Some Things Are Best Kept Secret

Some things are best kept a Secret! 



Why do I not share my recipes with guests? 

More often than not I have been asked for hints or tips on cooking. I'm happy to share my knowledge with folks in that respect, “tips or tricks”.

I used to host cooking classes for goodness sake. I love when people get excited about food. I love when people cook at home, as it's becoming a dying tradition in most households. Sitting around a dinner table with your family is still something I hold near & dear to my heart from my childhood. If my father was in town and not traveling we always ate together. Try it out for a few weeks in your home, see what happens.

I absolutely get overly emotional when I learn a new technique or get to teach a staff member something new and they master it! Those are some of my best days after all these years in a kitchen day in and day out standing behind that line. 

Folks dine with us and on the regular I get asked for recipes of something they enjoyed while dining here. I often chuckle and say if I gave you the recipe what need would you have to come back. That's how we keep you coming back! If I shared all my secrets, why have a business?? Now if you ask my Sous Chef she will tell you 5 million dollars and she will smuggle them out to you. I then turn to her and shake my head, probably with a bit of an eye roll added at the end. 

For real it always blows my mind when people ask. I mean I guess the saying goes ”it doesn't hurt to ask right. I guess not? But my lips are sealed tight. I’m trying to run a successful business, folks.

I haven't been asked to do a book deal! So why give them out? Also a cookbook would be next to impossible for me to do. Lets be real here if you have ever talked to my kitchen staff they all know most recipes, times, and temps aren't written down. Its memory and taste as I go. That's how I cook. Poor Lucas after a year working here still turns to me after I instruct him on something and says “How Long” then stops himself and says “Why do I even ask you that?” I respond with a snide smile and a chuckle. I appreciate Angie and Lucas for their absolute preciseness with everything they do. I have no clue how these two set timers for everything they do all in a night of service. I didn't learn to cook that way working in the kitchens I was raised in. Every Chef I worked for said, when it’s done. It was sight, touch, and smell. I really haven't set them up for success with no cooking times & recipes. But by hell or high water they have figured it out amongst themselves. I also believe there are numerous ways to get to the same result in a kitchen. We are just different animals.

I often joke (but for real) say to them my nose says something is done and Lucas will be like 11 seconds!! WTH Jodi! Sorry Bud….Love you!

Recipes in a restaurant are Intellectual Property, period. We all learn from different people we work under or with. If you are old school like me and plainly a good human you never leave an establishment and go down the road and use the recipe you were taught at the prior place. Ok in a different city, fine, cool, whatever. Put some distance between you and them. Or if the prior place closed ok fare game. But if you have any sort of respect for the chef you worked for or the owners, that is just dirty pool to take the recipe and make elsewhere. It's just something you don't do. Just the same you would never hand out the recipe to a guest or a future place of employment especially if it was something unique to someone's menu. It isn't business savvy. Plain and simple.

I still have chef friends that I reminisce about a dish or a sauce they created and will reach out and ask if they mind if I do a rendition of it. It's the level of respect I have for those folks. 

My good chef friend Ryan created this Mussel pasta dish that I dream about still to this day.. He created this like 20 years ago in a kitchen that I worked in, under him. I still try making it and it is never quite the same as when he made it. But the first time I tried, I asked first, that was the key! I asked. He laughed and told me to go for it. I should try that dish out again soon. Hmmm..

Long story short I don't share most recipes because what we create here is what keeps you all happy, keeps you coming back, keeps you intrigued, keeps the lights on, and keeps the bills paid. 

A recipe is everything valued in a chef’s hat. It's the only trick we have to pull out of it! 

The amount of time, effort, and research that goes into a well thought dish is more than you may think. 

A recipe, its flavors, aroma, textures are all this beautiful tangled romance that a true chef created for you to feel, taste, experience, remember, and dream about with each bite that graces the threshold of your lips. So take it all in, enjoy it, make it a memory, and come back for more.