Tucson architect Leo Katz has designed custom homes throughout the southwest, but it is his love of food that is the foundation for gatherings with family and friends.
“It is family and comfort and memories. Food holds a lot of memories and nostalgia for people. I don’t know if it’s genetic, but all my sisters — my oldest sister isn’t a great cook, but everyone else is. I think it’s the passion of loving to eat. You can ask my wife, I get more excited about food than just about anything.”
He is well-known in his circle of friends for planning elaborate meals, and he has conveyed his passion for cooking onto his son who graduated from the Culinary Institute of America near Napa, California.
Growing up in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Katz was the youngest of four children and the only boy. He was raised by a single mother who stirred his interest in cooking.
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“My mom was an amazing cook. I was in the kitchen with her all the time, and loving to eat inspired me,” Katz said. “I loved hanging out with her and her being there for me. You know, cooking is synonymous with family. And so that’s really how I sort of brought up our kids, too. My wife and I spend a lot of time in the kitchen.”
You are an architect by profession, but you cook elaborate meals for friends. How did you get into cooking?
A: “The two would be my two personas, I guess. I always had a passion for cooking. I sort of grew up in my mom’s kitchen, and I tried it for the while. I did a lot of my professional cooking in my 20s. I lived in Santa Fe in the late 1980s. I cooked at nicer restaurants there and a couple of not-so-nice restaurants.”
Why didn’t you stick with cooking?
A: “I don’t know if it was the ’70s or the lifestyle of a cook, getting in at 3 in the afternoon and working until 3 in the morning and sleeping until going to work the next day, but I went into construction, then went back to it until my late 20s, then went into architecture. I’m the cook in the family. I have a passion for cooking, and we do a lot of entertaining and a lot of that training kicks in.”
What have you learned from your son, the chef?
A: “He loves pasta, so I learned how to make handmade pasta from him. I had my standards (recipes) that I always used to do, but really his interest piques my desire to learn more and try more and experiment and learn new techniques. That’s probably what I learned from him. We will talk recipes and ingredients and where to source food and where to find new inspiration. That’s really what I get from him.”
What is the most important thing to remember when cooking holiday meals for guests?
A: “For a holiday meal, it’s really timing. That’s the biggest part of it. It’s always the classic question, how big is your turkey and how long does it have to be on. That’s always the big challenge for me. You figure you have six hours to cook your turkey and when do you start all the different dishes? I will write it out and do a whole meal plan, figure out what courses I am going to have; figure out what the most demanding part of it is going to be. Choosing your courses, planning the sequence of what you are going to serve and when things need to be fired up and prepping the day before so you have everything ready to go. It’s like painting a house. Ninety percent of it is prep, like taping the walls and spackling and getting everything cleaned up and ready to go and everything together, and painting is the quick part. In a lot of ways cooking is the same. Planning and prepping is the hardest part.”
Do you have any tips or suggestions for people who don’t have a lot of experience feeding big groups?
A: “What’s really great is sort of one dish that kind of is the whole meal that you really can build around. Like, tomorrow night it’s my mother-in-law’s birthday. Her favorite thing is brisket. The slow-cooked brisket, that type of meal has everything in it. You roast the potatoes in it and the carrots and celery and the sauce, it’s an all in one. You have a big all-in-one meal that doesn’t take a lot of planning, and you can really just put it in the oven. I’d say the same thing, a big stew, a big pot of posole. That covers a lot of ground. As far as everything that goes with it, you can have salads and everything else. That would be a good place to start for someone who doesn’t have a lot of experience.”
Do you have a favorite dish?
A: “My mom had this great recipe. and it was sort of a throwback to, not a traditional Mexican dish, but sort of a casserole kind of Betty Crocker meets Mexican food, and so she always made it after Thanksgiving. It was Green Chile Turkey Enchiladas. It was green chile, but then she would use Campbell’s Cream of Chicken and Cream of Mushroom soup. She would mix in green chile and onions and garlic … and she would put it together and use it as a sauce over enchiladas that were stuffed with turkey. That for me is the ultimate.”
