The secret behind L.A.’s great kitchens

Who do you call if you need 17 ladles, a scimitar, a pair of clogs, two square ice cream scoops and a peeler?

If you are a chef in Los Angeles or Orange county, you call Chefs’ Toys. In short order, a 23-foot truck will pull into your back alley, rattling with saute pans, spatulas and whisks.

In fact, every inch is crammed with all manner of gadgets and utensils: pastry tips, chef’s knives, fish scalers and mandolines; melon ballers, butcher steels, immersion blenders and scoops. Ladles, in every conceivable size, are strapped to the back door. Pastry equipment is displayed on a counter just behind the driver’s seat, just below a row of chef’s hats. Next to the side door are bouquets of wooden and plastic spoons, rubber spatulas, tiny nonstick saute pans and neat rows of French peelers in orange, green, red, blue and yellow. Running along the length is a magnetized shelf holding knives -- Globals, Forschners and Brietos, a couple of Macs and other Japanese knives, and three lines of Messermeisters. Below them are the clogs and shoes.

This compact wonderland is where the chefs and sous-chefs, pastry chefs and line cooks of L.A.’s best restaurants buy much of their equipment. Bastide, Spago, Patina and L’Orangerie are all customers, as are Hotel Bel-Air and the Four Seasons. The selection of equipment crammed on this truck is as good as what you’ll find at any wholesale store, they say.

But best of all, Chefs’ Toys has unusual items that chefs don’t even realize they need until they see them -- gnocchi paddles, bone-marrow scoops and other gizmos that can actually change the way they cook.

John Saslow hung up his whisk 2 1/2 years ago to drive the L.A. route. Five days a week, he travels the streets of L.A., Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, Santa Monica and the beach cities, stopping at restaurants and hotels. In all there are three Chefs’ Toys trucks, each driven by a former chef.

“He pulls up in the alley, and half of my guys disappear,” says Lee Hefter, executive chef at Spago. “They’re buying knives off the Chefs’ Toys truck.”

If they are buying knives, Saslow is happy; he works on 100% commission. Prices are competitive with other wholesale suppliers, but to a civilian they seem like steals -- about 25% to 30% below retail.

The idea for Chefs’ Toys began incubating when Steve Dickler, the company president, was working as a chef at Balboa Yacht Club in the mid-1980s. Frustrated that he couldn’t find anyone to sharpen his knives, he bought a machine of his own and soon found himself sharpening knives for other chefs. “Next thing I know, I had a truck, and I quit my job.” Before long he was selling cutlery. But the demand didn’t stop there -- the chefs wanted hard-to-find utensils such as chinois, aspic cutters and sugar pumps for pulling sugar. Chefs’ Toys was born.

Today the company, which became Chefs’ Toys Advantage this year after merging with a company that supplies front-of-the-house items such as china and flatware, has two trucks dedicated to sharpening in addition to the three Chefs’ Toys trucks.

(The truck sells only to professional kitchens, but the rest of us can shop at its Irvine showroom, or browse the Web site, www.chefstoys.net. For now, Web site purchases also require a phone call, but that is expected to change next year.)

One day last week, Saslow started his route by picking up some fry baskets in Rancho Dominguez. One of his customers, the executive chef at I Cugini in Santa Monica, had an emergency: His deep-fryer broke down. Saslow planned to help him jury-rig a temporary fryer.

Zipping across town on the 10 -- OK, maybe not zipping; Saslow’s the rare driver who lets everyone merge in front of him -- he pulled into the alley behind I Cugini and entered the back door of the kitchen, where Chef Stephen Gialleonardo was slicing tuna.

“We’re gonna set up a mock fry station with two pots,” the chef explained as he climbed into the back of the truck, “and keep a fry thermometer in it to monitor the temperature.”

“And hope nobody orders calamari!” said Saslow.

Since he was in the neighborhood, Saslow made a stop at Whist; he hadn’t been there in a few weeks. Bypassing the valet parkers, he pulled around the south side of the hotel. Inside, Saslow passed a row of lockers to enter the pastry area of the kitchen.

“You should have come Friday, man!” said the pastry chef, Verite Mazzola, by way of greeting. “I need some cutters. And I need a whatchamacallit. And another peeler.”

Out in the truck, Saslow sold her a set of nested round Italian pastry cutters ($17), two peelers (purple and yellow, $3.25 apiece), and a 10-inch whisk (the “whatchamacallit,” $8.90).

Accouterment for a crowd

At Water Grill, Saslow opened both the side and back doors for a big crowd: Executive Chef Michael Cimarusti, kitchen supervisor Ritchie Stoddard, fish butcher Santiago Huerta, pastry chef Wonyee Tom, and line cook Ian Torres. They bought a dozen Forschner paring knives ($3.25 apiece), six large rondos (straight-sided saute pans) and six two-ounce ladles.

“Do you need anything, Ritchie?” Cimarusti asked Stoddard.

Stoddard pointed to a chinois. These are expensive.

“A new chinois?”

“Yeah, with a handle,” said Stoddard.

“The handle can’t fall off that one -- it’s one piece?” asked Cimarusti.

Saslow unhooked the chinois from the ceiling. “If you use a ladle in it,” he said, miming the action of pushing stock and its solids through with the bottom of a ladle, “it’s not going to fall apart.” This is why chefs sell the wares -- they know how professionals will use the equipment. “Forty-seven bucks versus 62 bucks.”

At lunchtime, Saslow considered his customary quandary: Where could he stop where he wouldn’t bother the chefs during service? He decided to head over to Table 8, a new restaurant on Melrose that’s about to open. He sold them a bunch of supplies two weeks ago, but they might need more. Saslow parked in the alley, walked in a back door. “Anybody here?” he shouted.

Andrew Kirschner, the sous-chef, greeted him. “Do you have any gloves?” he asked.

The health department inspection was scheduled for that afternoon and the inspector would look for gloves, even though there was not yet any food to handle. If the restaurant didn’t pass the inspection, it couldn’t open in 11 days, as planned. “We’re gonna give you a couple of knives to sharpen,” Kirschner added.

Govind Armstrong, the restaurant’s chef, came out carrying a cardboard carton lined with a towel. Inside were half a dozen knives. He cradled the box as if his prize butterfly collection were inside. Two of the knives had gorgeous, sculpted multicolored wooden handles.

Saslow admired them. “I’ve never seen these before,” he said.

Armstrong has been buying from Chefs’ Toys for eight years, since his first executive chef job at Jackson’s on Beverly Drive. He continued the relationship when he went to Chasen’s, then Pinot Hollywood and then Chadwick. It is because chefs move around so much that Saslow has some 450 customers.

Kirschner picked up a package of table levelers.

“Those are too expensive,” said Saslow. “Eleven bucks.” Sometimes it seems as if he’s more friend-to-the-chefs than salesman-to-the-chefs.

Kirschner put them down.

After selling them some ladles, Saslow took an order for a saute pan and two shelves for a cheese storage unit. He handed them a half-box of gloves and a roll of labels, both of which they needed for their inspection, gratis.

At the Four Seasons Hotel, chef Conny Anderson came down. “I need some small ice cream scoops,” he said, all business. “This here. One of those. I need some whisks.” He grabbed two big balloon whisks. “And a nice wooden spatula.” He took six wooden spoons. Saslow placed each item next to the computer.

“Do you have those red spatulas for high heat?”

In three minutes, he was done -- pastry cutters, pastry brushes, tongs and more: $234.79 worth.

A full-service supplier

It was almost 5 o’clock, and Saslow was ready for his last stop, Bastide, where his wife, Koa Duncan, is the pastry chef. One would assume that’s why he sells the restaurant so many supplies.

Actually, one would be mistaken. On a sales call there shortly after the restaurant opened last year, sous-chef Diana Riffone said to Saslow: “We’re looking for a pastry chef. Do you know anybody?”

“Sure,” said Saslow. “My wife.”

Duncan, Riffone, and sous-chef Kevin Meehan climbed on board. Riffone, who was looking for an egg-topper, fingered a $39.95 spring-loaded model that’s a favorite at L’Orangerie, where a signature dish is shirred eggs with sevruga caviar. Saslow sold L’Orangerie four of them. Meehan ordered a truffle-slicer. Duncan bought a 9-inch chef’s knife, a birthday present for a friend. And Saslow hit the road, which was bumper-to-bumper, heading for home.

He didn’t get to Campanile, Hotel Bel-Air, Spago, Park Hyatt hotel or Chloe in Playa del Rey -- all scheduled stops.

But tomorrow is another day.

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TOOL DEPARTMENT: From the Toys’ chest

The chefs who drive the Chefs’ Toys trucks are always up on the latest and coolest kitchen gadgets. Here are three of our favorite finds from the restaurant supply store on wheels.

Julienne peeler from Hiroko’s Kitchen. If you’ve ever wrestled with a carrot, trying to subdue it as you cut it into julienne strips, you’ll love this tool. Just lay your vegetable victim on a cutting board and pull the peeler along its length, applying gentle pressure. The result is beautiful, uniform strips of zucchini, daikon, celery root, cucumber -- or just about anything else you’d care to julienne.

$10.85 at Chefs’ Toys, (800) 755-8634; $14.95 at Sur La Table, (800) 243-0852 or www.surlatable.com.

F Dick fish spatula. Thin and flexible enough to lift the most fragile of filets, this German model is sleek, with a comfortable handle. The offset angle makes it easy to slide right under the fish.

$21.45 at Chefs’ Toys, (800) 755-8634; $31.70 at Chef Knives to Go, www.chefknivestogo.com.

Inox egg topper. Ever wonder how a restaurant gets a perfect, clean-cut rim on an eggshell presentation? Set this spring-loaded model atop a raw or soft-boiled egg, pull up the ball, and let it drop. Although there’s no blade involved, the impact makes a perfect cut.

$39.95 at Chefs’ Toys, (800) 755-8634; $46.50 at Surfas, 8825 National Blvd., Culver City, (310) 559-4770.