Kristen Essig and Michael Stoltzfus
Pigs brought Michael Stoltzfus and Kristen Essig together. When Stoltzfus opened Coquette, his New Orleans eatery, a little more than ten years ago, he was lucky to have good purveyors. One of them, a truck driver for his pig farmer, set him up with Essig, a fellow chef and then manager of the Crescent City Farmers Market. The two got along well and soon moved in together around the corner from the restaurant. They drove to work together, cooked together, and soon Essig became co-chef and co-owner. The James Beard Foundation and Food & Wine nominations followed.
Essig grew up on the Gulf Coast of Florida, eating fried-grouper sandwiches with tartar sauce and her German grandmother’s sauerbraten. She often spent weekends going crabbing with her grandparents, eating the boiled crabs on Sunday nights when her parents came to pick her up. Family dinners were a nightly occurrence, and usually the conversation turned to her parents’ work. “Hearing them discuss how much of their work they didn’t enjoy around the table every night inspired me to do something that I love, every day,” she says.
While at Johnson & Wales culinary school in Charleston, South Carolina, Essig met Emeril Lagasse at a charity event. He was in the process of preparing a live TV show and asked her if she wanted a job. This was before celebrity cooking shows were so ubiquitous, so Essig had a hard time believing people would want to watch a chef cook on TV and figured her parents would be disappointed if she quit school. But after graduation she called Lagasse, and three days later she drove from Florida to New Orleans, where she began work at his namesake restaurant. Working there taught her how to be organized. “Walking into work every night was like walking into a battle. You had to find a way to center yourself, put your head down, and get your work done.”
Stoltzfus also came from a shore culture—in his case, the Eastern Shore of Maryland, where his parents ran a dairy farm. “It was, as you’d imagine, lots of hard work, sweet corn, and cows,” he says. Just before he was set to go to college his mother decided to open a bakery. She needed help and Stoltzfus set higher education aside to give her a hand. Although he barely had any basic cooking skills, he was a fast learner. He began picking up cookbooks and gave himself a crash course as he cooked his way through The Culinary Institute of America Cookbook.
After a few restaurant jobs in Maryland, he moved to New Orleans to work at the restaurant August and picked up some European-style techniques, including how to prep a tête de veau. “We had to burn and shave all the hair off a cow’s head. Perhaps not my favorite task, but it was something I had never done before.” Stoltzfus knew quite early that he wanted to open his own place and be his own boss. He opened Coquette in 2008.
Over the years, Coquette has become an anchor in the Garden District of New Orleans, the kind of place where its former chefs open restaurants just down the road. In 2019 Essig and Stoltzfus decided to open a second place, Thalia, which also serves as a place for community meetings. That sits well with Essig, who’s an advocate for Shift Change, a local organization working to eliminate harassment in local restaurants.
CURRENT HOMETOWN: New Orleans, Louisiana
RESTAURANT THAT MADE THEIR NAMES: Coquette, New Orleans
SIGNATURE STYLE: Louisiana ingredients with international inspiration
BEST KNOWN FOR: Their fried chicken brunches, and becoming James Beard Award finalists four years in a row
FRIDGE: Kenmore
When at home in a kitchen that is a tenth the size of the one at Coquette, Essig and Stoltzfus take turns cooking and cleaning up. “If not, we run into each other,” says Essig. “We just do the best we can, it’s not a musical.” Space is so tight they’re unable to open the refrigerator door all the way, thanks to a large painting on the wall, and their table doubles as a countertop and home office. They do have a great view onto their small garden, though.
Their refrigerator is always stocked with Champagne and usually has at least a few boxes of leftover Vietnamese takeout and the occasional cut flower—a little aesthetic trick Essig picked up from her godmother, a florist who always kept blooms in her fridge.
- ASSORTED OYSTER AND CHESTNUT MUSHROOMS
- CHEDDAR, GRUYÈRE, AND PARMESAN, for easy meals on the restaurant’s ciabatta
- YEAST—“It’s one of those things that we keep so that when the mood strikes and the recipe requires yeast, we have it on hand.”
- GOLDEN TURMERIC JUICE—“We use the turmeric juice at the restaurant for making pasta; at home we add it to salad dressings, cocktails, soups, and juices. It’s concentrated, so we use it in small amounts right at the end so that the flavor is pronounced but not overwhelming.”
- KIMCHI
- FRESH ANCHOVIES—“We like them on the restaurant’s ciabatta with butter and sliced tomatoes when they’re in season.”
- JASMINE—“I change the flower whenever I have time or find something pretty.”
- CHAMPAGNE—“At least two bottles at all times!”
- YARD EGGS, FROM GREENER PASTURES FARM—“We like their motto—bugs, not drugs. They’re called yard eggs because the chickens are free roaming.”
- PRESERVED LOUISIANA MEYER LEMONS
- COQUETTE BREAD-AND-BUTTER PICKLES—“We call them B&B’s, and we keep them in our $600 jar, which was given to us full of granola after we’d eaten an overpriced dinner in New York City.”
- SIGGI’S VANILLA YOGURT
- RANDOM FOODS IN TAKEOUT CONTAINERS: RICE, NOODLES, PEANUT SAUCE, AND HOISIN
- LEFTOVERS FROM PHO TAKEOUT: BEAN SHOOTS, THAI BASIL, SLICES OF JALAPEÑO, AND LIME WEDGES, IDEAL FOR TOSSING WITH RICE
- COFFEE BEANS
- LEFTOVER TAKEOUT PHO BROTH
- GOLDEN TURMERIC JUICE
- MISSISSIPPI RED RICE
- WINE BOTTLES, FROM THE RESTAURANT—“At the end of the night we bring home the just opened bottles that were used for pouring individual glasses.”
- MEYER LEMONS, BLOOD ORANGES, WHITE AND RED GRAPEFRUITS, LOUISIANA SWEET AND NAVEL ORANGES—“We love citrus: we eat it, juice it, and mix it into cocktails. And when it’s in season, it’s all from Louisiana.”
- “Known as where all of our produce goes to die!”
- MORE CHAMPAGNE, RANDOM BOTTLES OF WATER
Q & A
What’s the story with that little dish of coffee beans in your fridge? Kristen Essig: Whenever we have something in our fridge that is kind of smelly, I leave a little bowl of coffee beans. They will pull odors in.
Tap water or bottled water? KE: I drink tap water and Michael doesn’t. Although sometimes I refill the bottles with tap—don’t tell Michael!
What is Southern-style cooking to you? KE: Southern-style cooking is so many things, but most important, it’s a commitment to using ingredients that are regionally grown, to honor the people and cultures that grew, foraged, or created classic recipes, and making sure that we honor those traditions by educating our staff with their origins so that we can inspire and encourage young cooks to carry these recipes into the future. There is no way to say what Southern cooking is without looking back to the lives of the people who created it.
What is your favorite food when coming home from a long day at work? KE: Popcorn. Michael Stoltzfus: Egg sandwich.
What do you cook for each other? KE: Michael is great at making delicious “brothy” soups for us to enjoy throughout the week.
What do you always have in your fridge? MS: Eggs, kimchi, leftovers, orange juice, sparkling water, and Champagne.
How about cheese? KE: Our favorites are Harbison, Mt Tam, and Gruyère.
Who does the food shopping in your house? MS: We both shop as needed, but we do a lot of “shopping” from the restaurant. We like to bring home whatever produce looks especially beautiful, fresh eggs, or braised short ribs. And the housemade ciabatta. Meals at home are really centered on lots of rice and eggs with whatever extras we bring home from the restaurant.
What is in your freezer? KE: Almost always Martin’s potato rolls, frozen steamed buns for quick sandwiches, and ice, lots of ice. We really don’t keep much food in the freezer. It’s mostly just ice storage.
Did you make those preserved lemons? KE: Yes, they are my favorite things right now. They are great to keep on hand for marinades, vinaigrettes, or chopped up to mix into salads and rice. They are super easy to make too: just mix together quartered lemons with three parts salt and one part sugar, a fresh bay leaf, crushed pink peppercorns, and a cinnamon stick. Then pack them tightly into a jar and cover with lemon juice and let them sit for at least a week in the fridge.