Christopher Kostow on Pebble Beach Food & Wine, Michelin stars, love.

Christopher Kostow has to think for a minute about his second favorite Pebble Beach Food and Wine memory. (That was a lunch collaboration with Richard Reddington and Melissa Perello.)

The first one, not so much.

It came with his debut appearance, fresh off Food & Wine's nod as a Best New Chef.

When he took one of his prep chefs for a drink in the bar, a PR rep for Tillamook cheese named Martina sent him one of his own.

Today the two are married and she directs communications for the foodie traveler dreamscape that is Meadowood in Napa, where Kostow has led the restaurant to three Michelin stars six straight years.

Today the pair is readying for Pebble Beach Food & Wine, March 31-April 3, and a brazen new Napa project called Charter Oak, debuting this summer.

Read more about that restaurant in this week's print column. Check out the Weekly's full Q&A with Kostow here.

Weekly: So this is the ninth PBFW. What is most remarkable to you that it’s already been nearly a decade?

Kostow: That I met my wife there. I used to go when it was Masters of Food & Wine. We had such a small staff in those days, I didn’t have many to bring, and had to bring a kid stage-ing [or apprenticing] from England, who now is the head baker at [super-popular S.F. bakery-cafe] Tartine. After the grand tasting I went to the bar to buy him a drink, and she sent over a drink and looked at me with these come-hither eyes. 

She told me a recent tasting for Charter had her head spinning, and she’s budgeting for 10 more pounds before it opens. What will stick from the tasting—I’ve heard talk of things like Cabernet barrel-smoked beef ribs and slow-cooked pork shoulder in wild mustard and sea lettuce?

The whole process is workshopping. We won’t know till we get there. Some of the service elements, some of the table side stuff are things we don’t know how to master yet. It can be easy to sketch out, but you don’t know how people are going to interact with the format and each other, and it’s all in the the minutiae. We want to get that right before we charge people. We’re lucky we have some time to flesh things out. We’re doing food events in New York, Chicago and PBFW with the Charter Oak team so we can test what works.

What’s most surreal about how far food has come in the last decade?

You have a lot of smart people doing a lot of very different things. There’s talent everywhere—fast casual, casual, high end—and a smarter and more dynamic group of people in the industry overall. Smarter people are doing the training, and smarter people are getting trained. But in the end it’s still about doing the work, and sometimes that gets lost in all the dynamism.

Back to PBFW. What has been most fun, rewarding or unique about the Lexus Grand Masters group?

Some of those activiations are fun just because get to hang out with people. It’s nice seeing each other. The brand is obviously a great brand, and the people involved with Lexus are super fun. It all started with Coastal Luxury Management in Carmel, at an event called Harvest [which succeeded TomatoFest]. From there we put together a team idea.

What do people misunderstand about what three stars mean and what they take to achieve?

To achieve them there needs to be some sort of point of view, a singularity in it, and you need to be doing everything well. I don’t say we are doing everything all the time, but we are singular in our point of view, and we execute it really well. Sometimes a fancy place executes really well, but they don’t have a real identity. Or you have a garagiste upstart, where the ideas are great, but the execution isn’t there. You have to put it together, and do both. But it’s also the service, the cocktail program, the wine: You need all of it and it all needs to make sense together. It takes many years to get there.

What do you miss about the early days?

It was more pirate shippy. More emotional. A little more off the cuff. It wasn’t as good, but it was special. We were more like a teenager.

What are you most eager to do with the new Charter Oak concept?

The opportunities to let our team do its thing. Watching [former Meadowood sous chef and Charter Oak Exec Chef] Katiana Hung in our workshops, seeing her grow and create and get better has been, hands-down, the best part.

I like something you said to Carolyn Jung of San Francisco Chronicle about Charter Oak: “I want to start over. People will be shocked at how simple the food is. But no one ever complains that they want more technique or more chefy-ness.”

I want to purchase perfect product, cook it simply and get out of the way. Simplicity is the hardest thing. At Meadowood we have all the requisite artifice and technique and it’s very beautiful. I want to do the antithesis. It’s going to take courage. Not casual, but really simple in its approach.

Can you tease out the difference between casual and simple?

It can be hard to parse. Here’s one way to think about it: We’re working on these great pigs we’re curing and spicing in house. We don’t do charcuterie at Meadowood, but we’re wondering can we figure out best pig with best spice bush? In New York, our team’s doing ham with this great farm we’ve found, grated horseradish and cured butter. That’s our dish. We’re finding if we’re courageous enough to serve stuff that simple.

What do you like most about that property? Any discoveries as you took it over?

The light is amazing. The courtyard and interplay of trees and brick. I was surprised at the condition of the building—or at least the extent of its condition. We’re spending time to make sure it can last several generations.

Fellow Lexus Culinary Master Michael Chiarello, who used to be chef there, said, “It’s like someone marrying your ex-wife—an ex-wife you really like.”

Chiarello’s always good with the quotes.

How do you collaborate with your team to keep things fresh?

We have a lot of things to pull from, our farm, what’s in the root cellar, using lists of what’s happening and in season at that time. We’re incredibly product focused. That’s where it starts: Trying to creat something special out of everything.

How do you spot a poser—whether they’re greenwashing, or spinning how they source, or overdoing the technique?

When you see food that checks all the boxes but doesn’t taste that good.

Your favorite part of the Meadowood garden?

The team there is strong. They’re the most dedicated people in the world. Their work is the most extraordinary about the garden for me.

Your favorite way to find interesting new ingredients?

Asking around; working with good people we already know. Good people find good people. I’m not looking for interesting as much as the best. It’s a younger man’s game to find the most interesting spice. For us, it’s finding the best duck and guy who has it.

Favorite new (or rediscovered) technique?

Steaming.

Favorite recent ingredient discovery?

We’re growing white endive, which is challenging technically, but it’s been really nice to work with.

Ethnic food fetish?

I live in Napa, so unfortunately, it’s just a lot of white people’s food. But let’s say ramen.

Most annoying trend?

The race to bottom—this focus on who can be the most casual, the more you show you don’t care, the more celebrity you are.

Is it harder to get to three stars or hold onto them?

Harder to get them, I’d say, since once we got them, we don’t think about them, and just keep doing what we’re doing.