BACKGROUND

Eve Aronoff is the Chef/Owner of Frita Batidos.  She has worked in the culinary industry for over 25 years – from prep cook, to line cook to sous chef, Chef de Cuisine to Executive Chef – honing her skills, studying different cultures and developing her own distinct style of cooking.  After many years working hands-on in the restaurant industry, Eve had the opportunity to attend Le Cordon Bleu in Paris where she earned diplomas in French Cuisine and Wine and Spirits.

STYLE

Eve’s style combines the Philosophy of Classical French Cuisine with a love for big flavors, bold spices, texture and contrast.  With culinary influences from West African to North African, Cuban to Vietnamese, Eve has always followed her intuition to bring her to what goes together, rather than convention or a desire to do something different for its own sake.

INFLUENCES

Eve grew up spending time in Miami, with her Grandmother, and the Cuban, and more broadly, Latino cultures became a major influence in her style of cooking.  Her love for the ingredients, culinary traditions and spirit of the culture grew as she spent years working alongside people from these communities.  Excited by the melting pot aspect of Cuban culture and cuisine with significant migrant communities including Chinese, Spanish, Creole and African – Eve, always savoring the opportunity to learn about diverse cultures, took that knowledge as a starting point to see where her imagination would take it from there!

VISION

In creating Frita Batidos, Eve followed her dream of honing in on the Cuban and Latin American influences, which have been integral to her style of cooking.  The Frita and the Batido, two dishes from Cuban street food culture which Eve had fallen in love with, are the starting points for her whimsical menu at Frita Batidos – The Frita, a delicious burger made of chorizo with shoestring fries on top in a soft, egg bun – and the Batido, a tropical milkshake made with fresh fruit, crushed ice and sweetened milk.  While the idea of these dishes derive from classical Cuban cooking, Eve’s whimsical interpretations are all her own.  These unique interpretations of the Frita and Batido are just the starting point for the bold, lush flavors expressed in each dish.

Frita Batidos is the juxtaposition of Eve’s two greatest passions – The desire to create something truly special through the merging of the highest standards and attention to detail  with the warmth and conviviality of feeding the people you love.  Eve dreamt of creating something truly special grounded in her core beliefs – Making food from scratch, following the seasons and supporting local farmers, purveyors and community – and bringing these elements together to create something with her unique fingerprint and uniquely its own in Frita Batidos.

Open for two years, Frita Batidos has received accolades from both local and national press and food blogs – including The New York Times and The Chicago Tribune – and has drawn personal visits from some of the foremost chefs and food aficionados in the country.  Eve and all of us at Frita Batidos are excited to continue learning and growing and making Frita Batidos truly special!

HIGHLIGHTS

Over the years in the culinary industry, some of Eve’s proudest moments include-

  • Earned Diplomas in French Cuisine and Wine and Spirits from Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, France
  • Travelled to The James Beard Foundation in New York to create a multi-course seasonal dinner – A coveted honor amongst the most celebrated chefs in the country
  • Sent as a delegate of The Slow Food Movement to Torino, Italy to attend Terra Madre, the bi-annual conference of the International Slow Food community
  • Opened and operated eve – a nationally renowned independent restaurant which received glowing praise from the likes of Chefs Mario Batali and Alice Waters
  • Published her cookbook, eve – Contemporary Cuisine – Methode Traditionelle, which guides the reader course by course through a dinner at eve and shares the repertoire of Eve’s celebrated seasonal recipes.  Numerous Le Cordon Bleu schools have since used eve Contemporary Cuisine – Methode Traditionelle as a textbook for their Contemporary cooking course.
  • Recently appointed to the Board of Directors of the Michigan Restaurant Association – An exciting opportunity for Eve to contribute her time, passion and knowledge to foster excellence in the culinary community.
  • Opened Frita Batidos – her Vision of over 10 years and hybrid of her favorite elements of her informal and formal culinary training and background – Combining the warmth and conviviality of the most casual environment with the passion and attention to detail of a formal restaurant to create something uniquely its own in Frita Batidos.
  • Frita Batidos awarded a 2012 American Institute of Architects Honor Award for outstanding design
  • Eve included in the 2013 Compendium of Best Chefs America