favorite desserts of 2019…

Is it me, or is pastryland slowly coming back down to earth? After years of frenetic experimentation and exploration, it seems like pastry chefs are finally getting back in touch with reality. There are still plenty of exciting and unexpected (and, yes, sometimes bizarre) ideas coming out of pastry kitchens. And sadly, one of the […]

Continue

favorite desserts of 2019…

Is it me, or is pastryland slowly coming back down to earth? After years of frenetic experimentation and exploration, it seems like pastry chefs are finally getting back in touch with reality. There are still plenty of exciting and unexpected (and, yes, sometimes bizarre) ideas coming out of pastry kitchens. And sadly, one of the […]

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 […]

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 […]

Continue

travel: leapfrogging…

~ Another year is gone, and I’ve barely written about it.  This is especially sad to me, since so many wonderful things happened. Every year, I pause at calendar’s end to record and remember the anxieties and adventures that made the preceding months memorable, including an accounting of all the restaurants I visited, and my favorite meals and dishes among […]

Continue

travel: leapfrogging…

~ Another year is gone, and I’ve barely written about it.  This is especially sad to me, since so many wonderful things happened. Every year, I pause at calendar’s end to record and remember the anxieties and adventures that made the preceding months memorable, including an accounting of all the restaurants I visited, and my favorite meals and dishes among […]

Continue

travel: between bike rides and barbecues…

~ Does the sun set more colorfully in South Carolina?  Do flavors speak more honestly the closer you get to Mississippi?  Does time slow as you approach Georgia?  Is this love? In an exchange I had with a Southern chef recently, I wrote: “Even though I have spent my entire life outside of the South, […]

Continue

travel: between bike rides and barbecues…

~ Does the sun set more colorfully in South Carolina?  Do flavors speak more honestly the closer you get to Mississippi?  Does time slow as you approach Georgia?  Is this love? In an exchange I had with a Southern chef recently, I wrote: “Even though I have spent my entire life outside of the South, […]

Continue

travel: southern, by the grace of god…

If you’ve been to the South and didn’t leave smelling like bourbon and barbecue, then you had best go back and do it right. The scene of the last chapter of this most amazing year of travel and eating for me was set among the palmettos and live oaks of the Lowcountry. On 20,000-acres of […]

Continue

travel: southern, by the grace of god…

If you’ve been to the South and didn’t leave smelling like bourbon and barbecue, then you had best go back and do it right. The scene of the last chapter of this most amazing year of travel and eating for me was set among the palmettos and live oaks of the Lowcountry. On 20,000-acres of […]

Continue