DanDan Dishes Up Chinese Food with a Midwest Influence
Top Chef contestant Dan Jacobs and partner Dan Van Rite mine their childhood memories for comforting flavors at their beloved Milwaukee restaurant.
Welcome to the weekend! If you’ve been obsessed with Top Chef: Wisconsin like us, you’ve taken notice of Milwaukee chef Dan Jacobs. Last week, he won the Supper Club challenge and on Wednesday’s episode he was again leading the pack, finishing in the top four. For this issue, we talked to Jacobs about his Milwaukee restaurants DanDan and EsterEv as well as his experience representing Wisconsin on Top Chef. Here’s everything you’ll find in this week’s newsletter.
Cover Story: Dan Jacobs of Milwaukee’s DanDan is competing on Top Chef: Wisconsin. At his restaurant, he and his partner cook the American-Chinese classics they grew up eating.
The Order: At Pedrin's Dairy Bar in North Adams, Massachusetts, the “fish fry” is a sight to behold.
Weekend Getaway: Download your copy of our Field Guide to Nashville! This 42-page dining guide is formatted for your phone and includes a curated four-day itinerary with 30+ recommendations for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and drinks.
Weekend Reading: The breweries to know right now, the best barbecue in Houston, and how to make White Limozeen’s summery Anti Hero cocktail.
American-Chinese Classics Meet the Midwest
MILWAUKEE, WIS. — When we saw that local chef Dan Jacobs was tapped for the current season of Top Chef, we were excited. It’s always fun to get to watch a season unfold through the eyes of a local (like Freight House’s Sara Bradley on the Kentucky season and Jun’s Evelyn Garcia on the Houston one), and we knew it would give us an excuse to return to Milwaukee for dinner at DanDan, the restaurant Jacobs and partner Dan Van Rite opened in 2016. There, the two Midwesterners cook the American-Chinese classics that they (and many of us) grew up eating and remember fondly — crab rangoon, General Tso’s, dumplings, fried rice — while pulling in influences from their chef careers and from the region to offer compelling takes on the cuisine.
“For me, Chinese food is a childhood memory,” Jacobs says. “That’s what we’re trying to portray. As a kid growing up in Chicago, we ate at Chinese restaurants for every major life event, like when people were having Christmas and we weren’t, graduations, and birthdays. There was a neighborhood place we went to all the time, and it reminds me of such happy times of being a kid. Food and hospitality is about making people happy, and if this makes me happy, I could use this as a vehicle for making others happy. That’s always been our driving force behind DanDan.”
The menu includes dim sum, dumplings, noodles and rice dishes, and house specialties, like lightly battered and fried cauliflower florets dressed with gingery General Tso’s sauce and tossed with bok choy. The signature DanDan noodles, with ground pork, peanuts, cilantro, and mustard greens, are on every table, as are the scallion pancakes with housemade hoisin sauce and Sichuan chile butter to spread on top. There’s a cocktail list, but all this food goes perfectly with a refreshing Spotted Cow, the signature farmhouse ale from New Glarus Brewing.
The spicy Sichuan pork dumplings, which come basking in a heady sauce of chile oil and black vinegar under a shower of cilantro, scallions, and fried shallots, are a standout. “Dan and I spent a lot of time in Flushing eating a lot of Chinese food, but the pork dumplings specifically are something we kept going back to,” Jacobs says. “They had this hot, spicy, oily, Sichuan-y flavor and it was like, man, we have to find a way to nail that. Every chef de cuisine we’ve ever had at DanDan has put their own spin on the menu a little bit, but that’s one that hasn’t changed whatsoever since the beginning.”
Crab rangoon is a personal favorite of mine, and DanDan’s version, large pockets served with a sweet and sour sauce, is great. “We use Organic Valley cream cheese for something local,” Jacobs says. “Then we use real crab. At the beginning, there was Dungeness crab but it made them so expensive. Right now we’re using cold water red crab from Alaska.”
DanDan has become very popular with locals, and it comes up repeatedly each time we’re in town. “I feel like having a restaurant is 70 percent super hard work and 30 percent being lucky,” Jacobs says. “We got a little lucky where it was the right time, right place, the right thing people were looking for. We’ll be open eight years this year but I’d say three years ago it felt like we were becoming a cornerstone Milwaukee restaurant, where you go to Milwaukee, and you’ve got to go to DanDan along with Lake Park Bistro or Mader’s. The restaurant community is amazing. It’s like nothing else I’ve ever experienced, the camaraderie. We’re lucky to have that kind of support in our community.”
Jacobs and Van Rite also run EsterEv, a fine dining spot that has earned them five semi-finalist nods for the James Beard award for Best Chef Midwest. This year, they are finalists in the category (last year, another chef duo, Itaru Nagano and Andrew Kroeger of the great Madison, Wisconsin restaurant Fairchild won that award). EsterEv operated out of DanDan since opening in 2016: “We were doing a 10-course tasting menu for 20 people a night on two four-foot tables with no heating element outside of a two-burner induction burner,” Jacobs says. “We had to run over to the DanDan line to use that equipment while they were in the middle of service.”
This spring, they relocated EsterEv to its own space, which Jacobs and his wife, artist Kate Riley, designed. “We wanted it to feel warm and cozy and playful,” he says. The larger kitchen will give the chefs a chance to evolve the concept. “We switched to a prix fixe menu where we’re doing four courses and choices in each. We’re also doing extra enhancements, like caviar tater tots and a Wisconsin-focused cheese course. We’ll be able to do things more a la minute and grill on a wood grill. There’s a lot of fun stuff we’ll be able to do.”
Jacobs and Van Rite, who have been cooking partners for nine years, will split up the duties between the restaurants. “Dan is going to spend most of his time at DanDan and I’m going to spend most of my time at EsterEv,” Jacobs says. “This is the first time we’ve really split ourselves up.” The partnership works so well, Jacobs says, “because of who we are and our dynamic and how we’ve grown together the last nine years. It’s very similar to a marriage. It takes work, as any relationship takes work. Me and Dan, we don't go to bed angry with each other. We don’t fight. It’s a collaborative effort. And to tell you the truth, two minds always work better than one.”
In the 13 years he’s lived in Milwaukee, Jacobs has seen the dining scene take off. And it’s a landscape that’s heavily driven by owner-operated restaurants. “Every one of these restaurants you hear about that are on the top of Milwaukee lists, the owner is involved in the daily operation of the restaurant,” he says. “You don’t see many chains. Even Paul Bartolotta is around all the time. He’s everywhere. I think that’s really the driving force — there’s a level of care and hospitality that’s given across the board and it’s so much fun to see.”
Jacobs’ love of Milwaukee clearly comes through on Top Chef. “I can’t tell you how much gratitude I feel to be the chef representing not just the city of Milwaukee but the state of Wisconsin on Top Chef,” Jacobs says. “I tried to give an honest look at what a Midwestern person is and what our food can be and how awesome I think we are. Milwaukee is so cool we don’t know we’re cool yet. That’s how I wanted people to see us. With the other chefs, when we were driving around, I was pointing out places like their tour guide. I’m proud of what we do here.”
360 E Erie St, Milwaukee, WI 53202 | @dandanmke
“Home of the Fish Fry”
NORTH ADAMS, MASS. — Last May, I wanted to spend my birthday at Tourists in the Berkshires (this was a great idea!), and while the food at the property was good, we also did some culinary exploring in the area. For lunch one day, we went to Pedrin’s Dairy Bar, a casual spot that’s open seasonally (all seating is outside at picnic tables) for well-made versions of road food and seafood shack classics.
We ordered a selection of things — an herby tuna melt topped with a pickle chip, whole fried clams, overly mayonnaise-y coleslaw (my favorite kind), a towering pile of delicate onion rings, and the “fish fry.” This is not what you would envision (I know you are envisioning fish and chips). Instead this is a long flaky white fish fillet that’s fried and served in a hot dog bun. You can spread tartar sauce over the top. It’s absurd. It’s tasty. It’s the reason why Pedrin’s slogan is “Home of the Fish Fry.”
1360 Curran Hwy, North Adams, MA 01247
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BREWERY ROUNDUP
Pour Me A Cold One: At Punch, Courtney Iseman has put together a list of the 10 breweries to know right now. In Chicago, we are big fans of the traditional brews at Dovetail, so that bodes well for the rest of this list.
TEXAS
Smoke ’Em if You Got ’Em: We are equal opportunity diners when it comes to regional barbecue styles, but, like a lot of folks, if I had to pick I’m partial to Texas. Writing for the April issue of Bon Appétit, Kayla Stewart shares a list of the eight best barbecue spots in Houston. Amy is certainly the resident Texas Barbecue Expert at the American Weekender Home Office, but I’ve always enjoyed Truth BBQ and look forward to my next trip to the Lone Star State.
TENNESSEE
Nashville is So Hot Right Now: Regular readers of American Weekender met Demi Natoli earlier this month when we interviewed the White Limozeen bar director about the cocktail menu at the over-the-top hotel bar in Nashville. We were happy to see she was also featured in Garden & Gun, where Wayne Curtis wrote about one of her cocktails, the Anti Hero. It’s a summer sipper spiked with strawberries and Campari, a favorite flavor combo of ours for cocktails. If you can’t get to Nashville, here’s how to make it yourself. Cheers!
— Compiled by Kenney Marlatt
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So cool! As a Top Chef fan I feel like we’re just starting to learn more about Dan’s food since so much of his screen time is about his apparent love for Wisconsin! Can’t wait to see how this passion for Chinese cuisine makes its way on screen! DanDan looks yummy! 😍