Knives & Ink: Chefs explain their weird and wonderful tattoos

Knives & Ink

Man-buns will come and go (hopefully in 2017), but tattoos are not simply a passing trend; chefs have been illustrating their skin with pictures of butcher’s knives, cuts of meat and produce long before hipsters discovered pizza tattoos.

A new book, Knives & Ink by Isaac Fitzgerald & Wendy MacNaughton, records interviews with some of America’s most well-respected chefs, such as Dominique Crenn, Sean Telo and Danny Bowien, about the reasons behind their ink. Some tell of their love for the kitchen or their mums, some tell of personal events, and some have little reason behind them at all. Here are a few of our favourites.

Knives and Ink by Isaac Fitzgerald & Wendy MacNaughton, published by Bloomsbury ($29.99). Out now.

Gracie Lieberman

Owner of and personal chef at the Royal Radish, Brooklyn, New York.

“I got this tattoo about five years ago, when I was working at a bistro on Elizabeth Street shucking oysters. I knew I wanted a tattoo of a calendar because I was interested in the passage of time and how we mark it. I had planned to get the design on my arm, but the guy took one look at my scrawny bicep and was like, “we can either do this around your waist, or the fattest part of your leg. Unless you want to take up bodybuilding.” So on my thigh it went. I get a lot of attention for this tattoo, some comments more welcome than others. Every once in a while folks stop me on the street, stick their face in my business, and say stuff like, “yo, I’m a virgo, what does that mean?!” If somebody is really bothering me, I tell them the tattoo has to do with charting my menstrual cycle, which usually shuts them up. Other people ask me if it’s a treasure map. I always say yes.”

Dominique Crenn

Owner of and chef at Atelier Crenn and Petit Crenn, San Francisco, California.

“A few years ago I had an accident. A very scary one. I was a hotel chef at the time, working seven days a week. I came home very late one night, exhausted, and while I was in the shower I slipped and sliced a tendon in my leg wide open. I lost consciousness for fifteen, twenty minutes. When I came to, blood was everywhere. I could have lost my life, but somehow I didn’t. I called 911 and an ambulance arrived before I bled out. Still, I was bedridden for three months. I couldn’t move. So this tattoo reminds me to celebrate that moment in my life: the moment I lived. I wanted something that spoke to the mix of struggle and hope, dream and reality. It’s about doing anything in life that you put your heart to, knowing that it doesn’t matter where you are in your life. Any moment is the right moment, becuase none of us know how many moments we have left.”

Angie Mar

Executive chef and partner at the Beatrice Inn, New York City.

“I decided to get this bee tattoo when I took over the helm of my first kitchen. It was such a troubled restaurant at the time and needed an overhaul desperately. Bees are not unlike chefs, I suppose. We work long grueling hours, creating a product for another’s enjoyment. To me, that bee represents a colony that works as a team to achieve one common goal. Everyone knows their role and works together. It’s exactly how a successful kitchen should run. The bee also reminds me to slow down, from time to time, and savor the sweetness in life.”

Kate Romane

Owner of and chef at e2 Restaurant and Kate Romane Productions, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

“My tattoo is the Library of Congress call number for The Joy of Cooking by Irma S. Rombauer. It was the first cookbook I ever owned. I love to remember my roots and make honet food, and this small coded number of The Joy of Cooking always brings me back to my roots.”

Danny Bowien

Owner of and chef at Mission Chinese and Mission Cantina, San Francisco, California, and New York City.

“My mother was super religious, and collected angel figurines. She was sick most of my childhood, and passed away when I was in high school. At the age of twenty I moved from Oklahoma City, where tattoos were illegal, to San Francisco. I got these wings in a tattoo parlour above a Subway sandwich shop in the Castro. They were expensive and I was broke, so I had to get them one at a time, about a year apart. They were, and still are, my way of always keeping her with me.”

Sean Telo

Executive chef, 21 Greenpoint, Brooklyn, New York.

“It’s a kohlrabi hot air balloon. The basket is made of cookbooks by chefs I’ve worked for or admire. Without them I wouldn’t be anywhere.”

Jamie Bissonnette

Co-owner of and chef at Toro NYC, Toro Boston, and Coppa Boston, Boston, Massachusetts, and New York City.

“I was just a young line cook when I got this tattoo, but I knew I wanted to be a chef. I had learned that every artist, whether painter or writer or one who works with food, has a sinister side. That’s what this tattoo represents to me, my devilish ambition.”

Joe Tomaszak

Sushi Chef at Ichi Sushi + Ni Bar, San Francisco, California.

“On my neck I’ve got “Mise en Place”, which roughly translates to “everything in place”, an old motto drilled into every cook’s brain, whether at school or in the field, from the moment you pick up a knife. In a nutshell, before you start service, you need to have all your bits and pieces, that together make a dish, ready to go; your diced tomatoes, your mother sauces, your seasonings, etc. It’s a concept that I strive to apply in my day-to-day life as well. A dedication to staying organized and keeping everything in its place.”