“Down around Biloxi
Pretty girls are dancin' in the sea
They all look like sisters in the ocean
The boy will fill his pail with salty water
And the storms will blow from off towards New Orleans”

– Jimmy Buffett more...

The other day my eight-year old daughter told me she had become a vegetarian.

A vegetarian? Oh, the betrayal. What hath my sins wrought? She comes from a long line of devout carnivores, what have I done to make God so angry? more...

In the September issue of Bon Appetite magazine, New Orleans was listed as one of America’s top five restaurant cities

The ill-timed edition— which hit newsstands two weeks prior to Hurricane Katrina’s landfall— serves as a tangible reminder of what the nation’s restaurant customers have lost. more...

Down around Biloxi
Pretty girls are dancin' in the sea
They all look like sisters in the ocean
The boy will fill his pail with salty water
And the storms will blow from off towards New Orleans
-- Jimmy Buffett more...

Living one hour north of the Gulf of Mexico has its advantages. Then again…

I hope to never again take electricity and running water for granted. more...

Chef Martha Foose traveled to Los Angeles in 1991 looking for employment.

During the westward flight, she had no idea what job prospects her pilgrimage to Southern California might yield. The minute she walked into the La Brea Bakery she knew she had found a home … and a career. “Just a few hours after I stepped off the plane,” Foose recalls, “I walked through the doors of the bakery and said, ‘This is what I want to do.’ ” more...

Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day.

If I were forced to choose my absolute favorite breakfast item I would have a tough time. However, somewhere in the top five would be freshly baked croissants. more...

 I am often asked the difference between Creole cooking and Cajun cooking.

If you want to start an argument in Louisiana, offer your opinion as to what defines Creole and Cajun. The Cajuns don’t agree on the definition and the Creoles don’t agree either. So, with that it mind, I’ll take a stab at it. more...

 am up to my earlobes in crabmeat.

I have just returned from a seafood cooking competition where I prepared soft-shell crab stuffed with crabmeat; in the Crescent City Grill we have spent the summer developing and rolling out an extensive crab menu featuring two dozen new items – all using crabmeat as the main ingredient; and in the Purple Parrot Café we are currently serving a five-course tasting menu showcasing … you guessed it … crabmeat. more...

SAN FRANCISCO – Twenty-four hours in one of the country's foremost food cities is just not enough.

A lengthy stopover before traveling to my final destination is typically all I need to squeeze in three memorable meals. My most recent stopover in San Francisco on my way to the Napa region yielded mixed results. more...

SAN FRANCISCO – Mark Twain once said, “The coldest winter I ever spent was summer in San Francisco.” I would like to add to that legendary quote, “The hottest winter I ever spent was a summer when I brought all my winter clothes to San Francisco because Mark Twain told me it was going to be cold.” Obviously Mr. Twain never traveled to Northern California during a heat wave. more...

Last week French President Jacques Chirac started a verbal food fight with Great Britain on the eve of the G8 summit.

In a private chat with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Chirac was overheard saying, “You cannot trust people who have such bad cuisine. It (Great Britain) is the country with the worst food after Finland.” more...

I have to go to the beach once every four or five years to remind myself why I only go to the beach every four or five years. My family is not like most families. I go to Destin, Fla., to check out the restaurants, my wife goes to shop, my children go because they don’t have a vote. more...

Last week the Boston Herald published a story with the headline: “Buffett fans hurt in gas grill explosion.”

The article caught my attention for two reasons: 1.) I am a Jimmy Buffett fan. 2.) I am an outdoor-grilling fan. more...

I have never enjoyed the television show “Iron Chef” in its original dubbed-Japanese form.

It always seemed a little creepy. The overly coiffed, leather-clad chairman donning black gloves and eating raw bell peppers, the bizarre Japanese foodstuffs, the obscure “secret ingredient” and the Godzilla-meets-Mothra-like English dubbing, held no appeal for me. Granted, the chefs were talented, the skills they employed were impressive, and the one-hour time limit was intriguing. However, I never understood the allure, and often wondered why the Food Network didn’t do an updated Americanized version. more...

Every Saturday during the summer, I wake up early and take my children to the Farmers’ Market in Hattiesburg to load up on fresh vegetables.

My first visit to the Farmers’ Market in 2005 yielded quite a haul: butter beans, baby new potatoes, early sweet corn, baby squash and peaches. more...

SOMEWHERE IN THE GULF OF MEXICO – Recently I read an article about the maiden voyage of the new Queen Elizabeth II cruise ship. The owners of the cruise company were complaining that they were going to have to buy a bunch of new deck chairs because, as they put it, “The fat Americans are breaking them.” more...

Now that the thumb-in-the-Wendy’s-chili fiasco is over, we all can breathe a sigh of relief and return to eating normally … or can we?

Not so fast my tamper-free friend, hold on to your opposable digits. A few weeks ago, London’s Daily Mail reported that a boy found a snake in his breakfast cereal. A snake! Here we go again. more...

I have a staple in my ear.

Actually, I have a staple in each of my ears. more...

Everything is changing and I don’t like it.

I am slowly turning into one of those old curmudgeons who spends half his time talking about the good old days. The music was better, the movies were better, the cars were better, the television shows were better, even the Girl Scout Cookies were better. more...

When I was a child, fountain-dispensed soft drinks usually were served in the 12- to 16-ounce range. Today, more than a quart of beverage – in a cup the size of a small trash can – is the norm. more...

I love cooking outdoors.

One of the best hamburgers I ever enjoyed was cooked in Omaha, Neb., in a public park on a small, portable barbecue grill. There was nothing special about the method, ingredients or cooking equipment. The meat was bought from the closest grocery store we could find, the buns were of the standard white-bread variety and we used disposable salt and pepper to season the meat. Nevertheless, that burger stands to this day as the tastiest burger I have ever eaten. more...

Last fall I was on a radio show with Marty Stuart, the Philadelphia, Miss.-born country music artist. After the program we began talking about my hometown of Hattiesburg.

Stuart recalled that the first McDonald’s restaurant he ever visited was in Hattiesburg. His family used to drive from Philadelphia to shop in Hattiesburg and he always begged his parents to eat at McDonald’s. more...

There are many phobias associated with food.

The general fear of food is called sitophobia or sitiophobia. I cannot imagine having a fear of food, but obviously some people do or they wouldn’t have created a name for the affliction. Actually, I could stand to have a mild case of sitophobia every once in a while. more...