Triangle Fridge Study: Derek Pierce

In our Triangle Food Issue, published Wednesday, May 29, we asked five local chefs, farmers, and small business purveyors to let us peek inside their fridges. You can read the rest of the interviews here.

Derek Pierce | Chef at Hutchins Garage and founder of Savant Garden Provisions hot sauce

INDY: Can you list off some things that are in your refrigerator right now?

Pierce: Almond milk.

A bunch of different hot sauces.

Chili crisp.

Yuengling pilsner.

Soda waters from Harris Teeter.

Eggs.

Ketchup.

Bouillons.

Hoisin sauce.

Mustard—Maille. 

Garlic.

Chick-fil-A sauce. That’s not mine. [It’s my wife’s.]

Sour cream.

Cheese: Swiss and cheddar.

Sambal oelek, which is a chili paste.

Gochujang, which is another chili paste.

Bread.

Tomato paste.

Cilantro.

What kind of mayo do you have?

Two kinds: Duke’s and Kewpie.

I’m gonna run through a list of foods that some people refrigerate and some people don’t, and you tell me your stance. I think you already said that you refrigerate ketchup and bread, which are two of the items.

Yeah, I always keep the bread in the fridge. Ninety-nine out of 100 times I’m going to toast it, so it’s not going to be cold when I eat it. 

Eggs?

Yes, definitely.

Peanut butter?

No. Do people keep peanut butter in the fridge? 

Some people do, yeah. 

Huh.

How about tomatoes?

I don’t really keep a lot of fresh groceries because I’m two minutes away from a grocery store.

Out of all the times you open your fridge, what do you reach for most often and what do you do with it?

Most of the time it’s almond milk, for my coffee in the morning, or if it’s late at night, my favorite go-to snack is sour cream with some Savant [Garde] hot sauce and tortilla chips.

Walk me through the hot sauces you’ve got in the fridge.

I have sriracha, which I usually put on takeout Chinese because I like the sweetness with it. I have sambal oelek, although that’s not really a hot sauce, it’s a chili paste. If I’m eating dumplings, I’ll mix it with a little soy and sesame oil and use it as a dipping sauce. And I have Crystal. I like that with my eggs in the morning because it’s super bright and simple.

I also have all four of my Savant [Garde] hot sauces: Red Hot is like your table hot sauce; Chile Verdant is a salsa verde; Maximus is barbecue-ish—it’s great for long roasts, and Halmi is like liquid kimchi, it’s gold.

Is there anything you eat cold out of the fridge without heating up?

All leftovers. 

Is there anything in your fridge that’s expired right now?

I’ve got some aging eggnog in here. It’s purposefully aged. It’s a recipe I found on Instagram from a place in New York. It’s sugar, a bunch of alcohol, and eggs, and you age it for two years, and then when you make the cocktail, it’s whole milk, half-and-half, shaken and with some nutmeg on top. The egg batter itself is 18 percent, so supposedly it’s more safe the longer it sits, because the 18 percent will kill everything in the bottle.

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