Behind The Food Road Less Traveled

What makes someone think they can become a food blogger? What in the world makes one think they are qualified? Well, in my case, It's roughly 40 years of restaurant and food service experience. 

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At various times I have supported myself and paid my bills as a dishwasher, busser, server, bartender, kitchen manager, front of house manager, or district manager. I have worked in fast food, fine dining, upscale steak houses, hotels, corporate dining, high volume Italian, upscale BBQ joints, and a brewpub.

I have opened new restaurants. created menu's from scratch, & ran a catering company. I have cooked for church auctions and ran holiday restaurant buffets for 100's of people. 

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I even worked at a fast food place in rural Ohio that was frequented often by the local Amish community. After my "promotion" to maintenance guy one of my tasks was to shovel the horse manure off the concrete pad where the Amish folks tied up their buggy's.

That's right. I had a restaurant job where I literally shoveled horse shit. In all my years I've never ran across a coworker who did the same in the restaurant industry.

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While I haven't cooked professionally for about 12 years I still enjoy cooking and making high quality meals for friends and family. And I still work on call as a banquet server and bartender at a large, high end, downtown hotel.

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My tendency when trying new foods or creating dishes at home is to be as true to the original style as I can. When I smoke pork I want it to be as if you were at a decades old, Eastern Carolina BBQ joint. I don't want folks to be able to tell that it was prepared by "some northerner". LOL And I'll match my greens up against any southerner any day. 

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Not everything I make is excellent. I still haven't mastered a good potato salad. That's probably due to my dislike of eggs. But my end goal is that someone eats it and swears that Big Mama or Grand Mama made it. But I'm not there yet.

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When we travel we do copious amounts of research to find the best local place. The goal is to not eat food we can get at home. Where is the best BBQ? If on a coast, where is the best seafood. Fried or raw bar, it doesn't matter. We just want a place the locals love and the tourists aren't aware of.

 Give me a Meat and Three where the locals eat. After a visit to Preident Carter's church in Plains, Georgia, we followed the church crowd into town to eat at a great little diner that was packed with locals in their Sunday finest. 

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Jane and Michael Stern are our heroes. They rarely, if ever, disappoint. Chef's like Sean Brock and Rick Bayless are high on my revered list. They both have a dedication to authenticity in their chosen styles of food. Their recipes always seem to hit exactly right.

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I'm not a writer by trade. My goal is to write well enough that it's not embarrassing. LOL

Fortunately, my wife is an excellent editor. I'm sure she will make me a better writer over time. She also has an extensive background in food. She waited tables for years in a variety of restaurants. And that's actually how we met.

She is an RD and LD with a bachelor's in Nutrition. And, as her passion takes her, she is on the board for a local Farmer's Market organization and was Board Chair through the pandemic.

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So there you have it. Those are all the things that make me feel qualified to write a decent food blog. Those are my bonafides, as it were. We hope you will find the content enjoyable. Please feel free to provide feedback. 

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Happy reading, eating, and drinking. Thanks for stopping by.

David

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