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rumination 24: get back to business…
Almost every law school student takes the same, core classes their first year (although my law school did not require Evidence, required by most). My favorite of these was Constitutional Law, which...
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review: cab ride to crazy town…
~ It’s not every day that one gets kidnapped on the way to dinner, as I was on my way to Jungsik. Afterwards, I read Pete Wells’s review of that restaurant in the New York Times and realized that my...
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rumination 25: hospitality…
Last year, Alan Richman penned a barn-burner review of M. Wells in GQ Magazine entitled “Dinner for Schmucks.” More than a critique, that article operated as a commentary on the seemingly deteriorating...
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travel: peripatetic…
~ I apologize for my silence. I’ve been on the road. In the last month and a half, I’ve crossed this continent four times, bouncing between New York and San Francisco, San Diego and Burlington,...
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travel: meet-ups and eat-ups…
~ Aaron and Chrissy are getting married! In Tahoe! I didn’t have time to go home between the Bocuse d’Or training session and the wedding, so I headed straight from The Greenbrier to San Francisco. It...
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travel: cryptozoology…
~ They say – and locals seem to truly believe – that a monster lives in Lake Champlain. They call him Champ. The sightings have been many, and surprisingly consistent over decades. And, as far as...
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travel: beach buffet…
~ When my plane lifted off the field at Kansas City, after sitting on the tarmac for nearly an hour, I knew, already, that I would miss my connection to San Diego, the last one for the day. I was going...
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rumination 26: show, don’t tell…
Yesterday, I was reminded of the most important lesson that I learned in my four years as a film and creative writing student in college: show, don’t tell.* After dining at Eleven Madison Park, which...
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travel: america’s resort…
~ Having now spent nearly two weeks, collectively, at The Greenbrier photographing for the Bocuse d’Or USA Foundation, I have learned one thing: at The Greenbrier, anything is possible. On my first...
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travel: sense of urgency…
~ While walking through the administrative back-end of TKRG (Thomas Keller Restaurant Group), a village of offices in a compound, including The French Laundry, inter-connected by trellised walkways,...
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travel: exclusionist, expressive, evocative…
~ This one goes to all the chefs out there: Beyond the bespoke ingredients you use, what sets your food apart from your peers’ cooking? Why would someone travel – sometimes at great expense – to your...
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travel: daily wipe-downs…
~ As a boy raised on the prairie plains of a Midwestern border state eating fried chicken and barbecue, I like to think that I have a particularly close kinship to Southerners. Whether it’s true or...
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review: gently smoked… (asador etxebarri)
~ Is it a coincidence that some of the world’s most renowned restaurants are located in some of the most remote corners or our world? Of course not. Special journeys make for special occasions. But...
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review: realm of intuition… (addison)
~ The drive up to The Grand Del Mar, a Relais & Chateaux property in the hills above San Diego, is particularly beautiful at sunset, when the sprawling estate, with its peachy, hacienda-styled...
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review: mobilizing… (port fonda)
~ It’s probably fair to criticize me for not writing more about Kansas City. Although I have spent most of the last two years traveling and eating around the world, Kansas City is still the city I call...
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dinner: the show must go on…
~ As the nation watched Hurricane Sandy plow into the Eastern seaboard, submerging subway trains and flooding the field at LaGuardia airport, I sat at home on the phone with Debbie Gold, executive...
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preview: twelve days of christmas…
~ In September, while I was in Napa, I spent a fair amount of time at Meadowood Napa Valley, a Relais & Châteaux resort in St. Helena, and home to the three Michelin-starred Restaurant at...
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travel: caricatures and meatsnacks…
~ Hurricane Sandy spurred an inspiring rally rise of support among chefs and restaurant industry folk in New York City. Overnight, Pete Wells, the reigning restaurant reporter at The New York Times...
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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 approachGeorgia? Is this love? In an exchange I had...
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review: sensationalist success… (lady & sons)
~ I solicited nearly a dozen of my most well-traveled friends for dining suggestions in Savannah. Without exception, every one of them – including a friend who forwarded me a fairly long list – told...
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