5 Questions with Chef Adam Keough

Adam Keough is the executive chef of Hayes Valley mainstay Absinthe Brasserie & Bar. Find out Adam’s favorite in-house cocktail, plus what he’d need to survive on a deserted island.

1. What is your favorite cocktail on the Absinthe menu?

21 Hayes – made with gin, cucumber, Pimm’s, lemon, sugar, cucumber slice, and onion.

2. What is your favorite meal of the day to prepare for friends and family, and what are a few items you’d include in this meal?

Early Sunday Dinner:  I love to prepare a large cuts of meat roasted whole such as herb roasted chicken, leg of lamb or beef roast and do a platter of different vegetables with different preparations. Some glazed, roasted or marinated. I like to have a variety of vegetables to add interesting flavors and textures. I always tie everything together with a bold/aromatic meat sauce made with the drippings from the roast.

3. If you were marooned on a deserted island for a week, what five ingredients would you need to get by? (Let’s assume that a refrigerator and a stove were magically stranded with you.)

Evo, salt, pork, rice, asparagus.

4. Where would you tell a tourist to go get the absolute best view that says “this is San Francisco”?

I like the view from Crissy Field.

5. If Anthony Bourdain redid his episode of The Layover: San Francisco and popped by Absinthe, what dish would you hope he ate?

Probably the homemade garlic pretzels, onion soup, and Coq au Vin.

Photo credit: Absinthe Brasserie &  Bar

Emilia Varshavsky grew up in the Bay Area and studied English and International Relations at UC Davis. While in college, she planned concerts and hung out with rappers and rock stars. Nowadays, Emilia spends her 9-to-5 time working as an internal communications manager for a big Internet company and her free time blogging, attempting yoga, and creating failed "shortcuts" of Muni routes.