Mise En Place

When we serve an entree to friends that is accompanied by a story about how your mother, grandmother or Uncle Henry prepared this dish, I am sure it will start a wave of nostalgia from your guests about their own remembered recipes. We all have them, even about the ones that were not especially ready for the New York Times cooking section. My grandmother was an amazing cook, my mother, well, not so much. It wasn’t that she did not learn the skills but she had to cook for my father who possessed a rather limited palate. That being said, I cannot walk down the canned vegetable aisle, see Green Giant creamed corn and not think of my mother pouring it into a saucepan while giving my father a cold stare. READ MORE

I decided to do an inventory of myself as if I was a recipe. I mentally laid out the “I ams.” I am an accomplished entrepreneur, a husband, a brother, a friend, a mature athlete, a reader, a traveler, a writer and a cook. I did not lose these aspects of my life when the doors closed on the restaurant. I believe that if more people took the culinary phrase that titles this missive and applied it to their lives they would be as satisfied as I am becoming. READ MORE