Viewers like you make this program possible.

Support your local PBS station.

>> ANTHONY BOURDAIN: Behold the strip mall.

The ubiquitous and dominating architectural feature of Los Angeles.

Love 'em or hate 'em, it's hard to deny that much of the Los Angeles soul and much of it's good food can be found here.

For chef Ludo Lefebvre and partners Jon Shook and Vinny Dotolo, there is great freedom and opportunity in these institutions.

All three of their restaurants: Trois Mec, Petit Trois, and Trois Familia make their home in strip malls.

Enter the Mind of a Chef.

>> LEFEBVRE: Cooking is not just a recipe, it's instinct.

Don't need to use caviar.

Fried chicken is cool, too.

Mama will be proud of me.

(sniffs) >> If you move to Los Angeles and you want to open a restaurant, the strip mall has been the spot where a start-up business can happen.

Rents are relatively less expensive, and the clientele is built in the local community.

And that's partly what makes them so interesting.

Los Angeles is one of the most diverse cities in the United States.

And that mixture of cultures and ethnicities brings with it all kinds of amazing cuisines and business models, all of which have found a home in the strip mall.

>> LEFEBVRE: Cinq.

Six.

Sept. Come on.

Nothing...

Nothing.

No.

Strip mall is part of L.A. culture.

I just love it, I feel like in Europe it's like we're alive, it's happening, the strip mall.

It's really the L.A. culture, I like it.

It's a winner.

It's like when you work in Paris, and you do all your business on the same block, that's pretty cool.

I'm going to park my car, I'm going to get my donuts.

I'm going to get maybe my nails.

I'm going to go to my cleaner and have lunch.

You know, you do... some strip malls are so big you have, like, ten or 15 different businesses.

And all my pop-up restaurants I did for four or five years really helped me to realize I can cook everywhere.

You know, so I decide to look for a cheap location.

And what is very cheap in L.A. is strip mall.

And I think it's good to have some little neighborhood like this.

It's the lifestyle I miss from Europe, but a strip mall reminds me of that.

You know everybody and you're sharing life, and you're talking about everything.

And I miss that.

I miss that.

Trois Familia is in a strip mall in Silver Lake.

And before it was Trois Familia it was a very, very famous Mexican restaurant opened for 22 years.

So just for the respect, I decide to do like a French-Mexican with Jon and Vinny.

Jon and Vinny, they're unique guys.

They're my two partners.

They owned three restaurants, and they approached me one day and asked me, "Hey, Ludo, you want to do your restaurant, we can help you."

Say, "Oh, I mean I'm okay, I don't need help or whatever."

They really insist, like, "You should have your restaurant.

It's sad a chef like you don't have a restaurant."

They invest with me, and now we open three restaurants together.

(laughing) They're very different than me.

They're really American, I'm very French.

But we like to work together.

We cook together, we spend a lot of time together.

And they are good businessmen.

I love fancy restaurants, don't get me wrong, but I love also to be available to do a restaurant like this.

To keep it with no frou frou.

I feel very comfortable, there's nothing very fancy here.

You come here, you enter, I put the disco music.

I love disco, I love it.

It makes me happy.

So I decide to put the place just with disco.

I want to have fun when I cook.

You know, make sure people are happy, have a good day.

Because life is stressful now.

You know, I think life... our job as a chef is to make people happy.

Bon.

(speaking French) ...beans burrito.

>> Beans burrito.

It's like Mexican, French, American.

It's got a little like Japanese influence in it.

>> LEFEBVRE: We take a lot of beans from the market, whatever we can find.

We'll just do a garlic broth-- water, garlic, that's it, simple.

So it's really beans, garlic water, here that's your garlic butter.

Just butter, chopped garlic.

>> Toasted garlic.

>> LEFEBVRE: And we cook it slowly.

It's a lot of flavor here, you know.

>> You taste it, and you don't know where it is, but it's there.

That alone, it's just like bean soup.

Well, that... we did... that's what it started with.

>> LEFEBVRE: Ah, oui!

>> That's how it started.

>> LEFEBVRE: It was a bean stew.

>> It was the bean stew.

>> LEFEBVRE: That's what it was, you're right, oh yeah.

>> That's what it started as.

>> LEFEBVRE: You're right, I forgot.

Yeah, it was the bean stew.

>> Bean stew.

It was more refined, but it just wasn't right for the restaurant.

We thought about it, and then you decided that it was like... >> LEFEBVRE: The bean stew finish in the burrito.

>> Yeah.

>> LEFEBVRE: That's it.

We want to cook food people like, and when we open this restaurant, people did not order dishes we put in front of them, we change it.

You know, I want to cook what people like.

I want to please people.

>> Yeah.

So we have the beans, and now we're going to put a little bit of fresh lemon supreme.

I love California because California has the best citrus in the world.

And here, Chef, one of my favorite ingredients in this country is American cheese.

I love it.

It smells very good, have a good flavor, I love the texture, it's great, man.

So now we have our bean stew here, so now we're going to add a little bit of wakame seaweed.

Of course, it's salty, a little bit.

>> It has an earthiness to it.

>> LEFEBVRE: Exactly.

You know, umami, a little bit flavor.

And now we're going to put a little dice of... >> Pico de gallo.

>> LEFEBVRE: Pico de gallo, some freshness.

Now we tie these guys.

>> Like to me, this is something that, like, at its base and at its core it's Mexican, but you're bringing in a lot of French influence.

And then that wakame that kind of seems weird, but totally works.

Bang, there it is.

Whoo... >> LEFEBVRE: And you put the flag, chef.

You have the flag, chef, you have it?

(speaking French) >> The most important part.

>> LEFEBVRE: Bing!

>> That's it.

>> LEFEBVRE: It's just fun food, you know.

Nothing complicated, it's just we're having fun over there playing with Mexican flavors and French mashed potatoes or French bean cassoulet.

I mean we're just playing, which is fun.

We don't take ourselves too seriously over there, you know, we don't.

We don't.

>> We obviously all love having fun in the kitchen, and we wanted to have tacos.

I had seen potato tacos at other Mexican restaurants, and the potatoes and how they're treated in classic French cuisine just sort of played into the idea of how we would do this.

So what we have is a carrot-based pico de gallo and carrot-based salsa.

>> LEFEBVRE: In France we have exactly the same carrot salad.

In France we do like a shredded carrot marinated with olive oil, a lot of lemon, garlic, salt, pepper, vinegar.

We call that carrot râpées.

>> I didn't know that.

>> LEFEBVRE: Yeah, we have the same thing too in France.

>> The potatoes themselves are like a French grandmother would make, you know.

>> LEFEBVRE: Yeah, butter, potato.

>> Put a little bit of garlic in it.

>> LEFEBVRE: With the skin.

>> This has been one of the more popular dishes here.

>> LEFEBVRE: Yeah.

>> Mash-up of Mexican flavors and some French technique.

And that was the exact idea of the restaurant, which was a challenge.

>> LEFEBVRE: What is French-Mexican food?

>> What is French-Mexican food?

We're still figuring it out.

>> LEFEBVRE: For me, you know, as a French chef to partner with two successful American chefs, I really love it.

Because I don't know nothing about American food, and I'm still learning a lot.

That's what I like, it's fun.

I remember the first day you come with this dish, I was very surprised about the soft shell and the crispy shell together.

I've never seen that in my life before.

>> Yeah, it's like Taco Bell, man.

>> LEFEBVRE: I never eat at Taco Bell.

I never eat at Taco Bell.

>> I was a Taco Bell fan, yeah.

Yeah, for sure.

Now comes the most challenging part is actually putting in the filling.

You have to, like, get it in there and kind of push it down.

When we opened, we were trying piping bags, and, like, basically you got to kind of spoon them in and push it down.

>> LEFEBVRE: So here, you know.

>> The potato taco.

>> LEFEBVRE: Double.

>> Double decker potato taco.

(loud crunch) >> LEFEBVRE: So many textures, but also so many flavors.

I take inspiration from a lot of food I eat in L.A., a lot of Asian culture and Latino culture.

People ask me what's my style, and my style is French technique with influence of L.A. L.A.'s a very, very big city.

And Jonathan Gold knows all the restaurants in strip malls in L.A. and all around L.A. That's his world.

He's doing that for a long time.

He was really the first critic to really focus on that, you know.

You know, and not just fancy restaurants.

You know, before you, Jonathan, I would never think to go to a strip mall.

For me, good food, Jonathan, was to go to a fancy restaurant, need to be one, two, or three-star restaurant, and I need to spend a lot of money.

>> And you eat well that way, too.

>> LEFEBVRE: You can eat well, too, you know a dish like this for $30.

>> Yeah.

>> LEFEBVRE: In the strip mall.

>> One of the beautiful things about mini malls, I think, is it's the place for entry-level capitalism-- where somebody can come in and they don't have much money, and they can... they can get a lease on a place and maybe buy some used restaurant equipment, and they're open.

But when you open a restaurant... and it costs $7 million to get the door open, then it's not your restaurant anymore.

>> LEFEBVRE: No.

>> But if you're in a strip mall, pretty much you're answering to yourself, right?

>> LEFEBVRE: For me, for myself, if you're asking me ten years ago if I will open my restaurant in a strip mall, I would say no, no way.

>> Did you imagine you'd open, like, a big, grand French... some place like L'Orangerie?

>> LEFEBVRE: Oh yeah.

Not anymore, I have no desire.

Where we are exactly, the food's amazing.

>> So this restaurant, Kobawoo, been one of my favorite Korean restaurants in Los Angeles for years.

I think I've been going here since the early '90s, at least.

>> LEFEBVRE: Wow, it's amazing here.

>> It isn't so far from an apartment that I lived in for maybe 12, 14 years.

It wasn't quite Koreatown then when I was living in it.

But I would walk five minutes in almost any direction.

There'd be a place serving not just Indonesian food, but the food of, like, northern Sumatra.

And you'd go here and there'd be Pakistani biryanis.

You'd cross the street and there'd be Colombian food.

There were restaurants from not just Mexico, but five or six different parts of Mexico.

There's not just Korean restaurants, but there were ten different kinds of Korean restaurants.

And there'd be some Japanese noodle shops that had been there for 25 years.

And there was something about having all of this in one place so concentrated that suddenly felt more like Los Angeles than anything I had ever known about or even thought about, even though I'd lived here my entire life.

>> LEFEBVRE: (calling out instructions) Let's go, guys.

Work together, finish your dishes.

(speaking French) Trois Mec is the first restaurant I opened three years ago.

It's like a very simple restaurant, set menu, we change every week.

Very, very small.

It's just 26 seats.

Why 26 seats is because to control the quality.

Why set menu is because to get the freshest ingredients, and I can be very creative with this restaurant and do what I want.

Trois Mec and Petit Trois located in the south of Hollywood.

It's not a princess location, trust me, it's not at all, okay.

We have some strip malls where they're beautiful, brand new strip malls in Beverly Hills or West Hollywood.

No, mine is still a little bit ghetto, you know.

I remember one night, you know, guys come with a gun in the restaurant.

It's scary.

It's still an area where it's not very safe.

But I'm a redneck from Burgundy, so, you know, I don't mind.

At Trois Mec, definitely all my techniques are French, but you know, I'm using a lot of ingredients from Asia-- from Japan, from China, from Korea.

And my food is really inspired by this culture.

Bonsoir.

But when I move in America, I fell in love with kimchi.

Kimchi, it's cabbage.

In France we're cooking a lot of cabbage, a lot of cabbage with foie gras.

I mean foie gras is really part of my culture as a French chef, you know.

That's why I decide to do a dish with kimchi.

Kimchi consommé.

So a consommé, it's kind of a broth, it's like a clarification.

Take out all the impurity, it's very clean.

So now I'm going to put some egg white, okay, in our kimchi.

Consommé is really something classic thing we do in France.

We do consommé with meat, with fish, with vegetables.

It's a very, very old technique, you know.

I don't know who created this technique, but old technique from France, you know, French cooking.

So we're going to cook that slowly, and there's going to be like a little volcano, and that's where our coagulation is going to start right there.

And the consommé is going to become clean, clear, like beautiful.

Look at the egg white, the egg white's starting to coagulate over there, so just going to leave that here, okay?

We're going to work now with the French legacy ingredient: foie gras.

Look, I work with a lot of chefs in France, spent all the time, we have a lot, a lot of foie gras in our menu.

For this recipe I'm going to steam it because that's a way I eat in France, the foie gois we steam around with cabbage, okay?

So here, I'm going to steam the foie gras halfway.

I want the foie gras to cook a little bit here in the steamer.

One minute on this side, and one minute on the other side.

I want the foie gras to cook evenly.

So let me check on my little consommé.

See, you see the coagulation.

I'm going to start to see the consommé.

You see, look at this.

Then, after, when the broth is clean, we just take the broth and look at this.

Here is the broth.

Look at it, it's so clean, guys.

So good.

It's like eating liquid kimchi.

It's really that.

Okay, I'm going to take my foie gras now.

I'm going to pour my kimchi broth very, very, very hot.

Why?

Because I want the kimchi broth to still cook the foie gras slowly in the plate to release more fat.

And that, keep in mind, is flavor, too.

Let the foie gras cook like this one minute.

Then after, you know, something I like is really the pickling.

I really love pickles.

When I was a kid, I eat a lot of cornichons.

Those little pickles in France, little cornichons.

So black radish pickles, a little bit.

Easter radish pickle, I julienne them.

A little bit of chopped scallion, voilà.

And then, onion flowers.

They're very strong.

So just a little bit, just to give a little kick in the dish.

And then a little bit of fleur de sel.

Voilà.

I mean it's really like a French dish with influence from L.A. That's really the flavor of Los Angeles.

So in this strip mall, before Trois Mec was a pizza place open for 20 years called Raffallo's-- Raffallo's Pizza.

I think the first time we saw the place, we actually were joined with Steve.

>> And we went in for lunch to eat.

>> We ate lunch there a couple times, actually.

>> LEFEBVRE: Yeah, we love it.

>> It's like a time capsule.

>> It was, it was crazy.

>> LEFEBVRE: There is a lot of history.

You feel like there's a lot of history in this building, I love it.

>> It was two brothers or something, and one of them had a falling out, and then one brother got this, and this brother didn't make it.

It was really cheap, so I buy it.

And then Petit Trois, it was a Thai restaurant went out of business, so the landlord asked me if I want it, I said, "Yes, I'll take it."

Why I take it?

I don't know, but I don't want to have somebody in another restaurant next to me, so I buy it.

And after I decide to do my little French bar, you know, bistro style.

Classic French food, what food I was missing from France.

You go over there of course for the food, but I will try to create this ambience where you know everybody.

Like a neighborhood restaurant.

>> And we actually kept the Thai sign originally.

>> LEFEBVRE: Yeah, for like one year at least, huh?

>> Yeah, and then in an article for Bon Appétit, when a guy...

It said, "Oh, it's got the Thai sign," remember?

And we had just changed it.

>> It still has the "Thai cuisine" up there on that part.

It still says Raffallo's up there, too.

People still come in here and they think they're going to get pizza.

>> LEFEBVRE: Yeah, pizza.

>> And then they come to the door and it says, "No more pizza."

(laughs) >> LEFEBVRE: So when's the last time you come here, guys?

>> I eat here all the time still because I live close to here.

>> I love this place.

>> I love this place, too.

>> LEFEBVRE: It's big, huh?

>> Yeah.

>> LEFEBVRE: For a strip mall, it's a big location, bro.

>> Yeah, for sure.

>> LEFEBVRE: It's a good lifestyle, the strip mall, it's funny.

>> I love a good strip mall.

(laughing): Yeah, I love a good strip mall.

>> We always ate in strip malls, and then find these little places.

Like different ethnicities-- you know, this place is Peruvian, and the portions are big and the prices are really cheap, and the flavors are delicious.

>> LEFEBVRE: The food of L.A., guys.

Did the culture of L.A. influence you a lot?

>> 100%.

>> Yeah, yeah.

>> LEFEBVRE: Look, I've been raised classic French background.

Where I am now, I will never be available to do that in France.

>> Ludo, you know how you used to... how you've adapted to being here in L.A.?

When you used to show up, you used to wear Speedos to the beach, right?

Now you wear board shorts, right?

>> LEFEBVRE: Oui.

>> No Speedos.

>> LEFEBVRE: No Speedos.

>> That's how I would say that's how your cooking has changed.

You used to be held really tight and firm and scared to dangle.

Now, you just dangle.

>> LEFEBVRE: Well, it's because of you guys.

It's because my cooking's changed since I know you guys.

Since I cook with you.

You have a lot of flavor.

You do Mexican, you do Korean, you do American.

I mean it's just crazy.

>> Yeah, because it's like it's what we eat, you know.

>> That's what it is, it's actually American.

When you do that kind of all that different food, it's American because America's a melting pot, and we have every culture here.

I mean people usually think of American and they think hamburgers and hot dogs, but it's like... >> America's actually every culture.

>> Yeah.

And I think what is happening over all these years is you're really becoming American.

You've loosened up, you're relaxed a little.

>> LEFEBVRE: I changed a lot, that's for sure.

L.A. for me, now it's home.

I'm 45 years old, you know.

I spent half of my life in France, half of my life in L.A. Ooh, I won another one!

(speaking in French) I never won.

With all the things I did about cooking for 20 years in United States, I don't know if I will be able to do that in France.

L.A., for me, was really a city of opportunity and open minds.

You know, I'm very successful because of Los Angeles.

You know, so yeah, I'm French, and I'm from California.

(sniffs)