5 Questions for Superba Snack Bar’s Jason Neroni

Jason Neroni is chef of Superba Snack Bar, the just-opened neo-Italian spot in Venice. Neroni’s an Orange County native who has cooked at several restaurants in New York; Portland, Ore.; and Southern California, including most recently at Osteria La Buca on Melrose Avenue. Now he’s focusing on Superba, with its menu of house-made salumi -- porchetta di testa pastrami on rye with dill pickes, for example; snacks such as fried duck egg or fried chicken; and stand-out pastas — whole wheat rigatoni cacio e pepe, smoked bucatini carbonara and creste de gallo (cockscomb) with shrimp, corn and shellfish butter.

What’s coming up next on your menu? Lunch. We are working very hard on it. It’s going to be kind of a mix of banh mi, bocadillos and American-inspired favorites. Think pig’s head pastrami sando with black garlic mayo, or Korean-style fried chicken on bao with kimchi ketchup. That sort of thing.

Latest ingredient obsession? Rancho Gordo beans. Lately in a pasta dish of garganelli with pheasant.

What restaurant do you find yourself going to again and again? East Borough in Costa Mesa. I order the curried chicken salad banh mi.

The one piece of kitchen equipment you can’t live without, other than your knives? CVAP [controlled vapor technology] oven — it’s the best way to slow-roast anything. We don’t sous-vide anything anymore.

Favorite kitchen soundtrack? David Bowie, Fleet Foxes, LCD Soundsystem, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros.

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