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 […]

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12 days of christmas: tusk… (2018)

– There are few chefs I know who can and will hand-make pasta on-the-road at events.  Michael Tusk is one of them.  He’s the chef and owner of the wildly popular Cotogna and three Michelin-starred restaurant Quince, both in the Jackson Square neighborhood of San Francisco.  He’s about to open a cave à vin and […]

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12 days of christmas: tusk… (2018)

– There are few chefs I know who can and will hand-make pasta on-the-road at events.  Michael Tusk is one of them.  He’s the chef and owner of the wildly popular Cotogna and three Michelin-starred restaurant Quince, both in the Jackson Square neighborhood of San Francisco.  He’s about to open a cave à vin and […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: cogley & moran… (2018)

– I first attended the Twelve Days of Christmas in 2012.  A few months later, in March of 2013, Justin Cogley, chef of Aubergine at the l’Auberge Carmel in Carmel-by-the-Sea, asked me to photograph an event he called Rediscovering Coastal Cuisine. In the years since, I have returned annually to photograph both events. In February […]

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12 days of christmas: cogley & moran… (2018)

– I first attended the Twelve Days of Christmas in 2012.  A few months later, in March of 2013, Justin Cogley, chef of Aubergine at the l’Auberge Carmel in Carmel-by-the-Sea, asked me to photograph an event he called Rediscovering Coastal Cuisine. In the years since, I have returned annually to photograph both events. In February […]

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12 days of christmas: amaro… (2018)

– Everything was gigantic in Warsaw.  The buildings were gigantic – enormous concrete structures that stretched as far as I could see.  Those city blocks were gigantic too. What looked like a short walk on a map, to my surprise, took three or four times as long as I estimated. But amidst all of the […]

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12 days of christmas: amaro… (2018)

– Everything was gigantic in Warsaw.  The buildings were gigantic – enormous concrete structures that stretched as far as I could see.  Those city blocks were gigantic too. What looked like a short walk on a map, to my surprise, took three or four times as long as I estimated. But amidst all of the […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: kim… (2018)

– As I have noted many times in the past, one of the best things about the Twelve Days of Christmas is the cultural exchange that happens in the kitchen among visiting chefs and the cooks at The Restaurant at Meadowood.  Often working across language barriers – as was the case with Byung-jin Kim, chef […]

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12 days of christmas: kim… (2018)

– As I have noted many times in the past, one of the best things about the Twelve Days of Christmas is the cultural exchange that happens in the kitchen among visiting chefs and the cooks at The Restaurant at Meadowood.  Often working across language barriers – as was the case with Byung-jin Kim, chef […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: seidler… (2018)

– Kamilla Seidler was a name unfamiliar to me until this year’s Twelve Days of Christmas at The Restaurant at Meadowood. Committed to championing social equality, in 2012, this Danish chef moved to La Paz, Bolivia to open a culinary school and restaurant (Gustu) to bring culinary education to an under-developed part of South America. […]

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12 days of christmas: seidler… (2018)

– Kamilla Seidler was a name unfamiliar to me until this year’s Twelve Days of Christmas at The Restaurant at Meadowood. Committed to championing social equality, in 2012, this Danish chef moved to La Paz, Bolivia to open a culinary school and restaurant (Gustu) to bring culinary education to an under-developed part of South America. […]

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12 days of christmas: lowe… (2018)

– In 2011, I met a young, clear-minded chef in Paris named James Lowe.  At the time, he was the head chef of St. John Bread & Wine in London. He would subsequently help found the Young Turks, a collaboration with fellow young guns Ben Greeno (who subsequently went on to open momofuku Seiobo in Sydney, […]

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12 days of christmas: lowe… (2018)

– In 2011, I met a young, clear-minded chef in Paris named James Lowe.  At the time, he was the head chef of St. John Bread & Wine in London. He would subsequently help found the Young Turks, a collaboration with fellow young guns Ben Greeno (who subsequently went on to open momofuku Seiobo in Sydney, […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: largey… (2018)

– I met Jessica Largey at the Twelve Days of Christmas in 2013.    At the time, she was the chef de cuisine at Manresa under chef David Kinch, who had been invited to cook on Day 11 that year.  In the five years since, she has won the James Beard Award for Rising Star, […]

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12 days of christmas: largey… (2018)

– I met Jessica Largey at the Twelve Days of Christmas in 2013.    At the time, she was the chef de cuisine at Manresa under chef David Kinch, who had been invited to cook on Day 11 that year.  In the five years since, she has won the James Beard Award for Rising Star, […]

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12 days of christmas: pynt… (2018)

– I perked up when I first heard about a restaurant in Singapore named Burnt Ends. (For the uninitiated, burnt ends are those charred “bits and bobs,” or “bark” of barbecued beef brisket first made famous in my hometown of Kansas City – the undisputed capital of American barbecue). I didn’t visit David Pynt’s restaurant when […]

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12 days of christmas: pynt… (2018)

– I perked up when I first heard about a restaurant in Singapore named Burnt Ends. (For the uninitiated, burnt ends are those charred “bits and bobs,” or “bark” of barbecued beef brisket first made famous in my hometown of Kansas City – the undisputed capital of American barbecue). I didn’t visit David Pynt’s restaurant when […]

Continue

12 days of christmas: enrique… (2018)

– For six years now, I’ve had the pleasure of dining at The Restaurant at Meadowood the night before the first night of the Twelve Days of Christmas with the first guest chef of the holiday series.  Not only does that meal telegraph some of what is to come from the Meadowood kitchen in the […]

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12 days of christmas: enrique… (2018)

– For six years now, I’ve had the pleasure of dining at The Restaurant at Meadowood the night before the first night of the Twelve Days of Christmas with the first guest chef of the holiday series.  Not only does that meal telegraph some of what is to come from the Meadowood kitchen in the […]

Continue

travel: personal history… (amsterdam; 2018)

– Why hadn’t I spent more time appreciating this place? A mild sense of regret trickled through me as I stepped out of the train station and into Leiden, a beautifully preserved Dutch town cut with canals and dotted with windmills.  Clean and uncluttered, Leiden is the Dutch postcard that Amsterdam is not. I am […]

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travel: personal history… (amsterdam; 2018)

– Why hadn’t I spent more time appreciating this place? A mild sense of regret trickled through me as I stepped out of the train station and into Leiden, a beautifully preserved Dutch town cut with canals and dotted with windmills.  Clean and uncluttered, Leiden is the Dutch postcard that Amsterdam is not. I am […]

Continue