year end: reality is a long game…. (2023)

Recently, La Tour d’Argent, a standard bearer of la grande cuisine since the 1500s – where kings and emperors have feasted, where the fork made its French debut – posted a horrifying video on Instagram of a soufflé being murdered at the table. It was scalped by the server, then disemboweled by the spoonful onto […]

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year end: reality is a long game…. (2023)

Recently, La Tour d’Argent, a standard bearer of la grande cuisine since the 1500s – where kings and emperors have feasted, where the fork made its French debut – posted a horrifying video on Instagram of a soufflé being murdered at the table. It was scalped by the server, then disemboweled by the spoonful onto […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: camara… (2019)

– I remember the first time I met Gabriela Camara. My friends and I were standing on the sidewalk outside of her new restaurant Contramar in Mexico City.  The sun was bright, the sky was clear, and spirits were high. Yet Camara managed to outshine all of it with her colorful entrance. Mexican by birth, […]

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12 days of christmas: camara… (2019)

– I remember the first time I met Gabriela Camara. My friends and I were standing on the sidewalk outside of her new restaurant Contramar in Mexico City.  The sun was bright, the sky was clear, and spirits were high. Yet Camara managed to outshine all of it with her colorful entrance. Mexican by birth, […]

Continue

december dozen…

– The email I hope to get each year finally arrived. Christopher Kostow and The Restaurant at Meadowood will be hosting its eleventh annual Twelve Days of Christmas, which will benefit the St. Helena Preschool for All.  And for the seventh year, I’m the lucky guy who gets to go to Napa Valley in December […]

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december dozen…

– The email I hope to get each year finally arrived. Christopher Kostow and The Restaurant at Meadowood will be hosting its eleventh annual Twelve Days of Christmas, which will benefit the St. Helena Preschool for All.  And for the seventh year, I’m the lucky guy who gets to go to Napa Valley in December […]

Continue

favorites of 2018: the restaurant edition…

– Last year, I got pretty worked up about an insultingly bad meal I had in 2017. This year I have no barns to burn; only good news to share.

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favorites of 2018: the restaurant edition…

– Last year, I got pretty worked up about an insultingly bad meal I had in 2017. This year I have no barns to burn; only good news to share.

Continue

kansas city: talking food…

– Did you know that salmon not only find their way up rivers to spawn, but they’re able to find the specific feeder branch, upstream, where they hatched?   It’s amazing. But in Norway, scientists have noticed that wild salmon are struggling to find their home streams. Wild salmon that have been tagged and tracked […]

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kansas city: talking food…

– Did you know that salmon not only find their way up rivers to spawn, but they’re able to find the specific feeder branch, upstream, where they hatched?   It’s amazing. But in Norway, scientists have noticed that wild salmon are struggling to find their home streams. Wild salmon that have been tagged and tracked […]

Continue

favorite desserts of 2018…

– I have little to add to the thoughts that I previously recorded about pastryland in 2016, and which I reiterated in 2017. The majority of desserts I encounter in restaurants continues to be overwrought.  Sadly, excessive plating remains a popular style.  And pastry chefs haven’t lost their interest in unorthodox (sometimes bizarre) ingredients. In 2018, […]

Continue

favorite desserts of 2018…

– I have little to add to the thoughts that I previously recorded about pastryland in 2016, and which I reiterated in 2017. The majority of desserts I encounter in restaurants continues to be overwrought.  Sadly, excessive plating remains a popular style.  And pastry chefs haven’t lost their interest in unorthodox (sometimes bizarre) ingredients. In 2018, […]

Continue

favorite dishes of 2018…

– Before I get on with telling you about my favorite whatnots from 2018, there’s something I’d like to discuss with you.  What follows is partly an explanation, partly an admission, and all of it a disclaimer. –

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favorite dishes of 2018…

– Before I get on with telling you about my favorite whatnots from 2018, there’s something I’d like to discuss with you.  What follows is partly an explanation, partly an admission, and all of it a disclaimer. –

Continue

travel: field and stream… (2018)

– Some of my happiest moments in 2018 were spent waist-high in cold water.  On especially good days, the sun glinted off the rushing stream, and glistened at the seams of the slow-moving eddies and pools into which my mind swirled.  In those peaceful afternoons, tiny flies hung in the air like a thousand points […]

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travel: field and stream… (2018)

– Some of my happiest moments in 2018 were spent waist-high in cold water.  On especially good days, the sun glinted off the rushing stream, and glistened at the seams of the slow-moving eddies and pools into which my mind swirled.  In those peaceful afternoons, tiny flies hung in the air like a thousand points […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: kostow… (2018)

– All of the guest chefs have left.  On the last night of this year’s Twelve Days of Christmas at The Restaurant at Meadowood – the 120th dinner, and my 72nd – the kitchen returned to the hosting chef Christopher Kostow and his team.

Continue

12 days of christmas: kostow… (2018)

– All of the guest chefs have left.  On the last night of this year’s Twelve Days of Christmas at The Restaurant at Meadowood – the 120th dinner, and my 72nd – the kitchen returned to the hosting chef Christopher Kostow and his team.

Continue

12 days of christmas: atsumi… (2018)

– I’ve had two excellent meals at Clown Bar, and my enthusiasm for that restaurant has been recorded on this blog (here, and here, and here again). This beautifully preserved bistro is in the 11eme of Paris, just next to the Cirque d’Hiver.  I regret not having gone earlier, as I’m sure I missed many […]

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12 days of christmas: atsumi… (2018)

– I’ve had two excellent meals at Clown Bar, and my enthusiasm for that restaurant has been recorded on this blog (here, and here, and here again). This beautifully preserved bistro is in the 11eme of Paris, just next to the Cirque d’Hiver.  I regret not having gone earlier, as I’m sure I missed many […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: ros… (2018)

– Slovenia is a small country, she told me. You can go from the beach to skiing in less than an hour. Wedged between Italy, Austria, Croatia, and Hungry, it’s a dynamic crossroad for wildly different cultures and culinary traditions.  And Ana Ros, chef of the Hiša Franko in Kobarid near the Italian border, is […]

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12 days of christmas: ros… (2018)

– Slovenia is a small country, she told me. You can go from the beach to skiing in less than an hour. Wedged between Italy, Austria, Croatia, and Hungry, it’s a dynamic crossroad for wildly different cultures and culinary traditions.  And Ana Ros, chef of the Hiša Franko in Kobarid near the Italian border, is […]

Continue