The biggest thing that I learned is when you're building something - especially a project that requires partners - you have to make sure that there is a lot of overlapping desire and a lot of overlapping alignment with the people that you're doing work with.
As a young boy growing up in New York City, we would spend our summers on the South Fork of Long Island. My dad would take me down to the beach at low tide. We would walk a mile down to the jetties, and he would lower me by my ankles into the crevices between the massive boulders to grab at huge ropes of mussels.
After attending The Dalton School and then Vassar College, I began cooking in New York City restaurants helmed by Anne Rosenzweig, Joachim Splichal and Thomas Keller.
A five-pound boneless rolled-and-tied breast of veal, like any other piece of meat fit for braising, can come in many shapes and sizes. So recipe times aren't uniformly applicable. A long and thin tied roast will cook more quickly than its stouter, football-shaped cousin.
In tribal Botswana, I received some woven necklaces and a handmade bow with three poison arrows. It's framed and hanging on the wall in my living room and is, without a doubt, one of my favorite possessions.
The big mistake people make is eating their grilled beef hot. I prefer room temperature or cool. When the meat rests and starts to get cool, all of that fat goes back into the muscles and becomes much more tender.
If there's one thing I've learned after a lifetime of dining on delicacies like blood pudding, sea squirts, and camel kidneys, even folks who wouldn't come within 100 yards of a Cambodian tarantula want to hear what it's like to chomp on one!
Let me say this: Camel is delicious, but when handled improperly, it's rank.
The summer after college, I got a job as a chef at Conscience Point Inn in Southampton. I spent the summer on the water and cemented my expertise with seafood. I've always gravitated toward places that do seafood.
I'm obsessed with Chinese food and culture. It's food that I adore above all others.
I've spent time in the coastal Carolinas and have seen what small business development has done to maintain the wetlands and reestablish the fisheries and secure jobs for the people that make their living off the water.
If you're not out testing what's complementary to your brand, you're not making the most of your income potential.
Copper is a superb cooking metal, conducting heat so evenly it has unparalleled control, especially at low temperatures.
Don't pile your tomatoes in a container that doesn't breathe. I like my baskets or grass mesh plates, and I layer them single deep, stem end down to prevent bruises and premature rotting.
For wok cooking, use oils with a high smoke point and low polyunsaturated-fat content: grapeseed oil, peanut oil, etc. Sesame oil and olive oil will burn and taste bitter. Oils with high polyunsaturated-fat contents like soybean oil will also make your food texturally unpleasant.
The jambalaya of the American South owes a lot to the cuisines of the islands and western Africa, and it's my favorite of this type of one-pot cookery.
Surrounded by a sweltering state known for its staunch conservatism, Austin is an oasis. It's home to the University of Texas, which continuously fosters a well-educated youth culture who have been funneling their collective creative energy into building a vibrant music, film, and technology scene for decades.
Don't ripen picked tomatoes in the sun. Put underripe tomatoes and stone fruits in a paper bag in cool, dark place, and magic happens. And never, ever store them in the fridge: they turn mushy and flavorless.
I find that most home cooks don't get vinegars. They're misunderstood, mostly due to the factory-made red wine vinegar that everyone commonly cooks with... that, and the giant gallon of white distilled vinegar that we all use, mostly to clean and disinfect things!
Way back in the day, I used to cook for Thomas Keller at Rakel in New York City. Keller is a down to earth, kind, supportive person. I wish people could see that.
