23 Dec A Gilded Year
What a year it’s been for me! Twelve months ago I was in paradise, but also in a small version of hell: I was working as a private chef for a billionaire, traveling back and forth between New York City and a private island in the Caribbean on a tricked-out 727. What a glamorous life, eh? Well, actually, when you’re the one charged with making it glamorous, it’s not exactly a walk in the park.
As a huge fan of the work that Jennifer was doing, I had been contributing recipes and articles to this site in between jet-set jaunts. I came to realize that I was much more excited about what was happening on these pages than anything I was making for unappreciative rich people, no matter that I had an unlimited food budget. Being told by an aging British Aristocrat that my exquisite Mixed Seafood in Ginger Broth with Confetti Vegetables “looked lovely but smelled horrible” confirmed for me that I would much rather spend my time with true epicures than classless wealthy people with no taste.
When Jennifer told me that she was planning on some major changes for the Gilded Fork, my yearning to be a bigger part of it became even greater, so I made the choice to leave behind the life of a jet-setting private chef and return to what I love. It’s been one of the best choices of my life. I was so honored that Jennifer would take me on as a business partner, and that she was so open to some of the innovations I was excited to introduce to the Gilded Fork.
We have made so many additions to the site in the last year, all in the service of our main goal: To celebrate the sensual pleasures of food. I had been recording podcasts since August 2005, and Jennifer was a frequent guest with a segment of her own. We decided to expand our offerings, and Jennifer created the Food Philosophy podcast. In March, the Culinary Podcast Network was born, bringing together the best and the brightest of food podcasters to become the world’s first all-food podcast channel.
We also switched over from a weekly publishing schedule to update the site daily, with one new recipe or article each day, and we brought in some fabulous talent to our Test Kitchen team with Chef Lia Soscia and our Pastry Princess, Monica Glass, as well as mixologist Damian Sim of Provocachic. We introduced the Mise en Place section, which quickly became the most popular page on the site, as well as our online boutique, enabling us to share some of our favorite artisanal products with you.
We are all about innovation, and 2007 will bring even more new elements to our pages, making the site more interactive, and we will do our best to bring even more food-related content to you, our readers.
On the culinary front, we are planning to focus on two major areas. On the one hand, we will focus more and more on dishes inspired by cuisines from diverse cultures. You know that my inspiration with ReMARKable Palate has always come from micro-regional cuisines from around the world, and my recent travels have served to strengthen my resolve to bring you more and more of these great dishes.
On the other hand, we will continue to add recipes that are easy to make and which will save you time in the kitchen. As much as we love the more innovative and complicated dishes we’ve become known for, we recognize that some of our readers may find some of these recipes daunting, or simply don’t have the time to tackle them. Fear not – we won’t stop making these dishes, we’ll just add more recipes that will take less time and effort to make, but which still celebrate the joys and pleasures of our featured ingredients.
Speaking of featured ingredients, we will continue to devote our attention to exploring the intricacies and glories of a Main Ingredient and an Indulgence each month. In 2007 we plan to explore persimmons, pork, salmon, mushrooms, port, cranberries, avocadoes and many more. We will also bring you menus for Bastille Day, Cinco de Mayo, a smorgasbord, brunch celebrations and Mardi Gras.
As always, we welcome your feedback, requests, and of course, accolades! Please let us know what you think, and accept our best wishes for a wonderful 2007.