the rhythm of how to do it.

One day, I start working the sfoglia,

and there's no hesitation.

It felt natural for the first time.

[soft music playing]

It was talking to me in a way

that I could understand, finally.

We were actually having a conversation.

I was in awe of what was going on.

[chuckles] Like,

"Okay, I guess this is happening now."

It was fresh and thin…

strong and balanced…

and in the end, it was perfect.

It was that defining moment,

"This is who I'm gonna be."

[music intensifies]

[music fading]

[Evan] Ragu Bolognese

is a cornerstone of cucina Bolognese,

and for me,

the truest expression of Alessandra.

[violin music playing]

I wanted to capture that…

and I started building up this Bolognese

to become a facsimile of her ragù,

with this big bass tone of umami.

I couldn't get it.

Beef that's raised in California

tastes like dry grass.

So, I added bone marrow

to gain this foundation…

and I put the marrow into pork fat.

I take the sofrito,

and I put it into the pork fat.

I add straight-grind brisket,

and as soon as it starts

to trickle out the juice,

add the wine,

add the tomato…

add the brodo,

and then you bring it up

very, very slowly.

[music continues]

Alessandra taught me you cannot rush ragù.

How dare you?

You just have to watch it.

You have to love it.

It's my favorite thing to make.

And what, 17, 18 years later,

I think I kind of have it?

[music ends]

-[in Italian] There you are.

-Thank you.

[Evan] Do you remember the first time?

[Alessandra] I remember everything

about all my students.

You are aware that you are the only one

who has been in my kitchen.

Yes.

In 35 years,

you have been the only one in my kitchen.

[Evan in English] Italy was three months,

six days a week,

as many hours

as they would allow me to be at school.

I felt myself coming into flower

as a human.

[upbeat music playing]

[Evan] One day Alessandra said,

"We're gonna make lasagna."

"I'm gonna teach you."

[in Italian] This is music to my ears!

A rolling pin should have a name.

[Evan] Alessandra!

[Alessandra] Now you are the only person

with a rolling pin with a female name.

[Evan] Always.

[Alessandra] So we will

always be together.

[music intensifies]

[Evan in English] The way that she made it

was just so beautiful.

The mixture of the besciamella

and the sugo,

this practiced, unmeasured balance.

Even though she had made it so many times,

she recognized

that this was the first time for me.

She took great care

in showing me how to do it.

[music continues]

[Evan] She wanted to give that to me.

Before Italy, I didn't know who I was.

And I found something

that I could shape my life around.

This is who I am. I'm a pasta maker.

[in Italian] Perfect.

I must say we are good, we did well.

[Evan in English] I didn't want to leave.

I wanted to rip my roots out of the US

and plant them in Bologna proper.

[music continues]

[Evan] But I was broke.

[sirens wailing]

[Evan] I get back from Bologna,

Los Angeles seems

so unbelievably boring and sad,

and I had to get a job.

I met Josh at Rustic Canyon.

It's this cool restaurant in Santa Monica.

It's struggling.

Josh was very adamant

about being a neighborhood restaurant.

And there had to be a burger.

[soft music playing]

The last thing that I wanted to cook

was a burger.

But I had to do it.

When I took it over,

it was this blue cheese,

confit bacon,

Sysco patty disaster.

And it was cooked in a cast iron,

and it tasted metallic.

If I'm gonna cook a burger,

I'm gonna make it my own.

[music intensifies]

[Evan] So I started to play with it,

get better cheese,

get better meat,

find a better bun,

cook onions down forever

and ever and ever.

Onion fondue.

And it turned into this beast.

It became a cult hit,

the cash cow of that restaurant.

Great. Successful, amazing,

making money. Good.

But it was not my ambition or dream.

[music fading]

This f*cking burger,

it wasn't fulfilling this desire

to make pasta.

That's what I wanted.

I needed to make my mark

with my hands, a stick, flour, and water.

The restaurant I wanted did not exist.

I wasn't sure what to do.

When I found my business partner,

I found a way forward.

I wanted this sanctuary

dedicated to handmade pasta.

No machines, just labor.

[upbeat music playing]

[Evan] I got in touch with Kosaku.

Ko was the teacher's aide with Alessandra.

Kosaku is probably

one of the best pasta makers there is.

Extremely focused individual.

Monk-like, even.

[music continues]

[Evan] And when I told him

that I was going to open up a restaurant

based on handmade pasta,

he was like, "I'm gonna come there,

and we're gonna be the best."

And I was like,

"f*ck yeah. Let's do this."

[music intensifies]

[Evan] We made pasta every f*cking day,

from six in the morning

to ten p.m. at night.

We were freestyling.

From corsetti

to busa

to tortelloni

to agnolotti to chitarra.

It was nothing but pasta.

I didn't even want people to talk.

I wanted them to focus on eating that.

"Eat that!"

"So I can give you another one."

[soft music playing]

Bucato was the greatest singular moment…

in my life.

-Everybody ready to go to church?

-[all] Yes, Chef.

Ori and a lamb, 7-2. Ori and a lamb, 7-2.

Heads up on arrabia, Mark.

Joe, what are you bringing me right now?

[indistinct chattering]

Copy that.

[Evan] One day, Ko comes to me and says,

"I can't work with your business partner."

"I'm going back to Tokyo."

"You should pay attention."

And I'm like, "Whoa. Whoa, what?"

"How the f*ck am I going to do this

without you, dude?"

I was still thinking about just the pasta,

the sheer production of the pasta.

Take the cipo. 5-2.

[Evan] Then I started to look.

Paychecks were bouncing.

Vendors were like,

"We're not getting paid."

"You're past 90 days."

So I'm like, "Oh my God."

[dramatic music playing]

[Evan] I had signed personal guarantees

on every single credit app

that that restaurant had.

Everything from china, glass,

silverware, booze, food, dry storage,

everything had my signature on it.

I took a meeting

with one of the investors,

and he said to me, "You need to separate

yourself from this person immediately."

"Immediately."

We draft a separation letter.

We have a courier drop off the letter,

and all f*cking hell breaks loose.

The phone starts blowing up.

"What's going on?

We can work this out. We can fix it."

Then it starts getting nasty.

I had been so engrossed…

in the day-to-day of just making pasta…

and so blinded by the craft…

not paying any kind of attention

to what was going on with the business.

And now, I was absolutely f*cked.

We get hooked up with a bankruptcy lawyer.

He says, "Well, Evan… it's about

three and a half million bucks."

Bankruptcy was the only option.

[music continues]

[music fading]

[Jeff] Bucato was supposed to be

his dream restaurant,

his temple to handmade pasta.

The restaurant went under,

he declared bankruptcy,

and he went into exile.

[dramatic music playing]

[Evan] I was just lost.

And I was drinking a ton.

I was not in a good space.

I was so pissed that I had failed

because I wasn't f*cking paying attention.

Who was going to trust me?

[music continues]

[Evan] In order to overcome the fear,

I had to do the thing

that I dreaded the most.

I had to come to grips with the fact

that I didn't know sh*t

about running restaurants.

[thunder rumbling]

[Evan] I got in touch with Rich Melman.

He owns Lettuce Entertain You,

one of the most successful

restaurant groups there is.

I needed to go

and learn the business from scratch.

-[thunder rumbling]

-[dramatic music continues]

[Evan] Rich had gone to Bucato,

so he had already known about me.

He said, "Ev, come on out to Chicago."

"We'll see if we can find something

for you to do."

Rich is a master operator.

Working with him, I started to understand

the art and science of this business,

accounting, insurance,

food costs, labor costs, inventory.

But the most important lesson

was how he treated people.

How he grew people…

that showed their worth.

Chicago became this awakening

of a different side of myself

that I did not know existed.

All those things you need to be a leader.

I was like, "f*ck."

"I'm not done."

[Evan] One day, I get an email.

It says, "Hey, Evan,

I'm opening a restaurant on Abbot Kinney."

"Wanted to see

if you were interested in having a chat."

And I was like, "f*ck yes."

Felix became where I could show

Los Angeles that I could be a success.

[soft music playing]

[Evan] The new kind of approach

of doing the tortellini,

tortelloni, tortellacci shape

is to just seal the shape

only where it's absolutely necessary.

The first step was to build a team.

Taking five pasta makers

with different size hands…

how do you make them all

form the same size and shape?

I was loving teaching people.

And, man, we f*cking took off.

-[music continues]

-[people chattering]

[Jeff] When I first went there,

I see Evan Funke,

and he's in this glass box

in the middle of the restaurant…

and he's making this pasta

with such ferocity.

I was like, "Okay, wow."

Wave after wave of food came out.

The pasta was so exquisite

that I was in that state of delirium.

At the time, I helped put together

Esquire magazine's list

of the best new restaurants in America.

I was like, "This is my number one."

[Evan] Esquire named us

"Best new restaurant in America" in 2017.

And then there was

the James Beard nomination,

"Best new restaurant in America."

Felix was my thesis

of everything that I'd grown to learn

about myself,

and what I really wanted to give.

[soft music continues]

It worked.

It worked.

[music ends]

-Buona sera!

-[all] Buona sera!

Welcome to Friday, everybody.

How's everybody feeling?

[all] Great, Chef!

Fantastic.

[Evan] With the success of Felix,

I got an offer

to do a restaurant in Beverly Hills.

They said, "Go ahead and dream."

"Whatever you need.

We're gonna let the artist make the art."

[soft music playing]

[Evan] At the time,

I was going back to Italy

as much as I possibly could.

Seeking out a shape

and finding a person

that would teach me that shape.

I wanted to celebrate these women.

So when I opened Funke,

I listed the pasta shape

with its provenance.

Region…

city…

and the woman who taught me.

[music intensifies]

The real heroes

of handmade pasta-making are women.

And he's standing up for them.

His devotion to them,

his commitment to naming them,

it's a pretty extraordinary thing.

[Evan] We are celebrating their history,

giving the credit where credit is due.

Now their story gets to live on at Funke.

[music continues]

[music continues]

[music fades]

[woman gasping]

[in Italian] Good morning.

[woman laughing]

[Alessandra] Welcome home!

Ciao.

My baby.

[soft music playing]

Guys, he is going to show us

how to roll the dough,

and you will do the same.

Rolling the dough is a dance.

With feeling,

energy,

heart, yes?

[Alessandra] A life.

[Evan in English] Pasta is all about love.

It is my guiding light.

It's really important to me

to continue the tradition.

I don't want it to die.

I do not want any of it to die.

[music continues]

[Evan] I'm just like a tiny little spoke

on a massive wheel,

and every sfoglia I roll

is a part of history.

I find that really beautiful.

This is what I was meant to do,

to make pasta.

Make pasta.

Make pasta.

[music fades]

[violin music playing]

[music continues]

[distorted voice] Make pasta.

[music ends]