About Me

SImply put, food philosophies are just my humble, silly, and sometimes bitingly honest musings on both life and food and how the two are so intimately and inextricably linked.

My love affair and insatiable hunger for food began at an extremely early age, I’m told. My mom often recounts the story of how at age one and half I would scream between bites as she fed me vanilla frozen yogurt. because she wasn’t getting the spoon back to my mouth quickly enough. Back then my favorite food was cubes of turkey and cheddar cheese, and twenty something years later the debate still rages on in my mind as to whether I adore meats or cheeses more. In addition to, or perhaps because of this love, food has had a huge influence on me throughout my life. It is what has fueled both my body and mind as I have grown, and as an adult it has provided both a challenging career path and life-long passion.

So many of my memories and monumental life events have been tied to food, and as a result, many if not all of the major life lessons I have learned have been tied to food as well. Growing up, food was always a symbol of love in my family and a tangible way to express that love. Whenever I visited my Yia-yia (grandmother in greek), she always showered me with hugs and kisses as well as mickey mouse pancakes that smiled through a mouth of M&Ms, and macranada ( a specialty dish of hers made with pasta and and a never ending sea of melted butter).

My mother also taught me that food could be an expression of devotion through the nightly, well-balanced and thoughtful dinners she never failed to make, regardless of how busy and chaotic her day had been. She also imparted this lesson through the lunches she packed me daily from kindergarten to high school, which always, without even one exception, included a sweet and encouraging note.

It was these memories and little daily lessons that inspired the desire inside me to cook for my boyfriend, when we first moved in together on our own. As I fell for him, I also fell for the new culinary skills I was learning daily through books, shows, and blogs. Learning to build a home and family of my own, and trying to keep up with all the new challenges of adult life was surprisingly similar to learning how to build flavor within a dish and keep up with the challenges of a new recipe. So many of the rules and lessons in cooking applied to the issues and problems of life. And as I enrolled and studied for two years in culinary school, learning even more lessons, I was constantly surprised to find that culinary school not only prepared me for working in a professional kitchen but for living life in general.

As I continued on completing my externship and working my first real jobs in the culinary industry, I developed not only as a cook, but also as a confident and sure adult. Someone who felt they could take what life threw at them and come out stronger for it. And every day at work and at home, as I stood slicing onions or searing meat, it would strike me again how the lessons I learned from handling food went so well with handling life as well. It also struck me more and more as I delved deeper into the culinary world how unifying and bonding food is. As the one element that ties all life forms together, it can overcome all differences and bring together broad communities of people regardless of language, species, culture, or age . It was this major lesson among the countless others I had learned through food, that led to my inspiration for this blog, Food Philosophies.

I hope that my thoughts inspire and encourage you to also think about what you’re eating, where it’s from, how it’s made its way to you, and the effect it will have on your life as well as the world around you. I hope to spark conversation and spread awareness about the numerous and paramount issues going on in both the food world and the general world, (seeing as they are one and the same.) And as always, I hope to entertain you, as well as motivate you, to share your own musings and responses on the subject.

Until the next bite,

Jenn