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Commerce's Harold Moore makes pasta

By Alexis Korman | Special to amNewYork

12:29 PM EDT, June 10, 2008

Making fresh ravioli with chef Harold Moore at Commerce. (Katya Pronin)

Michelin star winner Chef Harold Moore has logged time at some of NYC's most famous restaurants, including the demanding kitchens of Montrachet, Jean-Georges, and March. Moore's ascent in the NYC culinary scene occurred step by step, as he moved from intern all the way up to sous chef.

In 2008, he assumed the title of chef/owner of his own restaurant, Commerce. The casual yet upscale West Village place serves contemporary American cuisine in a refurbished, landmarked space that was once the Blue Mill Tavern, Grange Hall, and a Depression-era speakeasy.

We spoke to Moore about the new restaurant, his $100,000 custom-made oven, and snagged his recipe for one of our favorite things, homemade pasta.

Commerce 50 Commerce St; 212-524-2301

Talking to Chef Harold Moore of Commerce

How did your work at Montrachet and March influence your vision for Commerce? Well, working at those places was a goal I had set for myself as a younger man. I was 27 at Montrachet, and it was a big deal for me. And then I moved on three years later to March. It was all these fancy, fancy places, you know, but they weren't super busy. I started looking around, and I was doing a lot of thinking about what I wanted to do with my career, and I knew I didn't want to do just steak frites and hamburgers and stuff like that. It's just I can't be fully engaged mentally doing stuff like that. So, my vision for Commerce was to have a restaurant that was very casual -- you can just walk in and not need reservations -- and you can just wear shorts or whatever, but we're still serving refined food.

Why is serving homemade pasta important to you? I like it because you can control the texture and flavor of the pasta and what's inside. It takes a lot of practice to know how to make things by hand, and you don't want to take the easy way out. And it's also just passing on of tradition, pleasing the guest, and constantly evolving.

Do you have any tips for our readers who might be making homemade pasta? You want to make sure that the pasta's not too wet. If the pasta's really, really wet, it sticks to the mold, sticks to the table, sticks to everything. The other thing is, when you're handling the pasta, drape it over your hand, and don't grab it. If you don't stretch it evenly, it will get thin in some places and might break.

I heard that you had spent $100,000 on an oven at Commerce. Was it worth it? I know it sounds like a lot of money, but the next less expensive oven was $70,000, so it's not that big of a stretch. It needed to be able to hold up to the pressure and the amount of work that goes on on it, and the quality and materials -- it's been custom built for us so it's actually very small and sturdy, and that's the whole deal.

Mushroom Ravioli
Pasta Dough

Ingredients:
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup olive oil
5 whole eggs plus 7 egg yolks

Procedure:

Sift all of the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl or the bowl of a tabletop mixer.

Add the olive oil and mix until completely incorporated.

Add the whole eggs, one at a time, while mixing.