Out of the Ordinary

by Kelli Colaco

photos by Audrey Ma

SOCAL NATIVE MICHAEL BECKMAN, Executive Chef of Workshop Kitchen + Bar in Palm Springs (with sister venue to open in LA any moment now) is a poet and storyteller.This is vibrantly apparent in his jaw-dropping sculptural venues and fresh-enigmatic menus.

While studying English Literature at San Francisco State, Beckman wrote copious amounts of poetry and prose in his free time. While working as a dishwasher at the university to make ends meet, the chef asked Michael to fill in as a prep cook. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Not long after graduating from SFS Michael took the deep dive into proper culinary training and attended Paul Bocuse Institute in Lyon, France. Work at Maison

Lameloise in Chagny, France, and The Ritz Carlton in Berlin followed. Chef Beckman credits his six years working and living in France, Switzerland, and Germany as the experience that carved much of who he is as a chef and human being. On the cusp of Beckman and his team opening a second Workshop Kitchen + Bar in LA, as a nod to Beckman’s penchant for prose and poetry, we decided to take a cue from him and offer something out of the ordinary. The following is Chef Beckman’s content from our Q&A broken down in the form of prose poetry.

Braising Liquid

a prose poem with Michael Beckman

At the Paul Bocuse Institute What I remember most a class with 30 different nationalities people from all over We learned from each other each other’s culture A communal kitchen Indians firing up curries Chefs Israeli and Lebanese No conflict between cultures food brought us and kept us together That was really powerful powerful for me. The markets in Lyon, amazing Tasting the saucisson… A city in touch with food. And its history. Six years is a nice long time to live somewhere After five, most folks don’t make it back. My last few years, I was in Berlin I started to miss the sun. Just too far north for me. I’m a California native But my love of travel distilling all the information

sources of creativity unified style composing a menu cooking over wood working with the farmer’s markets That’s what’s really me. Workshop Kitchen + Bar opened in Palm Springs 2013 2022, soon LA my role is all whole concept & development build-out, build in team Our two venues two ateliers echo one another Two ‘workshops’ both alike in dignity related, but not identical. like siblings fair-faced concrete fair-faced concrete sculptural dramatic from rectangular booths to towering cocoons progressive chef counter-middle of the action

menus reflecting one another house braised oxtail roasted creminis stuffed with chuck braising liquid braising liquid truffle mayonnaise, caramelized onions topped with five grams fresh truffles truffles truffles most popular dish octopus carpaccio log topped pickled cauliflower, roasted peppers then Espellete when do we open? million dollar question. for young guns, young cheffy ones without brick and mortar they can pop up at our workshop to build their future As far as The Chefs’ Warehouse been working with since late 2005 always there and on target I’m especially fond of their ‘farmers market.’