To be brief: long-time home baker, short-time professional viennoiserie baker, really big fan of feeding people treats from butter, sugar, and flour. Will also happily talk about exciting recipes, baking techniques and the magical chemistry of kitchens for hours.

Recipes you’ll find here will range from successful to failed attempts; tips and explanations based off research and trials; my effort to learn how to make a very presentable layer cake, every time; as well as some food based stories from travel and memories.

For now, I’ll lean heavily here on someone else’s words. Reading Ruth Reichl’s My Kitchen Year, I finally found the point I’d been looking for when writing about food.

“Most cookbooks…are in search of perfection, an attempt to constantly re-create the same good dishes.  But you’re not a chef in your own kitchen trying to please guests. You’re a traveler, following your own path, seeking adventure. I wanted to write about the fun of cooking, encourage people to take risks. Alone in the kitchen you are simply a cook, free to do anything you want. If it doesn’t work out–well, there’s always another meal...recipes are conversations, not lectures; they are a beginning, not an end…add a bit more of this, a little less of that, perhaps introduce new spices or different herbs…if I were at your house I’d expect every one to taste a bit different than they would when you’re at mine.”