In keeping with my annual tradition of not committing to anything that might make me change my eating habits, once again, I will not make New Year’s resolutions. more...

Christmas morning excitement is an emotion unmatched by any other.

Adult excitement pales in comparison to the holiday-exhilaration recipe of two-parts anticipation, mixed with one part delight, a dab of enchantment, and a pinch of joy that is experienced every Christmas Eve until our pre-teen years sweep the thrills away. more...

For 46 years I have been blessed with excess energy.

I seem to have been born with enough vitality and drive for two people. Though lately, I have been feeling my age.

Sunday I experienced my first “true” day off in six weeks. I planned to stay in bed most of the afternoon and treat myself to a full day of football for the first time since September. more...

At a book signing on the Mississippi Gulf Coast last week, I was hit with a blinding jolt of reality.

I have been a victim of out-of-sight out-of-mind Katrina apathy. My hometown of Hattiesburg was hit hard. Yet we bounced back quickly. more...

Exactly one year ago today I was contacted by a producer of the Travel Channel television program “Bizarre Foods.” He said that they were going to be in the area and asked if I knew of anywhere in, or around, my hometown that served bizarre food. more...

I do not drink coffee.

I wish that I drank coffee. I would love to be referred to as a coffee drinker. “There goes Robert,” they would say. “He’s a coffee drinker.” more...

In the cafeteria scene of the 1978 movie Animal House, John Belushi pops up from behind a table and yells, “Food fight!” Chaos ensues. That was my first exposure to the phenomenon of thrown food. more...

Today is the fifth anniversary of the release of a cookbook that almost wasn’t.

Watercolor artist, Wyatt Waters, and I combined forces five years ago and published a coffee-table cookbook entitled A Southern Palate. more...

Everyone has food quirks. We all prefer certain foods over others. There are plenty of foods that I eat that some folks would never touch, and vice versa. more...

WATERCOLOR, Fla.— It’s fall break at my children’s school. I don’t remember having a Fall Break when I was in school. We were set free the day before Thanksgiving and a week or so at Christmas and that was it. No fall break, no spring break, no teacher’s meeting break, I don’t even think that we got a break between classes. more...

I am in an egg phase.

As I look back over my 46-year eating career, it’s easy to chart my personal dining tendencies. I’ll get on a barbeque kick for a few weeks, or go for months eating a certain dish from the same restaurant over and over. more...

“Drugged lamb shanks missing from clinic.” I can’t imagine how anyone could read a newspaper headline such as that and not take the time to dive into the rest of the story. more...

Growing up in

The Magnolia Classic was a Professional Golf Association sanctioned event that was held in Hattiesburg every April opposite The Masters tournament in Augusta. Tom Watson and Nick Faldo played here but never won. Payne Stewart and Craig Stadler each won the tournament. Dwight Nevil won it twice. more...

As I sat at the breakfast table this morning I stared at my glass of orange juice and contemplated the beverage’s evolution. more...

The restaurant business is full of chef/owners with atypical success stories.

The restaurant business is full of culinary twists on tried-and-true recipes. more...

Elvis is alive… on candy wrappers.

I walked into a convenience store yesterday and ran into the King of Rock and Roll. more...

I was walking from the restaurant to my office the other day and, out of the corner of my eye, caught a glimpse of C’est La Vie, the French bakery across the street. more...

New Orleans has many culinary icons. In the beginning there were Jean Galatoire, Arnaud Cazenave, and Antoine Alciatore. By mid century the Brennan family began to set up shop in North America’s Creole Capital. In the 1970s Warren LeRuth was on top and passed the torch to Paul Prudhomme who began his reign in the early 1980s. Emeril Lagasse opened his first restaurant in 1990, and John Besh brought us into the new millennium. All have left their mark on the Crescent City’s culinary scene. more...

A man in Morgantown, West Virginia is suing fast-food giant McDonald’s for $10 million because they put cheese on his hamburger. more...

I discovered The Dillard House several years ago on the recommendation of a former classmate. I have returned every year since, when my friends and I gather for our annual whitewater rafting trip. more...

One of the benefits of being a writer is that I am always on the receiving end of humorous and informative stories reported to me by the people I meet. more...

“If I was a doughnut, I‘d eat myself.”

Those words were spoken by my six-year old son as I sat watching him eat doughnuts yesterday. Our family talks about food a lot. My daughter talks about what we should have for supper while we are eating lunch. It’s genetic. more...

Over the past few weeks my family has been catching up on movies, sometimes seeing two films in one day.

I love movies. As a matter of fact, the two things I love most about owning my own business are— getting to wear whatever I want to work (no neckties, ever), and being able to see a matinee in the middle of the day. more...

This weekend I took my children to see the new Disney/Pixar film, Ratatouille. It’s about France’s greatest chef—a rat.

The food in the animated feature looks good enough to eat. A majority of the movie takes place in a French restaurant kitchen and most of the main characters, sans the rat and his family, are chefs. more...