For chef Art Smith, food a 'common thread that connects us all'

For chef Art Smith, food a 'common thread that connects us all'

Chef Art Smith wants to get you back to the table. Specifically, the dining table.

Smith believes that meals shared with family and friends can provide nourishment way beyond the physical kind, that food is a way to learn about other cultures and build a sense of community.

Oprah Winfrey says "You can taste the love" in his cooking, and Smith -- who served as the talk show host's personal chef for 10 years -- has spread his brand of love far and wide.

While still working with Winfrey on special events, he opened a new Chicago restaurant this summer, published a sequel to his best-selling cookbook and won a humanitarian award for a nonprofit he created to teach children that food, as he says in his Southern accent, is a "common thread that connects us all."

Smith's feed-the-world philosophy is evident at the condo he shares with his partner, artist Jesus Salgueiro, on the city's South Side. Visiting family members occasionally pass through the kitchen to say hello.

Smith, 47, who talks so fast he nearly runs out of breath sometimes, relates how he trades one neighbor bottles of wine for supplies of the arugula she grows, and how the couple share their French bulldog with another neighbor who fell in love with the pet.

About a year ago, the couple transformed the building's courtyard into an eye-popping outdoor kitchen featuring a brick pizza oven, wok, gas grill and tandoori oven. They share the space with their neighbors; a bamboo fence hides an ugly vacant lot next door.

"A little bamboo goes a long ways," Smith laughs. "Growing up in the rural south, I think we need a little soft around us."

That softness extends into the open, airy kitchen. A marble slab serves as a workspace, but a vase of sunflowers, a bowl of oranges, a collection of pastel colanders and shelves stuffed with cookbooks warm up the room.

A photo of Winfrey and Smith celebrating the first year of her book club and a signed photo of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama are nestled among photos of friends and family members.

One wall is devoted to children's artwork that Smith had framed. The artists represented include the children of fellow chefs Nigella Lawson and Jamie Oliver mixed in among drawings by neighborhood kids, his contractor's children and students taught by a friend in Costa Rica.

Lawson says she got to know Smith about five years ago through mutual admiration e-mails that turned into a fast friendship. She agrees that they share a similar philosophy -- an emphasis on non-fussy food and techniques, encouraging people to get in the kitchen and try recipes out to share.

"But I wouldn't like to undersell Art," Lawson says in an e-mail, saying she lacks Smith's culinary training.

"Art is a highly, technically proficient individual who could cook anything at no notice and (with) no nerves, but who understands that the important thing about food is simplicity, honesty, and its ability to bring people together."

"He is not just a 'food writer,'" Lawson says. "He is a person with a mission to make people connect with one another."

Still, his writing won him in 2002 a James Beard Award -- regarded as among the most important in the food world -- for his first cookbook, "Back to the Table: The Reunion of Food and Family."

This year, he won a humanitarian award from the organization for his work with Common Threads, in which children are educated on the importance of diversity, nutrition and physical well-being through food and art of different cultures.

The group, which Salgueiro also helped start, serves about 800 children at spots around Chicago and in a national pilot program that opened in Los Angeles in September. Most of the children are low-income; one recently added feature gives the children food to take home and prepare with their families.

Smith also spent time this summer at Winfrey's Leadership Academy in South Africa, teaching the girls there about cooking and bonding with them over a love for the pop star Fergie. He hopes to do similar work with Aboriginal children in Australia this winter.

"Anything to do with helping children, I'm all there," Smith says. "It makes people happy. I really believe in it. It's what I'm good at."

He began cooking as a child growing up in tiny Jasper, Fla., near the Georgia border. His parents worked three jobs between them to make ends meet, in addition to running the family farm. Smith began cooking with the lady who cared for him while his parents were at work, and the two would watch Julia Child together.

After college and two cooking internships, he worked five years as the executive chef for Florida Gov. Bob Graham. He spent some time as a family chef overseas, worked on a high-class train and served as a special event chef for Martha Stewart Living magazine.

In 1997, he was hired by Winfrey as the personal chef for her and her companion Stedman Graham. Sometimes that meant cooking for the couple at home, or for Winfrey and her guests at her Chicago studio. He also trained others on her staff to follow his recipes and techniques.

He says Winfrey helped inspire him to look for new ways to get his message out that sharing home-cooked meals with people you love is worth the effort.

"The greatest lesson that Oprah taught me was do what you know, and believe in what you know. Do what you're good at, and believe that it's good," says Smith.

His new cookbook, called "Back to the Family," is filled with simple, hearty recipes, many tinged by his Southern upbringing, with colorful names like "Church Lady Deviled Eggs," "Electric Lemonade" and "Anne Bloomstrand's Chicken Under a Brick."

Smith says he's never felt pressure to make his cooking more upscale: "I don't think people care as long as it's good. I've never been ashamed to serve a biscuit."

Even at his new restaurant, Smith says he hopes it feels like he had the customers over for a Sunday dinner -- along with raising awareness for Common Threads. Located in an old carriage house and with just about 30 seats, Table 52 opened to positive reviews this summer.

"Art is a man who loves loving other people through food," Winfrey said in a statement. "I always believed that opening his own restaurant, which is one of his lifelong dreams, is what he should do.

"It was hard for me to give him up, but I really felt that the world needed to taste his food," she said.

Smith, however, is still her go-to guy for special events -- for instance, overseeing the menu for her gala fundraiser in California for Obama.

Of course, his work with Winfrey has led to plenty of celebrity run-ins. "I think I have served all of Hollywood fried chicken," he says.

He casually tosses off tales of feeding Julia Roberts, Tom Hanks and Princess Diana. He admits to only being awestruck when he met Nelson Mandela, though he was pleased when Barbra Streisand went ga-ga for his peach cobbler.

"It was just peaches and sugar with a little biscuit crust," Smith says. "But you know what? It said home."

Chef Art Smith offers tips for easy meals at home

Chef Art Smith offers these tips for busy families trying to find ways to enjoy homecooked meals together:

• Don't forget the freezer. Smith says he thinks the freezer went out of fashion when prepared, processed food became more available. He recommends cooking a whole roast, but freezing parts of it for later use.

• Buy fruit you don't have to peel. "There's nothing better than a simple breakfast or dessert with berries or grapes. Easy," Smith says.

• Look for recipes with few ingredients, and food you don't have to overly prepare.

• Don't feel pressured that every meal must have multiple side dishes. There's nothing wrong with a bowl of soup for dinner, served with multigrain bread or crackers, and perhaps a green salad.

• Smith says adults can't expect children to eat anything the adults won't eat themselves. Involve children in grocery shopping and cooking, and teach them where food comes from.

Anne Bloomstrand's Chicken Under a Brick

One 3-pound whole chicken, butterflied with the backbone removed

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

¼ cup olive oil

4 garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

2 tablespoons chopped fresh oregano

2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme

Set the chicken on a baking sheet and allow to come to room temperature (about 20 minutes). Season with salt and pepper.

Heat a grill to high.

In a small bowl, make a paste by combining the olive oil, garlic and the fresh herbs. Use your hands to loosen the skin on the chicken, then spread the paste under the skin.

Place the chicken on the hot grill, skin side up. Place the baking sheet on top of the chicken and weigh it down with a brick.

Close the grill, reduce heat to medium and begin checking for doneness after 30 minutes. The chicken is done when a meat thermometer reads 165 degrees at the center of the chicken.

When done, remove the brick and carefully transfer the chicken to a clean baking sheet or serving platter. Allow the chicken to rest 10 minutes before cutting and serving.

Serves two.

Nutrition values per serving: 760 calories, 46 g fat (9 g saturated), 2 g carbohydrates, 0 fiber, 76 g protein, 230 mg cholesterol, 230 mg sodium.

"Back to the Family" by Art Smith (2007 Thomas Nelson, $29.99)