My fourth year of working in restaurants and living in a school bus is coming to a close. For the last few Decembers, I’ve relocated my bus to Florida because I swore I’d never suffer through another Midwest winter. This year, however, my position in the R & D and Fermentation Lab at Audrey Restaurant […]
Peter Glatz
After the passing of his wife, Julianne (former Illinois Times food columnist), Peter Glatz decided to retire from a 40-year career as a dentist to reinvent himself as a chef at the age of 66. In his short culinary career, he has worked at Chicago’s Michelin-starred Elizabeth Restaurant, Oklahoma City’s Nonesuch (Bon Appetit’s “America’s Best New Restaurant- 2018), Savannah’s The Grey, and Spoon and Stable in Minneapolis.
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Pumpkin like you’ve never had it before
Gnocchi, pronounced N’YAW-kee, are little pieces of dough, usually round or oblong in shape, which are boiled in water or broth and tossed in a sauce. The word gnocchi is the plural of the Italian word gnocco, which means “little lump.” They are usually made from potatoes, but regional variants exist, including ones made with […]
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The humble, underappreciated parsnip
A fall frost warning announces the end of the road for most of the garden vegetables we’ve enjoyed over the summer. Happily, there are a few vegetables that reach their pinnacle of deliciousness when the cold weather arrives. Winter sweetening is a phenomenon that enhances the flavor of cole crops such as kale, collards and […]
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Going nuts about butternut
The R&D and Fermentation Lab at Chef Sean Brock’s Audrey restaurant in Nashville is one of only three of its kind in the whole world, the other two being in Copenhagen. My job in the lab is to find ways to unlock hidden flavors from foods through ancient food preservation practices like lactic acid and […]
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Pickle your green tomatoes
As I write this column, the first day of fall is just a couple days away, yet it’s still feeling like summer. The afternoon temperature has climbed into the 90s and the tomato vines are still bearing fruit, but I know that somewhere around the corner, a killing frost is coming. According to the National […]
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Frontiers of flavor
When folks ask me what I do at my new job, I like to steal a line from Egon Spengler (played by the late Harold Ramis) from the 1984 movie Ghostbusters: “I collect spores, molds and fungus.” I’m working in the glass-encased, high-tech Research and Development Lab of Chef Sean Brock’s Audrey and June Restaurants […]
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Don’t throw away your cantaloupe rinds
The latest stop in my culinary journey has landed me in the Research and Development and Fermentation Laboratory of Audrey, Sean Brock’s new restaurant in Nashville. The lab manager, Elliot Silber, holds a degree in food chemistry from McGill University, in addition to being a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America. He is passionate […]
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Tender, flavorful chicken breasts
Chicken breasts can often be quite dry and bland. They have a low fat-to-protein ratio, and fat content is a major contributor to flavor and moistness. Chicken breasts just aren’t something you can throw in a pan and come up with something flavorful. Nonetheless, they are extremely popular and convenient because they cook quickly, but […]
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The Oklahoma onion burger
I’m back in Oklahoma City for a few weeks, helping out at Nonesuch, the restaurant I worked at before the pandemic. Our bus is encamped at a peaceful spot beneath a big oak tree at the farm of Nonesuch’s general manager. The daily high temperatures have been over 100 degrees F every single day of […]
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Lentils grow on you
Lentils, whose scientific name is Lens culinaris, are little legumes with lens-shaped seeds. One of our most ancient food crops, lentils were first cultivated 10,000 years ago in an area of the Middle East known as the Fertile Crescent. Lentils are an inexpensive source of high-quality protein and fiber and are becoming increasingly popular as […]
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Homemade Sriracha
I spent the first month of the summer working at a camp in Washington’s Cascade mountains with a cellphone signal that flip-flopped between one bar and “No Service.” Though I was by no means “off the grid,” I wasn’t able to get my Facebook and Instagram feeds to refresh, so I pretty much gave up […]
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What I learned at summer camp
“Oh my goodness! What have I gotten myself into this time?” It’s 5 a.m. and the sun is about to rise. I’m in the Pacific Northwest working as a head cook at a summer camp for kids. In about three hours, I have to have breakfast ready for 120 campers and 40 staff. After I […]
