Chefs You Should Know
Emily鈥檚 served as a creative incubator for the cooks who worked there. In our downtime, we swapped the latest books and magazines, mining them for techniques and flavors to infuse into the menus we
What Chefs Really Think About Kitchen Scars
Young cooks are instantly identified by the rows of scars running up their forearms: the reminders of brief skin-singeing encounters with blazing hot oven racks and pan handles. A cook鈥檚 relative
Why I Tell Pastry Students 'Imagine Yourself as a Tiny Milk Fat Particle'
As a pastry chef, one might say that I鈥檓 already hard-wired to think a bit deeper about the composition and function of ingredients. I like to say that the primary difference between a pastry chef and
Putting in Solo Time: How Chef Michael Laiskonis Refines His Craft Alone in the Kitchen
My cooking career began at a tiny bakery in the outlying suburbs of Detroit almost 25 years ago. What started as 鈥渏ust a job鈥 quickly became a compulsion: in cooking I found the satisfaction of manual
Making Every Move Count: Cooking With Economy
Describing the kitchen as tiny would be an understatement 鈥 there was barely enough room for three cooks. The chef and owner, Rick Halberg, became my first important mentor. While I learned a lot from
Always Forward: Pastry Chef Michael Laiskonis Sets Goals for the New Year
Five years ago this month, I completed an eight-year run as the pastry chef at Le Bernardin, satisfied (as much as one can be) that I had achieved a handful of notable accomplishments: a James Beard
Borrowing Lessons from Architecture in the Pastry Kitchen
I think a lot about architecture and design. It's a closet interest of mine, though I must admit that my passion is limited to: I don't know much about architecture, but I know what I like. One of the
New York's 'Golden Age' of Chocolate
With the industrial revolution of the 1800s, chocolate and cocoa made an interesting transition from the beverage served at coffeehouses and pharmacies into the realm of confections. The innovation of
In Search of Chocolate in Old NYC: A Quest for Clues
Among those merchant families importing beans, the first glimpse of cocoa processing can be found on the island. By the end of the American Revolution and the turn of the 19 th century, the city grew
In Search of Chocolate in Old New York City
Considering our new digs in the oldest part of the city, it hit me that perhaps we were bringing chocolate back to the neighborhood鈥攐ld New Amsterdam. I began to ponder the chocolate history of New
Refining and Conching: Unlock the Bean's Potential
The final steps in processing our bean-to-bar chocolate make up the longest phase of the manufacturing process鈥攁 waiting game where the true essence of the bean, its complex flavor and its silky
Evidence of a Life in the Kitchen
Young cooks are instantly identified by the rows of scars running up their forearms: the reminders of brief skin-singeing encounters with blazing hot oven racks and pan handles. A cook鈥檚 relative