Brunch with Bobby Chinn

A meal that many of us wish we could enjoy seven days a week is brunch. Imagine how sweet it would be to sleep in every day, waking up at leisure to a meal that encapsulates everything that is good about breakfast and lunch. Just to get the point across, how can you go wrong with bacon, waffles and litson baboy on the same platter?

Brunch, because of its inconclusiveness, possesses a certain eccentricity that is missing from the other, more regular meals of the day. An outcast, neither breakfast nor lunch, it is the renegade, the rogue. Because of its in-between-ness, brunch breaks out of the mold, and creates a name, space and function of its own.

It is interesting to note that the same offbeat and flexible nature of brunch manifests itself in the character of chef Bobby Chinn, the star of Discovery Travel and Living’s World Café Asia TV show. If brunch were a person, he would be Bobby Chinn.

Perhaps it all begins with tidbits of Bobby’s personal history. Half Chinese, half Egyptian, born in New Zealand, and educated mostly in England and San Francisco, this oriental-looking, curly-haired fellow with a strong American accent admits to being an “ethnic mutt.” Although somewhat self-deprecating, this playful description skims the surface of Bobby’s rich cultural background, as well as the number and quality of experiences he has had in the culinary world.

Getting to know Bobby over brunch at The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in Greenbelt a couple of weekends ago, we discovered the true versatility of Chinn. Before hosting his own show, Bobby went through a number of jobs. He worked on the New York Stock Exchange, waited tables in San Francisco and Paris, sold seafood to the mob in America, dabbled in standup comedy, and worked as a runner, busboy, and server in various restaurants in America and Europe.

Bobby’s initiation into the culinary world began when, as a server, he started hanging out in the Kitchen of Elka, a Franco-Japanese restaurant in San Francisco. From there, renowned chef Hubert Keller of Fleur De Lys took him in to further develop his skills, and he would later work with other chefs such as Jeffery Inahara, Traci des Jardin, and Gary Danko. After completing his apprenticeship in Bordeaux and Paris, Bobby ran several highly acclaimed restaurants in Vietnam including Camargue, Saigon Joe’s in Ho Chi Minh City, and the Red Onion in the Hanoi Towers. He later opened Restaurant Bobby Chinn, a personal project built on his wide experience in the food industry.

While members of the audience munched through their Salmon Scramble and Camembert Oreo Cheese Tart brunches, Bobby gulped down maybe four or five tall cups of coffee in between lots of comedic storytelling and playful profanity. He truly lives up to his reputation as being a motor-mouthed, high-octane chef, and his standup act isn’t half bad, either.

On his show World Café Asia, Bobby incorporates the fearlessness of a world traveler with a sound working knowledge of international cuisines. His proficiency in putting the two disciplines together is something that can be attributed to a wide range of experiences and, of course, being adventurous.

“I have lived my life like an algebra equation,” he says. “You find out the answer through the source of illumination, finding out what you do not like versus doing what you think you will like. I tried planning it all out, but it never really worked out that well whenever I did, so I just stopped planning and started to feel my way through it all.”

“Feeling your way through it all.” It might not be the best route for many people, but it’s definitely works out for some. And it sure sounds like the kind of person who can appreciate the sublime contradictions of brunch. Bring on the champorado and foie gras.

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Visit Bobby Chinn’s website at www.bobbychinn.com.

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For more information about The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, visit their website at www.coffebean.com.ph.

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E-mail me at enricomiguelsubido@yahoo.com.