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Meet Ryann Class of 2014

• All State pitcher, led team to state softball final

• National Honor Society

• Cheer captain

• Incoming freshman, University of Oklahoma

Favorite neighborhood restaurant?

We love Latin Deli. The Lomo Saltado sandwich, Cuban sandwich, red chicken salad. It is a staple for my wife, Carolyn, and me. Our place. We’ll go there all the time.

Cooking shows. Do you watch them? I used to when they were about food. The shows now are not teaching. They are about celebrities now. If I had to watch, it would be ‘Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives’ because I like hearing the guys in the diner talk about their food, their waffles and ice cream, comfort food. And don’t get me started on Paula Deen, who’s diabetic and telling people to eat blubber

The ones where they are screaming? That’s not a good method of teaching? No. Those upset me the most. Just perpetuating a stereotype. Yeah, it’s a hot environment and busy and frustrating, and tempers can flare, but usually when someone is reacting like that it is be- cause they are blaming themselves for something, seeing themselves in the guy they’re yelling at. The walk-in [the big refrigerator in a restaurant] is a great place for a reprimand for someone who needs his butt kicked, but in public, that’s where you compliment.

What country would you travel to just for the food?

Peru. Lima is a hotspot. I want to get there and try the markets, restaurants, see what’s happening at the farm.

Family/friends are coming for dinner without much notice — what do you make them?

It’s mostly going to be what I have in my refrigerator. But I do have a lot of food here in the two refrigerators — I’ve got a fridge out back filled with ingredients for work recipes. But maybe I make smoked-brisket burritos; there’s always something fun you can throw together. If I know they like something specifically, I’ll make that, even if I have to run up to the store.

Do you entertain at home a lot?

No, but we did have my daughter’s wedding here.

What did you serve there?

It was very eclectic — we had vegetarian food, Mediterranean, shrimp, short ribs the band played in the corner. The wedding cake was a cupcake wedding tier cake that I did not make. It was very good.

Where was the cake from?

Crème De La Cookie. It’s in Preston-Royal and Snider Plaza.

Ever had to cook for someone important who made you nervous?

I have cooked for two presidents and was part of a team that cooked for Queen Elizabeth. I’ve cooked for Bill Cosby, Ted Turner, Jane Fonda almost all of Congress when I was in D.C., but really, they are not the ones who are important, really, to me. The people who I most want to impress is, say, the couple who appre- ciates food, who worked hard, saved up, because they want to go have this one really special meal. They are all important, but that is the most important. I look at it, every single time someone walks into a restaurant, that I don’t know what’s going on in their life, and meals are a covenant. As restaurateurs we should be giving the best quality food and the best service. Making sure this person has the most awesome time. When people go into the restaurant they should only have to make two decisions. What am I drinking? What am I eating? Anytime you involve them in any other part of the process — do you need me to move this plate? Or they have to get the waiter’s attention for another drink — that’s a failure to me.

What presidents, and what did you serve the presidents and the queen?

There was Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan — I served Reagan a bomb. Haha. An ice cream bomb. That is when I was the pastry chef at Ritz. Also, I had to taste it before he could eat it. The Secret Service said, “Did you make this?” And I said, “Yes.” And they said, “We need you to taste it.” Jimmy Carter, that was for a dinner to raise money for Habitat for Humanity when I was in Atlanta — I cooked alongside Alice Waters and Stephan Pyles. And Queen Elizabeth, I was part of a big team of chefs with Dean Fearing. I really don’t remember the exact meal. I do remember Bill Cosby dragging a bartender into the kitchen to show her how to make a proper cappuccino.

Chef or mentor whom you would want to cook for you (alive or not)?

Probably Ferran Adrià. He is a Spanish chef and the father of molecular gastronomy and innovative cooking.

Cooking disasters you care to confess?

Oh, there are a lot. I mean, most great things happen because no one would think of it, and a lot of times getting to the point of the brilliant idea, you wind up with a lot of bad tastes. There was a rosemary chicken — it would have been fine but it was cooked in air in altitude and that made the rosemary stronger, and when it came out, it was medicinal. All good food is science and art and a certain amount of technology. Stand at the center and some crazy great stuff comes of that. Perfecting a sauce can take six months, and it’s as simple as adding a small percent each day until you find it can’t get any better. It is a misnomer that baking is precise and cooking is not precise; everything is a ratio.

What is the perfect ratio of a sandwich?

In a good sandwich, everything is properly rationed by weight. Ratio of the burger to the bun to the crunchy goodies like the lettuce and fresh things, to the sauce, to the cheese. That proper ratio, when it’s met, is really good. When it’s not, it’s an OK burger or sandwich. It has to do with everything — the texture of the bun, all the way in. Precision. Ideally you don’t use volume measurements at all; everything, almost everything, would be by weight.

—Christina Hughes Babb