MARGUERITE: Welcome to the Kennedy Center and the Roof Terrace Restaurant.

SETH: I could get used to this being the view out my office window.

MARGUERITE: It's not the worst view.

SETH: What you guys have cooking today in the kitchen?

MARGUERITE: Got a little chowder ready for you today.

SETH: Chowdah?

MARGUERITE: Chowder.

SETH: All right, we got to get that out of my system right now.

Chowdah!

MARGUERITE: Chowdah.

SETH: There we go.

I'm done.

MARGUERITE: It's one of JFK's most treasured recipes.

Why don't you follow me inside and we'll get started.

SETH: Let's do it.

MARGUERITE: All right, Seth.

Welcome to the Roof Terrace Restaurant.

SETH: All right, so these are all the ingredients for the chowder?

MARGUERITE: Yes, it is.

So the original chowder really started only with ten ingredients.

We wanted to elevate it, we wanted to make it a little more refined, a little more DC and kind of take it out of 1961.

SETH: And so how do you get started on the dish?

MARGUERITE: Well, we have to actually render out some delicious fat.

This is Nueske's bacon, so it's got a little smoke to it.

They actually used salt pork in the original recipe, but we went in for a little deeper flavor just to really set the soup off right.

SETH: You can never go wrong with good bacon.

MARGUERITE: Absolutely not.

We have plenty of fat in here to get started.

So we're going to remove our delicious Nueske's bacon.

SETH: Are you going to save that for later?

MARGUERITE: Oh yeah, this will definitely be added back.

All right, so now we're going to start with our "Mirepoix Plus," as I like to call it.

So we'll sweat down our onions.

We want to get them a little translucent, so they're really taking on that porky flavor.

SETH: Porky flavor.

That's the technical term?

MARGUERITE: Yes.

Yes.

That's what everybody learns in chef's school.

These are sweating down really beautifully.

We're going to add some carrot, some leek, celery, and some fennel for some sweetness.

And last but not least, our ever-important potato.

SETH: And potato is a key part of any chowder dish.

MARGUERITE: Of any chowder.

SETH: Chowdah We snuck it back in.

MARGUERITE: Chowdah.

SETH: Chowdah.

MARGUERITE: You can't help yourself.

And then classic to the recipe as well, a couple bay leaves and let's stir those puppies in.

I'm going to do a little white pepper.

Now we're going to add the roux.

And this is what's going to thicken it up.

SETH: And what's in the roux, chef?

MARGUERITE: It's just butter and flour.

And that will also thicken it and make it a really, really luxurious texture.

So we've added flavor, we've added a little depth.

Now we're adding texture.

And now time for our fish stock.

So we make this in-house.

It's nice and gelatinized.

SETH: That means that a lot of those bones and everything just cooked out.

MARGUERITE: All those bones got in there.

SETH: All the collagens in there.

MARGUERITE: Oh, yeah.

So the original recipe doesn't actually call for fish stock.

They use heavy cream and a little bit of water.

But again, we really want to heighten the flavor.

We're going to also add a little white wine to it.

Really nice dry Pinot Grigio.

SETH: Another elevated touch.

MARGUERITE: It is an absolutely elevated touch.

SETH: Wine not?

MARGUERITE: That was a good one.

We're going to add our corn now.

This is our bi-color corn, locally grown, which is again going to add a touch of sweetness, but also a little thickener as well.

SETH: So this is dish you'll even be willing to change up throughout the year, depending on... MARGUERITE: Throughout the seasons.

Yes, absolutely.

We always want to start with delicious, and start with seasonal, and start with sustainable.

Because we're very passionate about making sure we're keeping local but also wonderful flavors.

SETH: But if the aromas any indication ... MARGUERITE: I'm going to go ahead and add our little Nueske's bacon right back to it.

SETH: No, I was just getting ready to snack on that, chef.

MARGUERITE: Now is time for the cream.

So we want to turn it down just a touch because you never want to scorch the cream.

We're going to just slowly stir it.

It mixed with a little bit of half-and-half to lighten it up.

No reason to make you fall asleep in the middle of a show.

Just starting to simmer and come up to temperature.

So we're going to add in our delicious rockfish here.

But the original recipe called for haddock.

When I think of New England chowder, I'm thinking clam chowder.

So this is very much Kennedy's ...

He really liked the haddock.

He didn't really love the clams.

SETH: Oh yeah.

And as a Mid-Atlantic guy myself, I mean, I've been eating rockfish for ages.

MARGUERITE: Forever.

SETH: It's one of my absolute favorites.

MARGUERITE: So we've added our rockfish in and it's going to cook down for about ten minutes.

And once the chowder's done cooking, we're going to finish it off with a little bit of crunchy bacon on top for an extra texture.

Some micro-greens, a drizzle of our herb oil that we make in-house.

And then just a touch of Maldon salt, and the chowder will be ready to enjoy.

SETH: All right, chef.

So many colors on this bowl.

Just going to dig in.

MARGUERITE: Let's get after it.

Oh, with the bacon on there too.

SETH: Oh, that is a treat.

MARGUERITE: Oh, I'm so glad.

SETH: There's a freshness while also being hearty at the same time, which I think is a hard balance to strike, but you've clearly done it here.

MARGUERITE: Awesome.

Thank you so much.

SETH: There's no mistaking the smokiness that's coming from that bacon as well.

I'm not even sure I got enough of these crispy bacon bites on the top.

MARGUERITE: Bacon party.

SETH: It's hard to imagine what this would be like without the addition of that fish stock and all those other ingredients.

MARGUERITE: Yeah, from what I've heard, it is delicious, but I feel like it'd be a little one-note.

So here we really wanted to hit a symphony of flavors while keeping it fresh, keeping it bright, still really celebrating the rockfish and everything the dish is originally about.