Confit is the ultimate comfort food, and trendy or not, it is dazzling stuff.

I often write into recipes techniques that I learned in the restaurant kitchen. There are ways of organizing your prep and so on that are immensely useful. Those are woven into all the recipes I do.

I had all kinds of food issues, including health concerns and weight concerns.

I'm a serious eater and a seriously hungry person, so I set out on that path to figure it out for myself, and of course it really resonated with other people.

I was working in restaurants as a captain and as a waiter.

I realized I didn't want to be a photographer. I gave it up, but I still worked that job in the restaurant and I found myself constantly hanging out in the kitchen.

Often for hors d'oeuvres, I serve room temperature vegetables, something like that, so that the main course might be quite rich but the first course has balanced it out.