Millennium: curtain's up! Elegant vegan cuisine takes center stage - vegetarian restaurant Millennium's chef Eric Tucker - includes recipes - Interview

Vegetarian Times, August, 2003 by Alexandra Greeley

Before the house lights dim and the curtains rise in San Francisco's theater district, many of the city's food savvy, on their way for an evening's entertainment, head eagerly to the Millennium..... the elegant, upscale, 100 percent vegan restaurant in its new location, one block from the ACT Geary Theater in the luxury Savoy Hotel.

Much that made the former Millennium special--the signature fishnet chandelier, animal-friendly faux leatherette upholstery and floor-to-ceiling recycled fabrics remains. But the interior is grander.

"We inherited space from a French brasserie," says executive chef Eric Tucker, "with lots of dark woods and a yellow paint job." The dark woods remain, but the yellows are now shades of warm autumnal apricot. The new location seats twice as many patrons as its predecessor.

The Millennium Restaurant's chief claim to fame--its world-class vegan menu--has been both expanded and simplified. The new menu offers additional small-plate choices, incorporating the tapas concept. "We also have a prix-fixe tasting menu, which is a six-course, small-plate offering," says Tucker. The restaurant offers more salad selections. "Millennium is a high-end experience."

Tucker may be one of the first chefs in America to make vegan cuisine elegant, marrying two concepts often thought incompatible. "The challenge is in combining things," he says. "What we do to make vegan dishes elegant is the presentation--or sometimes the way we prepare a Thai curry, for example, by deconstructing it."

A graduate of New York's Natural Gourmet Institute for Food and Health, who interned at the now-defunct Milly's Restaurant in San Rafael, California, Tucker enjoys the challenge of vegan cooking. "We don't have the same products to play with--dairy, meat and eggs--so we come up with our own variations," he says. "It takes a bit of a different mindset to think in terms of composing a vegan plate versus a standard plate with its centerpiece cut of meat or fish. I like to show that you can create fine dining in a white-tablecloth restaurant with vegetable-based recipes." Most influenced by Asian cuisines Thai and Chinese, in particular--Tucker uses spices and bold seasonings, though he's talented at tempering and moderating flavors for a subtle effect.

Tucker's interest in healthful food goes back to his high school days in New Jersey, when he was diagnosed with hypoglycemia. Told by a nutritionist "to eat seven courses of meat per day," he decided to ignore this advice and find his own balance. He soon developed a passion for fresh, organic produce and vegetarian cooking, which influenced his future cooking style. "I really liked the vegetable-based dishes, visiting farmers' markets and having a rapport with those farmers when I worked at Milly's," he says. He adds that although the restaurant is not labeled "organic," all major products--including vegetables, beans, grains and oils--are organic. "Farmers come to the back door delivering food," he says, adding that some Sonoma County folks, who act as a clearinghouse for smaller farms, bring goods too.

Tucker dreams of expanding. "I believe in the restaurant's concept," he says. "We really want to make guests happy, satisfied and content, and we do that with sustainable food products. It's a good feeling."