Several years ago I wrote a column about funeral food and how people in the South band together to feed the family of the bereaved when a loved one has passed away.

I never expected to be so close, so soon, to the phenomenon. more...

Yountville, Calif. — “I have just eaten the best meal of my life. Hands down. No question.” Those were the opening sentences of a column I wrote just five weeks ago after dining at Per Se, in New York.

Stop the presses. I have just experienced a humbling, 32-course culinary bacchanalia at the hands of Thomas Keller, and the statements made just five short weeks ago are now old news. more...

When speaking of his wisdom teeth, my grandfather used to say, “I’ll never get my wisdom teeth cut out, I do some of my best chewing with those teeth.”

Once again, I should have listened to my grandfather.After 44 years and some extremely successful chewing, I have removed all four of my wisdom teeth.Day after day, I kept waiting for the wisdom to kick in, to no avail. more...

Have you ever wished for something for so long that there is no way the experience will live up to the “build up?” For 15 years, one of the restaurants on my “get-to list” has been the Coyote Café in Santa Fe, N.M. I am a big fan of Southwestern cuisine. It is one of my favorite regional/ethnic cuisines. more...

My son has a the bladder the size of an English pea.

He also likes pirates.

These two seemingly diametrically opposed statements converged during one fateful incident in a restaurant bathroom. more...

DESTIN, Fla— Greetings from the remnants of the world’s luckiest fishing village.

As a kid, when driving over the bridge into Destin, I was greeted by a large plywood sign that stated “Welcome to Destin… the World’s Luckiest Fishing Village.” A few days ago I crested the peak of that same bridge and was welcomed by a behemoth condominium structure being constructed where the pass meets the harbor, some call it progress. more...

New York, N.Y.— I have just eaten the best meal of my life. Hands down. No question.

That is a powerful statement for someone who eats for a living. Yet, there is no other way to describe my dining experience at Per Se as anything less than “perfect.” From the service to the food to the atmosphere, it just doesn’t get any better. more...

NEW YORK, NY— I’ve just finished five days on the island of Manhattan with one goal: Eat well.

Being one who is passionate about food, and also one who travels to the nation’s top restaurant city only once or twice a year, I usually have a lot of gastronomic ground to cover during my stay. more...

In the early 1970s, pop singer Carly Simon hit the top 40 charts with a song called “Anticipation.”

A few months after the song’s release, a company that manufactures ketchup purchased the exclusive rights to use it in a series of television commercials. It forever changed my connection with the song. Instead of thinking about a slinky, sexy Carly Simon singing, “Anticipation is making me wait. It’s keeping me wa-a-a-a-a-aiting.” I began to associate a thick glob of ketchup slowly oozing out of a ketchup bottle. Big difference. more...

O.K., I thought, you’ve got my attention, I’ll bite. more...

The world is filled with heroes; unfortunately we sometimes don’t know where to find them. more...

In my estimation, one out of every four new restaurants that open in my hometown is an establishment that features fried chicken fingers as its main offering.

When I was a kid, fried chicken eaten outside of my grandmother’s house came in buckets and had bones in it. I don’t remember seeing small finger-sized boneless chicken breasts served in a restaurant until 1982— the dawning of the McNugget era. more...

My friend Wyatt became a grandfather last week.

I am beginning to come to grips with the fact that I am old enough to have friends that are eligible grandparents. more...

Yesterday I spent $70.00 to fill my vehicle with gas.

Gasoline prices are at an all-time high and experts are forecasting even steeper prices in the near future. I am not worried. more...

When I am on the road, the first thing I ask the front desk clerk at a hotel is: “Where is the best independent, locals-only restaurant that serves a good breakfast?”

I never miss breakfast when I’m out of town. While spending the morning in a local diner, one can learn a lot about a town or city, not to mention, have a good, non-chain breakfast. more...

Yesterday I was on my way home from the office and passed an ice cream truck just two blocks from my house.

I can’t remember the last time I saw an ice cream truck in my neighborhood. It was probably sometime around 1974. more...

Baseball and food are numinously entwined. The two go together like peanuts and Cracker Jack.

Times have changed from the popcorn, peanuts, and hot dog days of our youth. Today’s major league ballparks feature servers who take your order while you sit in your seat, enter the order on a wireless computer device, and deliver the food directly to your seat. From San Diego, to Seattle, to Maryland, baseball fans are eating fish tacos, tofu hot dogs, and crab cake sandwiches. more...

In 21st Century life, there aren’t too many settings in which punch is served. Today, punch is strictly a church party offering.

Years ago my grandmother and her friends owned elaborately decorated sterling silver and crystal punch bowls. They were brought out at bridge clubs and sewing circles and loaned out for weddings and receptions. more...

Food suppliers are the ultimate behind-the-scenes partners of the restaurant business.

In an industry where margins are sometimes as thin as a slice of prosciutto, a good food purveyor can mean the difference between a profitable year and a used restaurant-equipment auction. When building business relationships, the successful business owner looks for a supplier that always keeps his customers in good hands. more...

PARK CITY, UTAH— Do Mormons eat breakfast? I’ve been in Utah for four days and still haven’t eaten a decent breakfast.

Granted, this is a ski resort and everything is centered around getting everyone to the top of the mountain as quickly as possible. It is my opinion that it would be a much nicer chair-lift ride to the summit if one had just enjoyed a first-rate breakfast. more...

LAS VEGAS- My friend Bud Holmes used to own a casino in this town. He told me that in the 1970s he and his partners came up with a novel idea: A 99-cent breakfast buffet.

Some might wonder how any establishment could survive, much less thrive, serving a 99-cent breakfast. According to my friend, people would line up waiting to be seated in the dining room, meanwhile every available square inch in the waiting area was lined with slot machines. It didn't take long to turn a meal served for less than one dollar into a profitable offering. It revolutionized how foodservice was done in Las Vegas. more...

LAS VEGAS- Greetings from the Glitter Gulch. I'm here on a business trip, my first visit here since 1993. Since then, celebrity chefs from all around the globe have opened branches of their famous eateries. more...

My friend and chef, John Besh, from Restaurant August in New Orleans, was a recent guest on the Food Network’s cooking competition Iron Chef America.

The following is an account of that competition with reverence to Ernest Lawrence Thayer. more...

I have written often of my favorite barbeque restaurant, Leatha’s, in Hattiesburg.

It is one of the most unique restaurants on the planet. Not because the barbeque ribs are fall-of-the-bone tender, the sauce is sweet and inimitable, or the beef brisket is smoked to the core, but because of the people. So many times the human element is taken for granted in the restaurant business. more...