I am fascinated by the various burdens we carry without realizing that they are there. Last week I completed my ninth book, turned it in to the book producer, who will send it to the copy editor, who will hopefully not run out of red ink, before sending it to the printer. A few [...]

  Do you remember the most stressful day of your life? I do, and I have a photograph to prove it. In 1991, I was opening my second restaurant, Crescent City Grill. Actually, I was reopening it under another name and concept and in a new space next door to the old space. The building [...]

    The restaurant business is full of characters. Restaurateur’s personality profiles run the gamut— buttoned-down straight-laced business types, off-the- wall bohemians, and everything in between. It’s usually in the “in between” where one finds the best of the lot. Last week I met one of those characters. On a remote South Mississippi two-lane road, [...]

  I am a blessed man. I am blessed for many reasons: I have a beautiful, smart, loving wife who is an excellent mother. I have two wonderful children, a great extended family, and several businesses with passionate managers and dedicated employees. One could stop right there and feel he or she is leading a [...]

  I read a news article last week that described how the owners of Kentucky Fried Chicken were starting to serve boneless chicken. I am not a KFC customer, but it puzzled me for a moment because I thought they were probably already selling a lot of boneless chicken. After a little more research I [...]

  I love restaurant people. They are my comrades, and I am proud to be considered among their ranks. I’ve been working with, and hanging around, restaurant people for 33 years. We are a different breed of human being— slightly off center, squarely off base, and gluttons for punishment. It takes a special person to [...]

    Chicken pot pie might be the quintessential family-supper comfort food. Some could make a valid case for pot roast or meatloaf. Others might cast their vote for beef stew. Healthier types would argue for baked or roasted chicken. Many southerners would insist that fried chicken be listed at the top of the family-comfort [...]

  Spring is here. I know this, not because of the calendar but, because pine pollen is blowing across the roads in thick, billowing yellow clouds. It’s thick this year, and is possibly the most pollen I’ve seen since Hurricane Katrina wiped out a good portion of our pine forest. I used to wonder what [...]

  “The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”— Robert Burns Two weeks ago, while looking for a non-traditional location for the St. John family Spring break of 2013, I came up with Austin, TX. It was a brilliant idea. Unfortunately the vacation gods had other plans. Austin’s South By Southwest music, [...]

  Over the last decade, cooking has become very competitive. For years, the only cooking competitions that existed were low-key chef contests that no one had heard of— mostly events where chefs with tall toques and a lot of red and blue stripes on their chef’s coats prepared gelatin-glazed foodstuffs. In those days most of [...]