Don’t Mention Bananas to Davio’s Executive Chef Chad Brown

“What’s to like about bananas? They’re the worst thing ever created: the texture, the smell, the mealiness. The fact that after you peel it, it still has these stringy things still attached to it. The fact that people think bananas and they think potassium. But potassium is a buzzword. It’s like electrolytes in Gatorade. You know that it helps your body. You know what else helps your body? Calories! Can you live without calories? No.

“I think I just realized, when I was in a strong enough phase of mental aptitude, that they only exist to make people’s lives miserable. They’re not good until they look rotten. The whole peeling process is debatable.

“One time at Catch, everyone found out about that. It was around Halloween time. So one of the girls – the maître d’ – had this really great idea that she would dress up in a giant banana suit and give me a hug on the line while we were in the middle of service. Traumatizing. I almost punched her in the face.”

Chad Brown is the Executive Chef at Davio’s Northern Italian Steakhouse Manhattan

Interview by Kara Chin; photos by Kara Chin and Flickr user Fernando Stankuns