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Community Corner

Meet the Chef: David Shakin of The Heights Bistro and Bar

A local chef dishes on his Yorktown bistro and the joys of cooking

The walls of The Heights Bistro and Bar on Underhill Avenue in Yorktown Heights breathe with the same relaxed patience as its owner, Chef David Shakin.

From the cozy bar at the entrance to the long, subdued dining room that leads to the restaurant's quaint tomato garden, Shakin's mild-mannered bistro resembles the attitude of the town that he is proud to serve.

Chef Shakin is not the Food Channel hotshot begging for the limelight, nor is he the withdrawn chef hiding in the kitchen like a mad scientist, stewing and steaming over the stovetops.

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At 55 years old, he tends to speak with his eyes, while his soft-spoken voice only complements the gentle expressions of a chef at home in his profession. Indeed, Chef Shakin has learned to live happily with his food and his bistro. Where other chefs have far-reaching, take-over-the-culinary-world ambitions, this man is comfortable in Yorktown with his local patrons—as much a fixture here after six years as the Town Hall across the street.

However, as a young man growing up in Brooklyn, Shakin never dreamed of becoming a chef. His affinity for cooking was always there, but it took him dropping out of SUNY New Paltz at 18 to discover what his true career path was meant to be.

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"I was never really good at academics," Shakin said, "but whatever I do with my hands, I tend to do well…. When I was in school I used to cook for my friends… and after I left college they said, 'Why don't you become a chef?' It was like a light flipped on for me."

Shakin applied to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY, the destination for many of the world's most successful chefs. Unfortunately, due to a lack of real work experience, the CIA turned him down. Shakin decided to find a job working with food in order to expand his horizons.

He started out small, working as a dishwasher at a local pub in Queens. His natural talent for cooking evidently made an impression on his boss. After only two months scrubbing pots and pans, Shakin was temporarily promoted to chef following the departure of the previous chef.

"I was like 19 years old and had no idea what I was doing," Shakin said. "It was more a learning experience for me than anything…. I remember watching this guy making New England clam chowder one day, and he had like a pile of onions, carrots and celery, all diced, perfect little squares. I was amazed – they looked like little jewels… I remember thinking, 'I want to do that!'"

His time as a bar chef allowed him to understand the business side of the restaurant world—making orders for inventory and checking stock, developing menu items and meeting the bottom line.

His next job was as the head dairy chef at a kosher sleep-away camp, Cejwin in Port Jervis, NY. Shakin had five employees under him and struggled to maintain an air of confidence while still trying to learn the ins and outs of working in a kitchen.

After that summer of working at the camp, Shakin had developed enough experience to be accepted to the Culinary Institute of America. 

"I was exposed to every aspect of this profession, from garde manger to pastry," the chef said. "I worked with a master chef named Fritz Sonnenschmidt who was one of the writers of the CIA's book on garde mange–I was able to do my work-study with him… I was his gopher, and we developed a really great relationship."

Following his education, Shakin was hired by the celebrated pastry chef, Jean-Yves Le Bris, at his French bakery, Le Gourmandise, on Mamaroneck Avenue in White Plains. He then went on to cook for Jilly Flowers in Harrison, one of the area's finest French restaurants at the time.

Around that time, Shakin met Melissa, now his wife of 28 years. They have two children together—Matthew, 22, and Emily, 25.

"It's not easy being a dad and a chef at the same time," Shakin said. "But for a while I was lucky. I had a partner, Robert Horton, who owns An American Bistro in Tuckahoe… he asked me to come there and be 'co-chefs.' We ended up sharing a lot of the responsibility…it worked out great…I got to see all of my son's wrestling matches and all of my daughter's softball games. By the time I bought The Heights, they had already graduated."

The Heights is an example of how a restaurant can resemble a community. The walls are adorned with the paintings of local artists, and the crowd during lunch and dinner hours is a reflection of Yorktown's rich social milieu. The menu, a collection of international and American dishes inspired by Shakin's own obsession with ethnic and classic foods, is tailor-made to suit the tastes of his traditional customer base.

"We have to cook for our clientele," Shakin said. "When we started I had some more intricate items… they didn't sell. From then on, I decided to stop trying to impress people with fancy terminology. Better to keep the menu as simple as possible and impress them with what's on the plate."

His dishes, like the tender veal stew with prosciutto and porcinis, or the Porterhouse pork chop with Portobello and a potato-bacon-horseradish croquette, provide robust flavors that are approachable and welcomed by his customers.

When he's not working, Shakin plays blues guitar and reads cookbooks of his favorite chefs and food writers. While many chefs sweat and struggle to impress, Chef Shakin manages to do so with a rare patience and charisma. Evidently, that graciousness also lives at The Heights Bistro and Bar.

Grilled Sea Scallop and Mesclun Green Salad

Ingredients - 8 cups mesclun greens
6 oz haricot verts (thin green beans) cooked in lightly salted boiling
water until just
tender and shocked in cold water, drained and dried
2 oz blanched sliced almonds, toasted in a 375 degree oven until medium brown
4 large moist dried apricots cut into 8 pieces each
4 oz crumbled goat cheese
4 oz red onion vinaigrette (recipe follows)
*16 large sea scallops, cut in half horizontally to produce 32 thin rounds
 freshly ground coriander to taste
1 carrot, julienned (thin strips)

Red Onion Vinaigrette

Ingredients - 1 large red onion, thinly sliced
1/2 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
1 cinnamon stick
1 bay leaf
2 cloves
2 black peppercorns
1 star anise
2 tbl. dijon mustard
2 tbl. Hellman's Mayonaise
1 bunch fresh tarragon (leaves only) or 1 tbl. dried
1 cup vegetable oil
Directions -
Combine sugar, vinegar, and spices and boil for 1 minute
Add onion, stir and remove from heat
Let stand until cool, then remove spices

Put onion liquid, tarragon, mustard, and mayo in a blender , turn it on blend
and slowly add the oil while blender is running to emulsify the sauce
Recipe yields 31/2 cups extra dressing will keep in the fridge for up to 1 week

Salad Assembly Directions: 

Place mesclun greens, haricot verts, almonds, apricots, and goat cheese in a large mixing bowl. 

Heat oil in a large saute pan until very hot. Season scallops with salt and corriander and carefully lay scallops into the oil, seasoned side down.

Do not move scallops until they are golden brown. Turn over and brown lightly on the other side and remove from heat.

Add enough dressing to the mixture in the bowl to lightly coat the ingredients.

Distribute salad evenly in the center of 4 large dinner plates.

Place 8 scallop halves around the outside of the salad and decorate with the julienned carrots.

*Be sure to ask your fish purveyor for "dry" scallops, as opposed to
those which are soaked in brine to plump them. These scallops will
never brown.

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