Personalities

Adam Keough

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Chef - Absinthe Brasserie & Bar

A Boston native, Adam Keough’s passion for the culinary arts was fueled at a young age by cooking with his grandparents at family holiday gatherings. He is influenced by the culinary simplicity of his Boston roots, and incorporates this basic approach to food plus techniques and philosophies learned through his years in fine dining into the brasserie fare he offers at Absinthe as Executive Chef.

At the age of 16 he landed his first job, at a local South Boston restaurant, and four years later he enrolled at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York. After honing his skills through an externship at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Palm Beach, Florida, he began his professional career as junior sous-chef under award-winning chef Anthony Ambrose at his restaurant, Ambrosia on Huntington, considered one of the best restaurants in Boston. After a year, he was promoted to chef-de-cuisine and began to adopt his own culinary style.

Keough went on to work under Joshua Skenes at Chez TJ in Los Gatos, California, before joining Michael Mina and the Mina Restaurant Group as the Interim Chef at Arcadia in San Jose, California. In February 2006, the 28-year-old chef opened Stonehill Tavern for Mina at the St.Regis Resort, Monarch Beach in Dana Point, California, as executive sous-chef, to much success. He was promoted to executive chef shortly after. While he was there, the restaurant received three stars from Irene Virbila at the Los Angeles Times, and Keough was named “Best New Chef of Orange County” by Riviera magazine in 2007. He was also a two-time James Beard Foundation semifinalist for national “Rising-Star Chef of the Year,” in 2007 and 2008.

Keough’s experience brings a high level of creativity to Absinthe and Arlequin Café’s menus, earning the restaurant three stars from the San Francisco Chronicle in October 2010 and a spot in the publication’s list of “Top-100 Bay Area Restaurants” for 2011. He was also named as one of Restaurant Hospitality’s “Chefs to Watch in 2011.”

In addition to updating the lunch and dinner menus at the restaurant, Keough has refreshed the bar menu, adding snacks to appeal to the mid-afternoon and late-night dining scenes. Seasonal menu highlights include Local Sole with citrus-fennel brown butter, caramelized fingerling potatoes, capers and fava greens; Kurobuta Pork Rib-Eye with jalapeno-cheddar grits, braised red cabbage, and natural jus; and Coq Au Vin with red-Burgundy-braised Mary’s chicken, bacon, roasted crimini mushroom, crostini, and persillade.

Keough lives in San Francisco’s Hayes Valley neighborhood, and when not at Absinthe enjoys shopping in the markets of Chinatown, cooking at home with his girlfriend, and exploring the Bay Area.