Chef Jared Cook has been enduring some sleepless nights, and when he finally does doze off, he’s dreaming about one critical culinary concoction: dough.
“Figuring out the process of making pizza dough is keeping me up at night,” Cook admitted.
“That’s what makes great pizza—the dough has to be perfect.”
Cook is a perfectionist in everything he does, whether it’s playing a round of golf or playing around with the perfect dough recipe.
It’s that dedication to his craft that makes Cook the perfect executive chef and partner of five feted OC restaurants: Vine in San Clemente, Ironwood in Laguna Hills, Olea in Newport Beach, Sapphire in Laguna Beach, and, most recently, Bloom in San Juan Capistrano.
Cook is one of the partners at San Clemente-based RJB Restaurant Group, whose founder, Russ Bendel, in 2018 earned the Business Journal’s nod as Restaurateur of the Year.
Cook has earned his own spotlight for his work at some of Orange County’s best-known, and respected, upscale restaurants.
He’s the Business Journal’s selection as Chef of the Year for 2024.
Parlor’s Gain
In addition to the five restaurants that Cook oversees, a sixth restaurant is in the works: Parlor, Wood Fire Kitchen & Cocktails.
The restaurant will be in San Clemente, not far from Vine, which sits along El Camino Real, in the heart of the city’s main downtown area.
Parlor is scheduled to open later this year, taking the spot of Brick restaurant.
Don’t expect a repeat of Vine, or any others in the RJB portfolio: the concept for Parlor—pizzas and pastas—is much different than any of the other restaurants.
“I’m excited about it,” said Cook, whose last name certainly fits his profession.
“We have other restaurants where we do pasta, but the pizza is a whole new thing which makes it fun for me. Everyone loves pizza. We’re going to do a new American pizza parlor take on it. It will be very much our style, but unlike anything else. I think we are going to turn out something new and exciting.”
Julia’s Influence
Cook has been passionate about the culinary arts ever since he was a kid growing up in Oregon. He started cooking with his mom once he could reach the stove. He spent hours watching cooking shows, especially anything featuring famed chef and author Julia Child.
“As a kid, Julia Child was a huge influence on me,” Cook confirmed.
“I have a tattoo of her on my arm, and my daughter’s name is Julia. The other show I watched was “Great Chefs of the World,” and the early days of the Food Network with Emeril Lagasse, Bobby Flay, all those guys before they made it big.”
As he got older, his love for cooking expanded to a love for the dining experience.
“I loved everything about food service and being in a restaurant, whether it was nice or not. It’s always been a huge passion. I never considered doing anything else.”
Cook gave in to his passion and attended culinary school in Portland before moving to Orange County.
He did an internship at French 75 in Laguna Beach, now Selanne Steak Tavern, which he deemed “incredible.”
“We were so busy—the kitchen was tiny, and we were doing 400 covers out of that restaurant on a Friday and Saturday. In its heyday they were the gold standard.”
From there Cook went to Vine restaurant in San Clemente, owned at that time by Justin Monson. He worked at Vine on and off for several years in between stints at Chat Noir and Crow Bar and Kitchen, where he became executive chef.
Buys & Burgers
Russ Bendel Jr., the son of former Habit Burger Chief Executive Russ Bendel, bought Vine in 2013, the first restaurant in his soon-to-grow empire.
He reached out to Cook and asked him to return to Vine as both the executive chef and a partner.
Once firmly back at Vine, Cook revamped the menu, expanded the offerings and added more casual options.
“We kept some Vine classics that I loved, things that had been on the menu, like the ravioli, or the lamb shank which is now on the menu at Ironwood. Those are Vine classics.”
So is the duck wings dish, a menu staple at most of his restaurants. And then there is the Mexicali burger: American Kobe beef, queso fresco, avocado, chile de arbol crème, sweet onion slaw, and roasted spicy serrano chile, served with hand-cut herb fries.
“That’s everyone’s favorite,” Cook said. “At Bloom we do a double Mexicali burger.”
All his restaurants have a burger on the menu that have different fixings including cheese, lettuce and sauces, but they all use the same perfected blend of American wagyu beef.
“People have tried to sell us another blend, but we always do a blind taste test, and we can tell which is ours. We had an amazing blend, and it took years to find another blend, and that is the one we have now. It went from amazing to even better. We sell more burgers than anything else. When you combine all the restaurants together, the amount is astronomical.”
Cook has a love for the garden and uses organic heirloom vegetables, fruits and herbs harvested from a garden he has at Vine restaurant.
Ironwood, Olea Addition
Once Vine was humming along, Bendel and company opened Ironwood in Laguna Hills, in 2016.
“It was my first time opening a restaurant and we started with a fairly big menu. We learned the menu was way too big, so we scaled it back with dishes that were winners.
Now our focus is consistency, quality, and being able to execute everything at a high level, make it top tier and get it right every time.”
There were a handful of dishes carried over from Vine but Cook said 60% or more of the dishes are unique to Ironwood.
“I try to have the smallest core menu if I can, with a huge emphasis of quality over quantity. We have neighborhood regulars, people that come in multiple times a week, so we have new specials every night. They’re exciting and constantly changing.”
Up next in November 2017 came Olea restaurant in Newport Beach. Again, Cook carried over a core menu but created dishes that were unique to Olea.
Sapphire & Pivot
In March 2020, Bendel closed escrow on Sapphire and got the keys to the Laguna Beach restaurant along Coast Highway, previously run by the acclaimed Chef Azmin Ghahreman, six days before the pandemic forced all restaurants to close their doors.
COVID-19 made Bendel and Cook reset their methods and packaged dishes to go. Cook appreciated that customers loved their food, but he was passionate about the hospitality and the presentation, both missing ingredients in to-go cuisine.
Finally, patio dining was allowed, so Bendel created patios at his other restaurants. Sapphire has always had patio dining, a boon to Bendel during the pandemic.
SJC’s New Concept
In December 2022, with the pandemic starting to wane, Bendel and Cook opened Bloom in San Juan Capistrano, across the street from the city’s Mission.
Because Bloom was so close to their other locations, the menu concept was very different.
“The idea was rustic American but still California coastal, and still within the wine country cuisine theme,” Cook said.
“We looked at demographics and asked people what they wanted to see on the menu. People mentioned meatloaf. So, we put meatloaf on the menu. I thought it would be a lower-selling item, more comfort food, but all of a sudden after two or three weeks it was the No. 1 item. I looked at last year’s sales, and meatloaf was No. 1.
“I called it the meatloaf factory. I could not keep up with production. We were making absurd amounts of it.”
New Role
Cook’s job description has changed over the year. He still gets in the kitchens and cooks, but he also does a lot of teaching and managing in addition to menu creation.
“He was the guy in the kitchen making 50% of the food that came out, now he’s slowly made the transition to teaching, coaching, checking in, observing, making sure people are following processes, keeping standards to where every chef at every restaurant is a carbon copy of Jared,” Bendel said.
“I have sous chefs at each location, I guide them in the right direction,” Cook said.
“Depending on their creativity I want to enable them, support them, help them with special ideas. I still write the menus, but their names are on each location’s menus, not mine. I want each chef to have some ownership of what goes on. The specials are things they come to the table with, that’s the fun part for me now. They come to me with an idea and say what do you think about that. We bounce ideas around.”
Collaborative Partners
Bendel and Cook collaborate on everything, from kitchen processes to menu changes.
“We’re always looking for ways to improve,” Bendel said.
“We’ll line up the menus from all five locations, go through them, see what’s working and what’s not, what are people asking for, what’s harder to execute. We’ll look at costs. Maybe the cost of crabs has gone up three times, so we need to take it off the menu for a while.
“We use his expertise on the culinary side and try and create a good balance between what our vision is and how to execute at a high level,” Bendel said. “There is always a dialogue for what we need to do to keep raising the bar to get better.”
Chef’s Selections
With five restaurants under their umbrella, a sixth under way, and dozens of menu items at RJB Restaurant Group, does Jared Cook have any favorites?
“The Mexicali burger for sure,” Cook stated. “And the duck wings are super cool. And it’s hard to get away from the schnitzel, especially the one at Sapphire.”
Sapphire’s version is crispy duroc pork schnitzel with maitake mushrooms, fried cage free eggs, butternut squash spaetzle, Meyer lemon and tarragon emulsion.
It’s a beautiful dish, packed with flavor. Of course you could say that about every dish on Cook’s menus. With each bite, you can feel Cook’s passion for the profession he grew up loving, thanks in part to his culinary idol, Julia Child.
