Dinner with a Difference

NAME: Theo Friedman, A15

PROFESSION: Chef, entrepreneur; founder of Theory Kitchen, a business based in New York City that hosts experimental pop-up dinners.

APPRENTICESHIP: Stints at cutting-edge restaurants like New York City’s wd~50 and Gotham Bar and Grill.

PROUDEST ACHIEVEMENT: “Starting a company out of my dorm room.” It all began his freshman year, when, he says, “I had two distinct desires. First, I wanted to test out new food ideas, and second, I wanted to bring together different groups of friends.” The eventual result was Theory Kitchen, and a life in which the love of good food has led him to travel the world and meet amazing people.

RECENT SUCCESS: Meal of Fortune, an event Theory Kitchen created in collaboration with Mouth Arcade, a Brooklyn-based food design studio. Staged at the Manhattan video-game gallery Babycastles, Meal of Fortune featured diversions like Seasoning Strike, in which diners rolled a rubber ball down a miniature bowling alley trying to knock down shakers full of seasonings. The object was to season a dish to taste—the shakers sat at the edge of a screen, poised to sprinkle their contents onto the food beneath.

RECOMMENDED READING: The works of food writer Ruth Reichl, such as Tender at the Bone and Comfort Me With Apples, and Blood, Bones and Butter, a memoir by Gabrielle Hamilton, who founded the acclaimed New York restaurant Prune.