Chef on the Edge.(David Chang)(Brief biography)

So Pete, let's just fucking bang out these recipes," Chang said.

"We'll get fish in tomorrow and start playing around," Serpico said.

"Fish is easy. I know you don't want to, but you can use the buttermilk with the stabilizer and whip it so it's like yogurt."

"I'm thinking a spicy buttermilk. Maybe we'll make it the consistency of the tofu."

"Doesn't Jean Georges have that fluke with a buttermilk dressing and champagne grapes?" Chang said. "It's fucking badass, over fluke."

David Chang and Peter Serpico were sitting in the basement office of Momofuku Ssam Bar, going over what they had to get done before the opening of Ko. The stoves were in, and the gas was ready to be turned on, but they couldn't cook there yet, because the fire-extinguishing system wasn't installed. Ssam Bar was Chang's second restaurant; Ko was his third.

Chang is only thirty, but in the past couple of years he has unexpectedly and, in his mind, accidentally and probably fraudulently, become one of the most celebrated chefs in the country. He is way too neurotic to handle this, however, so he compensates by representing himself as a bumbling idiot. He is five feet ten, built like a beer mug, and feels that most food tastes better with pork.