Chef Ben Ford, we are at your new Ford's Filling Station at the JW Marriott LA Live Downtown LA. I'm so excited to be here. Your new place.

Yeah. This is a really exciting, actually, first week, so you're getting in really early. And uh, you know, some fresh digs for us after about 10 years of doing this, so I'm really happy.

This is your eighth restaurant now?

Um, this is, this is the my eighth opening. This is the fourth restaurant that I've owned. Yeah. And so we are, you know, all of them have been uh, unique experiences and all great in very different ways, you know. So, I miss I miss all of them.

Are they like your babies?

Yeah, but they all were stepping stones, you know, to to where we are today. So they were, they were meant to do what they did at the time and, and where we're supposed to be right now.

Well, that's amazing. Okay, let's hit your kitchen and start cooking.

Yeah. Okay. This is where the magic happens.

Yes, it does. And I've got one of these for you. I get a real apron?

Yeah, we're going to protect that dress of yours just a little bit.

Okay, let's do it.

Okay. There we go. I'm going in. This is what happens when you're a chef at Ford's Filling Station. We're going to saute a little bit of the veg up here. We have a really nice little subie that we've made already.

What's subie?

Subie. Subie is a uh, onion slow cooked in a little bit of butter. We've got some celery root and some apples in there. and that we pureed. And that's going to be our base for the for the actual pork dish. Okay. We're going to add some fennel. And throw some apples in there.

What is that?

Butternut squash.

Butternut squash. And then these are my favorite.

Yeah, we'll build brussel sprouts.

Love it. Okay.

Just going to saute. Season it with a little salt.

Salt. The good salt.

Just going to let that get a little bit of nice color. Okay. While we're doing that, we're going to plate up the rest of our dish. We're going to take a little bit of this great looking apple, celery root, onion subie. Move that on there. We're going to smear and create a base.

Okay. The smear thing, is that the signature of a good chef?

The smear? Yeah, you know, at least it's trending. I would say it's trending. We're going to plate our pork chop. Right over there. Look at our veg.

Is there a name for this dish?

Uh, this would be the smoked pork chop dish. This is just a reduction of red wine and pork. Cuz every time you come to a Ford's Filling Station, the chef comes down and cuts your meat for you. Give that a little turn. Okay. That with a little. Yeah. Just dress it up a bit. Solid.

Okay, so before I finish this entire meal,

Yeah, we have a little something left to do. I mentioned we want to do a lentil salad for you. Yes. So, a beluga lentil salad. A little special. Something we've been doing for a while but it's really good. This is a really nice salad bar. When I come over here and I and I and I look at my collection of ingredients, that's what I call my paints. In this case, we're going to have some beluga lentils. These have already been marinated just a little bit. They have a little bit of roasted garlic in there and they have a little bit of uh, fennel. So we're going to start. We have a little bit of sherry vinegar. Okay. It's just going to marinate the lentils just a little bit. Okay. We have our frize. Frize is part of the chickory family. This is the little nice little tender insides that we have. Don't call it lettuce. This is my favorite part. These are the candy pecans.

Yum. Yum yum yum. And there. Don't tell me you candy the pecans yourself.

We do. Of course he does. So I'm going to put a little bit of curry oil in here. Okay. This is going to give it a nice essence.

Never used that before. Curry oil?

We make that here too. So we're going to take a little bit of goat cheese.

Yum.

Put that on top as well. Some micro rugula. And a little mirror of curry oil. just trying to show the dish a little bit. Pretty. There we go. Our beluga lentil salad. Really pretty. Really delicious. Lots of flavor. Very light, very good for you.

Love it. Just dig in. Yeah. This is okay, right? There you go. Get the curry out of there just a little bit. And the tomato like popped in your mouth. Yeah. Perfect. Delicious. Well, you eat all of this good food to enjoy it. Celebratory. Got to have cocktails and desserts, right?

That's right, actually. You got a great dessert that I want to show you. And we've got some great piece of New York sour that we're working on right now. that's My hometown. We can test out, make sure that it's uh, servable to our guests.

May I join you?

One second. Let's do it. Okay. All right. After you.

Thank you. Okay, so, from eating to drinking. Okay.

Yes. Completely. We have a wonderful bar program that's been set up by Danny Duschan, who actually started in New York in a place called Employee's Only. So he's coming in here, he's helping us with our bar program. So I'm going to let you try a couple of things.

Great. Looks like I got the cocktail in front of me.

You did get the cocktail. So should I stir this? Mmm. Or it looks really I can do spirits if you like this. Okay. Oh, mama. Yeah, that good bourbon. So, you know, the kitchen has secrets. The bar has secrets. Well, cheers to

Cheers.

secrets. Thank you. Ford's Filling Station is not a secret anymore. No, thank you.