No Space? No Problem!
How two Savannah chefs construct delicious dishes in spite of their kitchen constraints
Cramped kitchens, small staff, and limited equipment can pose challenges and frustrations for any chef. But for a couple of Savannah cooks, restrictions in the kitchen aren’t holding them back, and are instead sparking creativity, ingenious cheats, and thoughtful menus.
At Casa Guava Cuban Cafe, Chef Joaquin Montesino serves classic Cuban bites from pastelitos to empanadas but it's his sandwiches that take center stage. And with a tight kitchen comes certain constraints. Within the roughly 500-square foot space, the kitchen is located on the second floor, and Montesino and his staff use a dumbwaiter to lower down customer orders. With no traditional fryer, the empanadas are air-fried, and the chicharrones are cured, baked, and finished on the small electric stovetop to get that signature crispiness. “It’s not what I’m used to, but we adapt,” says Montesino.
The most notable challenge, however, is the lack of a grill. For his pan con bistec sandwich, Montesino found a way to still achieve a flavorful steak, true to its Cuban roots, without relying on a grill. He cooks the meat sous vide with a few spoonfuls of a bell pepperfueled sofrito. The protein soaks up the cumin, garlic, oregano, and onions of the sofrito, and the flavors are locked in once the steak is seared on the stove to achieve that craveable char. “Not having a grill, you have to work with what you’ve got,” says Montesino. Layered with a sofrito aïoli, Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomato, and fried potato sticks on a pillowy loaf of Cuban bread, the steak is rich and juicy, and one of the most popular items on the menu.
Finding creative workarounds in the kitchen is also a must for Chef Zachary Joachim of Sobremesa. Luckily for him, the all-electric kitchen is a welcome challenge. “It just takes a different way of thinking.” To make do with the roughly 144-square-foot kitchen and lack of extra space during service, a streamlined prep and pick-up process is a top priority when developing dishes and setting up the menu. “I try to rely heavily on raw seafood and shellfish.
I think my way through dishes before trying to move forward with them. Limitations are the necessity of invention. These dishes spawn from that thinking.” One such dish is his sweet potato gnocchi with confit chicken thigh. With no hood in the kitchen, Joachim has to be mindful about how much smoke he produces when cooking his proteins, so he chose to instead braise his chicken thighs with spices and lemon slices until falling off the bone. For the pasta, he roasts and peels sweet potatoes before processing them through a ricer. With only one other cook during service, Joachim was “nervous about putting gnocchi on the menu and having to hand roll it,” so he instead stores the dough in piping bags and pipes the gnocchi directly into the boiling water. “I have to be careful about what I put labor into, and that it’s really worth it.” The hearty, comforting dish, finished with pesto and a parmesan frico, has become a staple on the menu.
