The Joy of Overkill

Recreating French Laundry Dishes at Home—and What It’s Taught Me

We have a one-year-old. His name is Bennett, and he is wonderful. He is also a time-devouring, pasta-hurling, endlessly-crawling little maniac—which means that my wife Lauren and I don’t go out to nice restaurants much anymore. Before Benny, it was something we loved: long dinners, tasting menus, beautiful plating, experience and ambiance, the works. These days, dinner is more of a countdown than a course—who can finish before someone starts crying? (Sometimes it’s Benny. Sometimes it’s us.) 

So in a moment of delusional optimism, I decided to bring the fine dining home. 

I pulled out “The French Laundry Cookbook,” picked a few dishes, and made a plan: Tomato sorbet with cherry tomatoes and garlic parmesan tuile. Duck roulade with creamed corn and morel mushroom sauce. It was a culinary flex, sure—but also a love letter to the kind of cooking that has always inspired my creativity as a chef. And an excuse to dust off my chinois. 

Here's what I took away from the experience: 

1. Mise en Place Is Non-Negotiable 

You cannot wing your way through a Keller recipe. You will fail. The ingredient lists are long, the components are many, and every part of the dish depends on the other parts being exactly where they need to be when you need them. The best thing I did? Prepping everything ahead. Sauces. Purees. Garnishes. Even the ice cream bowl went into the freezer 24 hours in advance. When it came time to plate, I wasn’t scrambling—I was cooking. 
 
Mise en place isn’t only a pro move. It’s the move. 

2. Texture Matters 

One of the things I love most about Keller’s approach is how much attention he gives to texture. He doesn’t just puree something—he purees it, then strains it through a chinois, then maybe even passes it through a tamis. The result? A dish that feels refined and intentional. There’s a reason his food reads as elegant: it’s not just the flavors; it’s the care in how those flavors are delivered. 
 
It made me think harder about how I build texture into my own food. Crunch, smoothness, temperature contrast—they all matter more than we sometimes realize. 

3. Ingredient Integrity Is the Foundation 

Keller’s dishes may be complex, but they’re fundamentally ingredient-driven. When you break down the individual components, it’s clear how much intention goes into making the ingredient the star. 
 
Take the creamed corn I served with the duck: just three ears of corn, shucked, pureed, and strained down to a half cup of liquid. No cream added. It was thickened only with the corn’s natural starch on the stove. Then more fresh kernels added to the thickened puree. The result? A silky, concentrated bite where the corn shines—unmuted by fat, full of sweet summer flavor. 
 
Same goes for the tomato course. Tomatoes showed up twice on the plate: first, as peeled and concassé cherry tomatoes, served simply at room temperature with a pinch of salt; and again in the sorbet, made from fresh tomatoes that were peeled, seeded, cooked down, and strained (twice) to concentrate their natural umami. Each version offered a different texture and intensity, but both celebrated the tomato for what it was. 
 
If you're curious about the tomato sorbet technique, I wrote an article on the process here. You can also grab the recipe here. 

4. Good Technique Shows 

There’s nowhere to hide in this kind of cooking. If your knife work is sloppy, it shows. If your emulsions break, it shows. If your tuile goes soft and you don’t have a backup plan, well... it shows. 
 
But when the technique is there—when the roulade slices clean and holds its shape, when the sorbet quenelle lands just right, when the tuile shatters with a perfect snap—it feels like all the effort was worth it. 
 
I’ve also broken down the roulade technique in a step-by-step guide here. 

That’s the joy of overkill. Not because you need to go this far every night, but because once in a while, it reminds you of why you fell in love with cooking in the first place. The care. The craft. The moment where the technique disappears and all that’s left is something beautiful to share. 

Duck Roulade with Sweet Corn and Morel Mushroom Sauce

Tomato Sorbet with Cherry Tomatoes and Basil Oil

Benny the Meatball Monster