Chef Roche Works the Moto Laser - Photo: Tuan Bui

If the whole physics thing didn’t pan out, and Albert Einstein pursued a career as a pastry chef, he’d probably would have been a lot like Chef Ben Roche. Chef Roche, pastry chef at Moto restaurant in Chicago’s Fulton Market neighborhood, employs an arsenal of lasers, liquid nitrogen, and alginate powders to construct a new dessert movement in American cuisine. Chef Roche, along with his partner at Moto, Chef Homaro Cantu, are not breaking conventions. They are ignoring them altogether. Chef Roche eschews cookbooks for inspiration, and instead finds inspiration in Surrealism and the experimentation of Salvador Dali.

In our podcast (What is a Podcast?) Roche talks about Dali’s influence, collecting smokey vanilla essence with a class 4 laser, and inventing hot ice cream for Albert Adria of El Bulli.

If you have Macromedia Flash installed, you can play the file right on this site, below, by pressing the play button. If not, download the file and play it on your PC or on an MP3 player here: Ben Roche Interview

You can also view a slideshow of Chef Roche working in the Moto kitchen from Hungry magazine photographer Tuan Bui.