Mark Welker – Set Goals and Make Them Happen

Which country is best for chefs?

I think there are so many locations, especially with the 50 best restaurants list out there, they highlight so many different restaurants from all over the world and so many of these restaurants have different philosophies. So if you want to focus on fermentation and foraging and things like that, there are restaurants out there that specialize in that, like, you know, a lot of the Nordic restaurants. I think some of the restaurants in Brazil and South America really do well with fermentation. If you're interested in Mexican cuisine and Mexican spices, then you should probably travel south of the border. I think that there are restaurants all over the world at this point time, and it doesn’t need to be a Michelin star restaurant. If you're passionate about Thai food and you want to learn about Thai ingredients, then just go travel through Thailand. Go eat on the streets. Go to the markets, go to the wet markets, have an Airbnb, get the ingredients and cook. As long as you're setting yourself goals. timelines, and pushing to meet those goals with a mindset of coming back and actually using what you've learned to better yourself and to further your career.

Which savory ingredients could be added to sweets?

In the realm of things being fermented, different koji inoculating with different things, using different homemade vinegars is a big one that really can help desserts a lot, like using kombucha techniques to make a tea. Kind of like make a fermented tea and then use that to season things.I kind of think that's like the best. I'm not into using bacon, you know, or different meat products. I'm not really into even vegetables outside of squash or carrot. Like, I really don't want to. I'm not I'm just not a big fan of that kind of stuff. We use a lot of vinegar for brightness. And again, it kind of lower the sweetness of the dessert.

What is Mark Welker's apple pie recipe?

I would look at the apples first that I chose to make the pie and when I make an apple pie, I think of the different textures inside of apple pie. And I don't like it to all be one texture. So I think that I would choose maybe three different varieties of apples. That's where I would start, I would pick my favorite apples. And you'd want an apple that's going to be very firm and hold up the cooking while one that's going to have different make sweetness or acidity notes as well. You want one that kind of falls apart, they can kind of like bind it all together. But again, not having like too much moisture. And I think then there are different ways to deal with that if an apple has too much moisture. What I would do is give it a little sugar in my Calvados treatment or pick the core of your choice, rum or it could be bourbon, it could be anything you really want it to be. But I would add a little bit to the apples and I would let them soak and macerate overnight and then I would drain them, and then really kind of like get all that liquid out of it and then maybe even make a caramel with all that juice and sugar that's leftover and then kind of just lay it on the inside.