Steer Genius

Mess with El Camino Real chef Jen Zavala and you'll get the horns.

by A.D. Amorosi

Michael T. Regan TEX-MESSAGE: Jen Zavala cooked for acts like Pantera and Ozzy Osbourne before landing at El Camino Real. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

When Bar Ferdinand owner, operator and designer Owen Kamihira gutted neighboring Liberties Walk restaurant Deuce to turn it into Tex-Mex border smokehouse El Camino Real, he wasn't banking on authenticity in design alone.

Kamihira wanted beef — big beef — so he brought in former Ozzfest tour chef Jen Zavala to run Camino's kitchen (it's named after Cali's historic 600-mile "King's Highway"). "I really didn't know Owen. Just thought of him as the hippie rebel guy that owned Bar Ferdinand," says Zavala. "But it's hard to say no to him, a guy with dreams and drive."

"I just jumped on his dream wagon and transformed it into reality," Zavala laughs.

It's crucial to note how funny Zavala is. The Connecticut-raised 30-year-old is tiny and quiet, but her chuckles seem to come from deep within. Bring up her time spent feeding musicians and she immediately mentions the art of cooking for hungover taste buds. In 2000 and 2001, she catered on tour for the likes of Ozzy Osbourne, Pantera and Incubus, gigs she landed through her start at the Webster Theater in Hartford.

In 2004 to 2005, Zavala ran a restaurant called Cha Cha's in Long Beach. She landed here in Philly in 2007, starting at Deuce before working at Silk City and Amada.

Has all this travel turned her into a road dog? "I'd like to think I'm a road bitch," Zavala replies.

Kamihira's highly visual style comes through in Camino's rustic décor: floors and decking from an Amish gentleman who strips Lancaster County farms and bridges of centuries-old oak planks; furniture handmade in northern Chihuahua; an 8-foot-long skull-and-horn display near a Virgin of Guadalupe statue in a galvanized bathtub.

Concept-y, yes. But the restaurant's culinary identity is pure cowboy. "I wanted to get to Tex-Mex before it got Americanized, two different tastes reflecting two sides of the border," says Kamihira. "We picked El Paso and Juarez — north Chihuahuan Mexican dishes and West Texas smokehouse barbecue — and concentrated on the tastes shared."

The Mexican side? "Nothing fancy," says Zavala. She and Kamihira drove from El Paso to Juarez to flesh out the focus of the menu. "We hit upon these stands in truck-stop towns where the dialect was different at each location. We couldn't understand what was on their menus," laughs Zavala, who's half Sicilian and half Mexican, with the latter side hailing from Chitza Nitza. "We stumbled onto this dish — tripitas. Best food I ever had. Turns out it's small intestines. We figured it out and made it for the restaurant." Same with machaca, a dried, jerky-like beef done with eggs and stuffed into wheat flour tortillas (never corn).

And the Texan side? This is where Zavala and Kamihira start salivating Homer Simpson-style. Because it's about the beef, not sauces (hot and sweet are served on the side). "This is brontosaurus stuff," teases Zavala. She's got rubs for her meat, which she smokes over mesquite applewood before char-grilling, but they're secret.

While I ponder that, I go back to her résumé. How does cooking for metal's best through Ozzfest relate to her present? "It was a crazy life, unpredictable every day," says Zavala. "But you can't lose your shit. You have to be prepared. Rock stars ... whenever they woke up and wanted whatever they wanted, I had to cater to that."

"We're a very down 'n' dirty, rock 'n' roll kind of place," says Zavala of her new project, which looks to open by the end of this month. And she's sure she'll be catering to a few of those all-too-familiar hungover palates, mixed in with the refined ones. "Mostly" — she laughs hard — "having had that experience is key to Owen, because working with him is like working with a madman."

Probably not Ozzy mad, but I catch her drift.

(a_amorosi@citypaper.net)

El Camino Real, opening soon at Liberties Walk, 1040 N. Second St.