Who

Dufresne is the famously innovative chef and co-owner of the restaurant wd~50, where he churns out aggressively oddball dishes like pickled beef tongue and liquid toast.

Backstory

The son of a small-time Rhode Island restaurateur, Dufresne studied philosophy at Colby before succumbing to long-harbored culinary ambitions and enrolling at the French Culinary Institute. During his early career, he bounced between various restaurants owned by Jean-Georges Vongerichten—JoJo from 1993 to 1997, the Bellagio-housed Vegas steakhouse Prime, and JGV mothership Jean-Georges, where he was Vongerichten's sous. In 1999, he put himself, Clinton Street, and the entire Lower East Side on the culinary map with his first creation, 71 Clinton Fresh Foods, a freewheeling restaurant underwritten by his father. The oft-mobbed spot bagged a two-star rating from the Times' William Grimes, and netted Dufresne himself a designation as one of America's "Best New Chefs" from Food & Wine in 2001. Later that year, he departed 71 Clinton; two years after that, with financial backing from Vongerichten and Phil Suarez, he opened wd~50 at Rivington Street. (Yes, that's a tilde in between Wylie's initials and the 50, in case you're wondering.) The restaurant immediately became New York's capital of experimental cooking, with Frank Bruni pronouncing it "Manhattan's most audacious, significant laboratory for avant-garde cuisine." In 2008, a Bruni re-review awarded wd~50 a coveted three-star rating.

Of note

Although he abhors the term, Dufresne is New York's leading practitioner of molecular gastronomy, the movement to bring scientific techniques and instruments into the kitchen. Using chemicals like methylcellulose and maltodextrin and gizmos endemic to laboratory settings, he produces dishes like fried mayonnaise, noodles made of shrimp, and Parmesan soup. But while his cerebral style of cooking has won him critics' and connoisseurs' respect, he's been chronically dogged by complaints that his food doesn't please the palette as much as it does the mind.

Namedrop

wd~50 has served as the cradle for many of the major players on New York's (relatively small and incestuous) avant-garde dining scene. Sam Mason, the chef-owner of the SoHo restaurant Tailor, was wd~50's pastry chef from 2003 to 2006; Eben Freeman, Mason's in-house mixologist, used to keep bar and concoct outlandish cocktails at wd~50. Rising star Alex Stupak has been Dufresne's pastry chef at the restaurant since Mason's departure.

The look

Dufresne may cook like it's the year 2077, but his 'do is more reminiscent of 1977: He sports long hair and vintage muttonchops. He usually wears big, clunky glasses, too, which—in conjunction with science fiction-style cooking—has led more than one food writer to describe him as a "mad scientist."

Personal

Rather ironically, the hero of food snobs everywhere recently married Maile Carpenter, an editor who works for the enemy of all things haute cuisine, Rachael Ray. The couple lives in Hell's Kitchen.

---