Hardcore chef trades drumsticks for knives as vegan cuisine specialist to Hollywood stars

PITTSBURGH — Former Pittsburgher Aaron Elliott was a punk rock drummer before he became a personal chef to professional athletes and other celebrity clients in Los Angeles. But neither career could have existed without the other.

Elliott was 8 when his parents, Brad and Sandra, left their longtime casino jobs in Las Vegas to move to his mother's hometown of Moon in 1994. While the couple enjoyed their work in America's gambling mecca — he was a seating captain at the now-closed Desert Inn and she was a photographer — they were "completely over Vegas," he recalls, and wanted to raise their three sons and a daughter in a town with less crime and more opportunities to play one of their favorite sports, ice hockey.

Within a year, they opened Elliott's Nest Italian Restaurant in Aliquippa, serving the Italian specialties Sandy had perfected over the years in her home kitchen — everything from eggplant Parmesan and linguine with white clam sauce to wedding soup and tiramisu.

"We had dreamed of opening a restaurant since we met," his father recalled in a Beaver County Times story in 1996. "I just never thought it would be in a little town in Pennsylvania."

"My mom was a really good home cook and Dad was a waiter, so what could go wrong?" Elliott, 38, agrees with a chuckle. "She would do these crazy dinners and everyone would tell her to open a restaurant, and so she did."

The eatery, which eventually relocated to Center Township, lasted about 10 years before his parents sold it to one of their employees and found their way back to Sin City. But helping out in the family business left an indelible mark on Elliott, who started bussing tables at 13 and helped out in the kitchen through high school.

Yet he didn't follow in his parents' footsteps with a culinary career until he got the dream of being a professional musician out of his system.

A self-described "horrible" student, Elliott worked out a deal to take drum lessons for high school music credit from the legendary Marcello "Mars" Scarazzo, who manned the kit for the famed Jimmy Dorsey Orchestra and also played gigs with Frank Sinatra. By 15, Elliott was playing in punk bands. The day after he graduated from high school, he was on tour full time playing drums and percussion with The Escape Engine, a post-hardcore band from Paramus, N.J.

It was while he was on tour with another traveling band in California a few years later that he went from being someone who went vegetarian in high school — there's a huge animal rights scene in punk subculture — to 100% vegan at age 23, partially out of necessity.

"I was making $5 a day to live off," he explains, with next-to-no options for plant-based meals away from the venues the band frequented. "So I would travel with a rice cooker so I could make lentils and brown rice and quinoa [backstage] after I set up the drums."

One day while he was working as a valet parker and awaiting his next drumming gig, a former bandmate in search of a healthier diet asked if he would prepare meals for him. He agreed "and it just kind of took off."

More jobs followed, and after a few years of cooking vegan meals for others, it was a done deal. "I realized this is the path I wanted to take, with music as a hobby."

By 2010, the self-taught cook was preparing meals for Texas Rangers pitcher C.J. Wilson (whose brother was a band member). He cooked for him in Texas and later in Los Angeles after Wilson was signed by the Los Angeles Angels, "which couldn't have been more perfect," says Elliott.

That, in turn, led to more celebrity clients, including Ellen DeGeneres, and coveted internships at two of the most famous restaurants in the world: Noma in Copenhagen, Denmark, and D.O.M. in São Paulo, Brazil.

While he didn't come home with the fat folder of recipes he'd hoped for, it was a great education.

"I learned how to work 16 hours a day," he says, including on the line during service. He also became an expert in the meticulous work of foraging and picking herbs, peeling walnuts and shelling peas — tasks he still does today for recipes such as hummus.

"We were living the dream. It was one of the best experiences of my life."

Back home in LA and armed with a private library of 200 cookbooks, Elliott returned to private vegan cooking through word of mouth and expanded his services to include catering. Current clients include mixed martial artist and professional boxer Nate Diaz, who he cooks for in the weeks leading up to a fight; director James Cameron and his wife, Suzy; and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker.

Elliott met the heavily inked rocker through his younger brother, Jake, who also works in food and beverage in LA and often seated Barker at the popular vegan restaurant chain Crossroads. When the drummer asked if he knew of a private chef who'd be willing to cook for his family, "He was like, 'Yeah, my brother!'"

He now cooks for Barker and his wife, Kourtney Kardashian, and their kids on Sundays — usually something saucy and Italian like gnocchi or a vegan chicken Parm made with artichoke hearts. "I have to make sure both kids and parents are happy!"

While cooking for celebrities offers unique challenges — standards are exceptionally high and there's often a lot of travel — it's also fun, says Elliott. In the case of Barker, there's also the chance to rub shoulders with an idol.

"I try to keep to myself and not talk about music," Elliott jokes, "but he was a very big part of why I played drums the way I did and I'm so obsessive about it."

Teaching himself to cook wasn't easy — the first time he tried his hand at vegan lasagna, for instance, his mother had to walk him through her recipe on the phone — but the more he did, he more he wanted to learn. Now going vegan is more popular than ever due to its many health and environmental benefits.

"It takes a lot of work, but everywhere we go [in the world] we find amazing places to eat authentic," Elliott says.

That includes Pittsburgh, which he gets back to at least twice a year to visit family still in the area with his brother, Jake, a fellow die-hard Penguins fan.

"I don't need any other reason other than Apteka to go to Pittsburgh," he says, referring to the James Beard-nominated vegan Eastern European restaurant in Bloomfield. "It's such an inspiration to me and the way I cook."

While the COVID-19 pandemic put on hold his dreams of opening a small brick-and-mortar family restaurant like his parents, he's really enjoying the vegan meal delivery service he launched in April. Meal Ticket, a first-come first-serve lottery via Instagram, allows Angelenos to enjoy six of his plant-based, organic dishes each week at home with ingredients sourced from Santa Monica farmers markets and "made correctly," according to the menu.

Scratch recipes even meat-eaters might cheer include a yuba Reuben on sourdough, wild mushroom and artichoke pot pie, and Korean fried cauliflower tacos topped with kimchi and gochujang cream sauce, one of Diaz's favorite dishes.

"Everyone is so busy and don't want to cook for themselves, or they want to have date night when restaurants are closed," he says.

In fact, business is so good that he's currently converting his garage into a commercial kitchen so he can scale up while continuing his private chef work.

"I'm having a lot of fun with it and don't see myself stopping," he says.

Vegan Lasagna

PG tested

As a person who very much enjoys "real" cheese along with the occasional serving of red meat, I'll admit this vegan recipe gave me pause.

While I loved that it included a fresh and herbaceous pistachio pesto, I wasn't sure the plant-based "ricotta" layered between the noodles — made by pulsing extra-firm tofu in a blender with soaked cashews and nutritional yeast — would deliver the promised cheesy flavor a lasagna requires.

To my surprise, it did. Even my tofu-adverse husband declared it "good."

Chef Aaron Elliott, who makes this recipe often for his vegan clients in Los Angeles, prefers Miyokos Pourable Plant Milk Mozzarella as a topper, but I could only find shredded vegan mozzarella (which doesn't completely melt). It still tasted great.

The recipe is adapted for vegans from the dish his mother, Sandra, made at Elliott's Nest in Aliquippa.

16-ounce box of lasagna noodles

8 cups pomodoro sauce (recipe follows)

Tofu-cashew ricotta (recipe follows)

Pistachio pesto (recipe follows)

Salt and pepper, to taste

8 ounces vegan mozzarella

For the pomodoro sauce

1/4 cup olive oil

6 garlic cloves, minced

3 28-ounce cans San Marzano whole tomatoes

1 tablespoon kosher salt

1 bunch of basil, leaves torn

For the tofu-cashew ricotta

1 cup raw cashews, soaked in water for at least 4 hours or overnight

8 ounces firm tofu, pressed of all its water

3 tablespoons lemon juice

3 tablespoons nutritional yeast

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup water, or as needed

For the pistachio pesto

1 cup shelled roasted and salted pistachios

2 cups fresh basil leaves, packed

1/2 cup fresh parsley

1/4 cup nutritional yeast

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

2 cloves garlic, peeled

Juice and zest of 1 lemon

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Prepare pomodoro sauce: Heat olive oil and garlic in a large cast-iron skillet or medium-sized sauce pan over the lowest possible heat. Cook low and slow for as long as possible, about 30 minutes, until the garlic looks brown and toasted but not burnt. If you happen to burn the garlic, throw it out and start over. (Burnt garlic will ruin everything.)

Once the garlic is toasted, add San Marzano tomatoes, 1 tablespoon of salt and turn the heat up. Once it starts simmering, turn the heat back to low and let simmer for at least an hour and up to 3 or 4 hours, stirring gently about every 10 minutes.

Turn off the heat and add in a handful or 2 (or 3) of fresh, hand-torn basil.

While sauce is cooking, make the tofu-cashew ricotta. Drain soaked cashews and place them in a food processor or blender. Add tofu, lemon juice, nutritional yeast, salt and water. Blend until smooth and creamy, adding more water if needed to achieve a spreadable consistency. Set aside while you prepare the pesto.

Put pistachios, basil, parsley, nutritional yeast, salt, pepper, garlic and lemon zest and juice in a food processor and pulse until pistachios are roughly chopped. With the motor still running, slowly stream in olive oil and process for another 10-15 seconds. Set aside.

When sauce is almost done cooking, preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Grease a 9-by-13-inch baking dish with olive oil or vegan butter.

Cook lasagna noodles in boiling salted water for about 3/4 of the time suggested on the package instructions (about 9 minutes). Drain and set aside.

Spread 2 cups pomodoro sauce to layer the bottom of the prepared baking dish. Place a layer of cooked lasagna noodles on top.

Spread half of the cashew ricotta evenly over the noodles, followed by half of the pesto, and another 2 cups of marinara sauce.

Repeat the layers: noodles, remaining cashew ricotta, pesto and enough pomodoro to cover all the visible lasagna noodles.

Top with vegan mozzarella, spreading it evenly over the top layer.

Cover baking dish with aluminum foil and bake in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for an additional 10-15 minutes, or until the lasagna is bubbly and lightly browned on top.

Remove from the oven and let the lasagna cool for a few minutes before slicing and serving.

Serves 6-8.

— Aaron Elliott