Welcome friends!
Who are we and why are we doing a blog? We are Kevin and Steven. We've each lived in and around Seattle, Washington for over 25 years, longer than either of us has lived anywhere else. Seattle is definitely our home, for now (you never know...). We met each other here 20 years ago and have been together ever since. Early on, we weren’t exactly on the same page regarding food – Kevin often refers to Julia Child as his 2nd mother and I was a bit, let’s say ‘definite’ about what I liked and didn’t. But eventually our histories grew closer together and we embraced a mutual love of all things food: cooking, eating and sharing with friends.
Over the years, we've developed a bit of a reputation among our friends for having a flare in the kitchen (and I don't just mean for catching things on fire - though that has happened - at least once). So, with some encouragement, we decided to start sharing through this website how things come together in our kitchen, the restaurants we've found, and places we visit around the world.
Kevin work as Professor, with me tagging along when possible, has taken us to many exciting places, mostly in Europe and a bit of Asia. Much of our travel has also been just for fun. It's something we both love to do so we plan to continue doing more as time goes by and see more parts of the world as yet unexplored by us. Since food and culture are so closely linked to geography, it only seemed natural to us to combine food, travel and our particular point of view on these into one blog.
As mentioned, Kevin is a Professor, his area of teaching is Psychology. I'm an Assistant Controller for a local international NGO. Neither of us has any formal training in cooking other than both of us working as short-order cooks in our high school and college days - a long time ago. So most of what we know is self-taught. In both of our cases, this started with watching Julia Child with our mothers. In Kevin's case, the price was having to watch pro bowling, his Mom's choice. Of course there was also Graham Kerr as the Galloping Gourmet and others who came along a little later, well before the abundance of cooking shows now on cable TV. But for us, this is where it began. Since then, it's just been a matter of reading cook books, magazines, watching cooking shows, and, most importantly, experimenting.
Half the fun of food is certainly cooking it. The other half is in the sharing with friends and family. We still believe in the lost art of the dinner party.
In this website, we hope to share with you our experiences with all things food and drink and take you along with us on our travels and adventures. However, this site will not be devoted strictly to recipes. Yes, there will be some from beginning-to-end recipes, but we'll be more focused on putting our own spin on recipes we've come across, combined in some way, or our own creations. We'll talk about our thought-process for coming up with something new, tweaking the tried-and-true, and even what we go through planning a dinner party menu. We have our own favorites that we've made over the years but have found ways to prepare them that we think improve them in some way. We'll also share with you some of our failures in hopes of saving you from wasting your time going down the wrong path. At the same time, we hope that you will share your thoughts in the comments about your successes and failures and suggestions on how we could/should have done something better and whether or not our suggestions have worked for you.
Just as the food sections won't always be specific how-to, our travel won't always be a Rick Steve's style travel guide. We're just a couple guys who like to strike out on our own or with friends to see the renowned sites of the world as well as get off the beaten path at times. We'll share with you the places we find and our experiences as we venture forth. Talking to the locals is always a good way to get to know the area and sometimes find the best food and sites. We'll pass these tidbits along as well.
Also, keep an eye out for our guest writers. Surprises abound!
We hope you will visit here often and join us on our culinary adventures at home and away!
Cheers!
[Cover photo above courtesy of our dear friend, Todd Byers, taken in Geneva, Switzerland February 2014. Thanks Todd!]
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