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Forbes Topline

Blanca’s Revival: The Hidden 12-Seat Restaurant Reimagining Fine Dining | Forbes

Forbes Topline

Forbes

Business News, News, Entrepreneurship, Business

4.86 Ratings

🗓️ 25 September 2024

⏱️ 31 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

After her celebrated run at Mena in Tribeca, Chef Victoria Blamey has returned to New York’s culinary scene, taking the helm at Blanca in Brooklyn—a restaurant revered for its daring tasting menu and intimate 12-seat setting. With support from Carlo Mirarchi, Blanca’s original founder, Blamey brings her inventive, globe-trotting techniques and Chilean heritage to a new chapter at the once Michelin-starred gem. Set behind Bushwick’s famed Roberta’s, Blanca offers an immersive, nearly three-hour culinary journey that pushes the boundaries of fine dining. Each course showcases Blamey’s meticulous attention to detail. The menu doesn’t reveal how much work each course entails; that the fermentation process takes days; that before the end of an evening’s service Blamey is preparing dough which needs 19 hours to process; that the spinach leaves take hours to press and wrap; there are shells to shuck; the Donabe rice pot has to be continuously stirred; and a wood oven outside needs regular attention. Beyond the kitchen, Blanca’s experience is enhanced by an extensive natural wine list and music as eclectic as the food. Executive Chef Victoria Blamey and Chef and Co-owner Carlo Mirarchi sit down with Forbes editor Maggie McGrath to discuss Blanca’s revival, their creative process, and what’s next for the iconic restaurant. Read more on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinwolfe/2024/01/26/stars-have-aligned-chef-victoria-blamey--blanca-in-brooklyn-are-reborn/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Blanka is one of New York City's most exciting dining destinations. This 12-seat intimate restaurant is tucked

0:15.9

away behind Roberta's in Bushwick and it has been earning rave reviews from

0:20.7

food media and diners alike.

0:23.0

It was recently named the number two restaurant in all of New York City

0:27.0

by the New York Times.

0:28.0

And we are here with Executive Chef Victoria Blamey

0:32.0

and Chef and co-owner Carlo Maracci.

0:35.0

Thank you both so much for sitting down with Forbes.

0:38.0

Thanks for having us.

0:39.0

So Carlo, let's go back to the beginning of Blanca.

0:42.0

This opened in 2012. What was your vision at the time?

0:46.9

And how has that changed for the 2024 iteration?

0:50.8

So Blanca had started initially as a tasting menu I was doing inside of

0:57.2

Roberta's. Chef David Ken, she was kind of a mentor and a very good friend of

1:01.3

mine had come into the restaurant and I just sort of threw together a menu for him.

1:07.0

And he started telling people that he was friends with and other chefs and stuff that they should come in and try just having a menu at

1:15.3

Robertis and that ended up becoming popular thank God and we decided that it made sense to expand that into its own restaurant.

1:27.0

So that's how Blount started.

1:29.1

And of course, like so many other restaurants, March 2020 happens,

1:33.4

COVID happens, shut downs happen,

1:35.4

Blanca closed and then reopened four years later.

1:40.0

Take me back to March 2020.

...

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