ITALIAN CHEF MARK STRAUSMAN - TALKS ABOUT FREDS AT BARNEYS DOWNTOWN
MARK STRAUSMAN is a native New Yorker who grew up in a Queens housing project and rose to become one of the best-known Italian chefs in the country. He received a degree in 1982 in Hotel and Restaurant Management from New York City Technical College. After graduation Mark took an externship for three months in a 5-star hotel in Frankfurt, Germany. He parlayed those three months into a four-year odyssey, working in several top European restaurants and learning the art of classical cooking, before returning to New York in 1986.Although in Europe he worked in formal, French-style kitchens, Mark strongly felt the lure of country cooking. In 1988, he partnered with Pino Luongo, and together they opened the ground-breaking Sapore di Mare in East Hampton, New York, and Coco Pazzo on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, which The New York Times awarded three stars. In 1994, Mark opened his own restaurant in the Flatiron district, Campagna, which was dubbed “media central” by New York magazine.
Since 1994, Mark has been Managing Director of the high-profile Freds, a restaurant he developed for the Barneys New York Madison Avenue flagship store. He has developed and run off-shoots of Freds at Barneys New York locations in Chelsea, Beverly Hills, Chicago, and San Francisco and is an in-demand consultant for restaurants all over the United States, from Cape Cod to the Northwest.
In March 2016, Strausman helped open Freds at Barneys Downtown. The renowned restaurant, headed by Executive Chef Mark Strausman, offers innovative Italian-inspired and modern American dishes, which cater to the downtown audience. Famed for its chopped salads and light Italian fare, dishes from the classic Freds uptown menu like the Freds Chopped Chicken Salad, Estelle’s Chicken Soup, Penne al’Arrabbiata with Chef Mark’s signature spicy tomato sauce, and a New-York style Pizza Margherita were all included on the downtown menu.
In October 2010 Strausman returned to his love of country cooking by opening
Agriturismo, a restaurant in the countryside close to New York City (Pine Plains, NY) that showcases foods from the nearby farms of the Hudson Valley. Agriturismo’s unique focus earned it a feature in the Travel Section of The New York Times, which called Mark’s food “uncomplicated but satisfying,” and “loaded with flavor.”
Mark is the author of two cookbooks, both of which have received starred reviews in Publishers Weekly. His first, The Campagna Table, was published by William Morrow in 1999. In addition to Publishers Weekly, it also received a starred review in Booklist. His second book, Two Meatballs in the Italian Kitchen, co-authored with Pino Luongo, is in its second printing. It received a James Beard Award nomination in 2008.
Mark has a wealth of television experience. He was a regular guest on the original
Martha Stewart Living since its inception. He has logged guest appearances on Late Show with David Letterman, Late Night with Conan O’Brien, CNN, The Today Show, The CBS Early Show, and numerous programs on The Food Network, as well as many others. Online, Mark has worked with Yahoo, and is a guest contributor to The Huffington Post.
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