Join us for a night of total collaboration with Chefs Matt Conroy and Isabel Cross of Lutèce
Click HERE to secure tickets
Matt Conroy always had jobs as a kid—from running a paper route to washing dishes at local diners. By age 15, he spent most of his free time in the kitchens of local restaurants in his hometown in northern Massachusetts. Knowing he was already passionate about cooking, he continued working after high school and opted out of culinary school, learning the tricks of the trade on the job. By 22, he became the sous chef of Verde, a popular restaurant in the ski town Stratton, Vermont. This is where he found his passion for using local produce and working with whole animals.
After three years in Vermont, Conroy moved to Boston to work for Chef Tony Maws at Craigie on Main. Working closely with Maws, Conroy absorbed his fierce discipline and attention to detail. In 2012, Conroy moved to New York City to join Chef Alex Stupak at Empellon Cocina—his first and fortuitous dive into Mexican cuisine. Over the next five years, Conroy served as executive chef of the French bistro Little Prince and then at Virginia’s, a neighborhood spot in the East Village. In 2018, he opened Oxomoco, in Greenpoint. where he served modern, wood-fired Mexican cuisine that earned the restaurant a Michelin star and Conroy a StarChefs Rising Stars Award.
Isabel Coss is a pastry chef who tells stories through her technique-driven desserts, celebrating and finding inspiration in local ingredients as well as the flavors she grew up with in Mexico. Coss first fell in love with cooking alongside her grandmother and fondly recalls early memories of the colorful candy street stands in Mexico City. She took on her first kitchen job at the age of 17 as a bread baker in Enrique Olvera’s landmark restaurant Pujol. In 2011, Coss moved to New York City to work with Alex Stupak at Empellón. She moved on in 2016 to help open Claus Meyer and Gunnar Gilson's Grand Central Terminal restaurant, Agern, before rejoining Olvera and Daniela Soto-Innes at Cosme. In her role as the executive pastry chef for Casamata Restaurant Group, which also included ATLA in New York City and Elio at the Wynn in Las Vegas, Coss refined her approach to food, focusing on ingredients in their natural state to better reflect the world around her. She was awarded StarChefs rising pastry chef in 2019. Coss believes food is the most humble and vulnerable way to give and find joy, and to connect as humans.
In 2020 an opportunity presented to lead a restaurant in Washington DC called Lutèce there together Matt & Isabel run a small neo bistro, pouring natural wines in the historic neighborhood of Georgetown.