Keith Corbin with Carla Hall - California Soul (Online Event)

Keith Corbin
in conversation with Carla Hall

California Soul

Live Online

Sun., August 28, 2022 • 5:30pm PT

This event will be online by Book Passage. Please contact webmaster@bookpassage.com with questions regarding events.
 

A sharply crafted and unflinchingly honest memoir about gangs, drugs, cooking, and living life on the line — both on the streets and in the kitchen — from one of the most exciting stars in the food world today.

Chef Keith Corbin has been cooking his entire life. Born on the home turf of the notorious Grape Street Crips in 1980s Watts, Los Angeles, he got his start cooking crack at age thirteen, becoming so skilled that he was flown across the country to cook for drug operations in other cities. After his criminal enterprises caught up with him, though, Corbin spent years in California’s most notorious maximum security prisons — witnessing the resourcefulness of other inmates who made kimchi out of leftover vegetables and tamales from ground-up Fritos. He developed his own culinary palate and ingenuity, creating “spreads” out of the unbearable commissary ingredients and experimenting during his shifts in the prison kitchen.

After his release, Corbin got a job managing the kitchen at LocoL, an ambitious fast food restaurant spearheaded by celebrity chefs Roy Choi and Daniel Patterson, designed to bring inexpensive, quality food and good jobs into underserved neighborhoods. But when Corbin was suddenly thrust into the spotlight, he struggled to live up to or accept the simplified “gangbanger redemption” portrayal of him in the media. As he battles private demons while achieving public success, Corbin traces the origins of his vision for “California soul food” and takes readers inside the worlds of gang hierarchy , drug dealing, prison politics, gentrification, and culinary achievement  to tell the story of how he became head chef of Alta Adams, one of America’s best restaurants.

Keith Corbin is the James Beard Award–nominated executive chef and co-owner of Alta Adams in Los Angeles, named one of the best restaurants in the country by Esquire, Thrillist, and the Los Angeles Times. A native of Watts, Corbin was formerly director of operations for the LocoL restaurant group and worked for Daniel Patterson at his Michelin-starred fine dining restaurant Coi in San Francisco.

Carla Hall attended L’Academie de Cuisine in Maryland. She gained her audience when she competed on Bravo’s Top Chef and Top Chef: All Stars. She has been a TV personality since then, cohosting on the ABC talk show The Chew, contributing on Good Morning America, and featuring as a judge on Crazy Delicious on Netflix and on Bakeaway Camp on the Food Network. She is the author of Carla’s Comfort FoodsCooking with Love, and Carla Hall’s Soul Food, which received an NAACP Image Awards nomination. She lives in Washington D.C. with her husband. Visit carlahall.com for more.

 

Keith Corbin photo courtesy of the author; Carla Hall photo courtesy of the author

Location: 

Online Event
California Soul: An American Epic of Cooking and Survival By Keith Corbin, Kevin Alexander Cover Image
$28.99
ISBN: 9780593243824
Availability: On Our Shelves Now - Click Title for More Details
Published: Random House - August 16th, 2022