About Me:
I love food. It started really when I was very young. My parents never cooked, so “what’s for dinner” turned into a pile of take-out and delivery menus. I soon realized I could eat whatever I wanted if I just found the right recipe. Collecting recipes became an obsession, and homework trips to the Bryant Library turned into spent hours in the cooking section. I watched Jeff Smith on The Frugal Gourmet whenever it was on. I soon prepared my own breakfasts, bagged my own school lunches, and prepared my own dinners. This was around first grade.
Then when I was 13, my close friend who had just moved from Sichuan, China invited me to spend the summer with him and his family in the heart of China. I didn’t expect my parents to let me go; but they did. The burn of spicy peppers, sweetness of soy milk, saltiness of MSG, and smooth textures of offal were all exciting and alive. I came home steaming rice and visiting Flushing on weekends.
But it wasn’t until College that I became obsessed with food. I spent 5 years living in New York as a student where I experienced a wide variety of incredible foods (during a time when I probably should have been studying). In between classes, I would cook when time permitted (and when I had access to a kitchen). My senior year, I spent my Saturdays taking classes at the French Culinary Institute. When I wasn’t cooking, I was eating. My food journal has grown to over 400 documented restaurants in these past 5 years ranging from marathon meals at Masa to scoops of gelato at Il Laboratorio, and many places in between.
In college I studied French, Spanish, and Japanese. I could flip through a book and put a few sentences together; but I wasn’t conversational and no where near fluent. So after I graduated, I was determined to speak these three languages. The summer of graduation I moved to Buenos Aires, Argentina, lived with a guest family, and enrolled in immersive Spanish courses. Later that fall, I moved to Paris with a guest family, enrolled in L’Alliance Française. 6-months quickly turned into two years. When I wasn’t studying and speaking French, I was eating. My journal of Parisian restaurants quickly crossed 200.
I am now preparing to spend a year in Japan. Save my favorite for last, I suppose.
And so my food experiences have been wide-ranging. I have no preference for haute cuisine, just for good food. In fact, I’m really turned off by pretense and the way it negatively affects my experience. My favorite restaurants in New York currently are L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon and Blue Hill at Stone Barns, two places I really miss. The best meal of my life took place at the Tapas Molecular Bar in Tokyo, the thought of which continues to make me hungry. My experience at El Poblet, Spain is not far behind. And if I had to choose a favorite restaurant in the US, it would be Urasawa, in Los Angeles, California. Favorite restaurant in France, no question, L’Ambroisie.
I love the way a meal can bring together a group of totally different people to satisfy a common desire, even if they don’t speak the same language or share many of the same interests. I love the feeling of spending a day in the kitchen and watching friends and family (hopefully) enjoying my attempt at creativity. Food is a unique way to connect people and, in the case of living in a foreign country, tells a lot about the culture.
Stay tuned, it’s bound to make you hungry.
- Adam
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