How this began

As you can see from the photo, wax Robin Williams has more talent than real me.  I need to learn how to take selfies.  

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I love to taste and love to reverse engineer things that I’ve tasted.  I do go to the internet for hints, suggestions, and recipes.

 

What makes me different than other foodies or food bloggers or amateur cooks, or professional cooks or chefs?  Probably not a whole lot.  For the most part those people might be my people as long as they are not pretentious a$$holes.  Disdain for pretense is why I don’t refer to myself as chef, it is a title that I have not earned.

 

I recall many years ago sitting at the bar at Blue Ribbon, Sullivan St. between Prince and Spring – SOHO.  Blue Ribbon kept the hours of 4:00 PM - 4:00 AM and became the local after hours place for others in the food business.  Who sits next to me?  Daniel Boulud.  I did not know who he was, though I had eaten a Le Cirque when he was the executive chef there.  This was the mid 90’s.  He was very nice, we had a great conversation.  He even remembered me when I ran into him some month later at the same bar.  I had similar encounters with Mario Batali and other chefs from around the city.  All of them were super nice.

 

This whole effort of posting my cooking activities happened during the COVID pandemic.  Since I no longer had the 2 hour per day commute, and was lucky enough to work from home, I figured why not just record what I’m already cooking and put it out there.  I add a splash of humor to it and hopefully make someone happy when they try it at home.  As you see from my videos, I’m not professional in any way.  Just want to have a little fun and share.

 

 Here’s the history of how I became me if you are so inclined to read it, otherwise – let’s get cooking.

 

I was born a poor black child.  No, but I do identify with Steve Martin’s character in, “The Jerk”.  Not on a ridiculous level, but as a guy who has said a lot of really stupid things and then looked back on it after having been properly schooled on the subject.  My journey through the appreciation of food, wine, and sprits is no different.  I’ve had strong opinions on things that have changed, grown, or softened over the years.

If I could offer any advice for anyone, it is: Taste everything, try again every 5 years.  That is pretty much why I now enjoy caviar, oysters, and sea urchin, and still enjoy White Castle to Foie Gras, and sauternes to retsina.  There is a flavor for every mood and every occasion.

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I have always been one of those people that lives to eat, well really to taste.  Have always been fascinated with flavor. 

 

If I had to draw a road map of where I started and how I arrived here, I’d say it really began when my parents took me to “Sonny D’s”, a restaurant that no longer exists, but my first fancy restaurant that had decadent food.  Sonny, the owner catered one of Frank Sinatra’s events and that was how my parents learned about the restaurant; from a news article describing the event and food.   This was likely the very late 70’s or very early 80’s.  Don’t get me wrong, my mom was a good cook, my dad’s mom was a good cook, and my mom’s mom was a good cook.

 

Influencers existed long before the internet.  Frank Sinatra’s praise for Sonny D was what put him on our map.

 

Strange thoughts came to me, like when Roger Moore, playing James Bond ordered Bollinger RD 1952 or when Pierce Brosnan, playing Remington Steele was dumped into a vat of wine and surfaced exclaiming that is was an excellent Cabernet Sauvignon, I had questions.

 

Watched a lot of Julia Child, Jacques Pepin, The Frugal Gourmet (Jeff Smith), and others on the telley (you must say it with a British accent).  Sad to learn the news on Jeff Smith later in life, but his cooking show was my influence, not his lifestyle. 

 

Had a subscription to Food & Wine and Chocolatier magazine for many years and tried many of the recipes.  Dedicated Sundays to tasting a new wine as described in the pages. 

 

Learned about the Zagat guide and visited many of the top rated restaurants of the 90’s, many times alone.  Every time I see “American Psycho” playing on cable, it brings back such memories….

 

It always annoyed me that a steak house could have the same rating as a French restaurant serving haute cuisine in the Zagat guide.  I get it, Peter Luger serves an awesome steak.  The porterhouse at Lugers is among the best I’ve ever tasted, but skill of the likes of Andres Saultner from Lutece is pretty much unparalleled.  The net of it is that both types of places produce their own art.   

 

Then the Food Network happened.  I was a David Rosengarten groupie.  The term foodie was invented around that time, and I had it bad.

 

In 1992, I attended the wine school at Windows on the World, with Kevin Zraly.  It was more a social event than a real class, but it was very well structured as week by week we tasted wines from all of the wine producing regions of the world.  Windows on the world was my very first food and wine pairing experience.

 

In the summer of 1997, while all of North Jersey was at the Jersey Shore, and all of New York City was in the Hamptons, I attended the French Culinary institute for a 22 week course called “La Technique”.  Every Saturday from 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM, learned the basic techniques.  Knife skills, basic sauces, stocks, different cooking techniques.  I always wondered that if I made stock, how would I know if I did it correctly.  This gave me an opportunity to touch taste and smell real veal stock and real demi-glace.  It also opened the opportunity for me to see guest speakers that visited the school.  I met Alan Sailhac, Jacques Pepin, Jacques Torres, Andres Saultner, Dan Leader, and others at different talks at the school.

 

In 1998, I attended class at the then WSET, wine and sprit education trust, for a certificate in wine tasting.  This was a more serious class than was Windows on the world. 

 

Then the Internet happened.   I know there was always dial up and message boards, but the easy internet that we love today didn’t really take off until 97 – 98 ish.

 

I appreciate pretty much every wine for what it is.  And yeah, I’ll drink a retsina with the cuisine that matches.  In the words of Kevin Zraly, I hunt for every day wine, once a week wine, once a month wine, once a year wine, holiday wine, special occasion wine, and lifetime achievement wine.  I think I have more categories than he originally stated, but follow the same sentiment.  I still love big oaky chardonnays, though I now lean to more fruit up front and subtle chards.  My across the street neighbor always trips me up when he brings over an old cab.  I never guess correctly because old cabs don’t smell or taste like young cabs or even age appropriate cabs. 

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I met my wife that very same year, 1998.  I know that I tricked her into marrying me with food.  For more than 20 years, I’ve been tempting her with deliciousness.  

 

I’m still a computer programmer by day, but I am the cook at home and my family is spoiled.  Our biggest problem now is that the restaurants that are truly better than 23 Magnolia, (my house) are very expensive.  The family joke; this food is not nearly as good as 23 Magnolia.  I’m always looking for something that can’t yet be done at 23 Magnolia, and then with a little research and practice, I do it.

 

Still, there are some things you can’t do at home.  You can’t make White Castle hamburgers  from scratch at home, you can try, but you’ll never get it right.  First you need to find a blue cow…..