I’ve been debating whether or not to write about food things. Food things = restaurants, cooking, tips/tricks, ideas, stories, and reviews.

In 1975 I hired on as a cook at the Red Barn Hamburger joint. In 2005 I was 86’d from the steakhouse where I worked as a sort of traveling food ‘chef’ (note the quotes around the word chef, please; street educated). In between I worked for thirty years at nearly every level possible in the restaurant biz.

(BTW, what does 86’d mean? To 86 something in restaurant speak is to tell the staff you’re out of a certain item. “86 10 oz Ribeyes.” If someone is 86’d, it’s means they are excused, off the menu, no longer around.)

Kind of a pompous thing; me musing if I should bless y’all with some tidbits or kernels of knowledge, but here’s the deal: any idiot who does something for thirty years does it because (a) he likes it, and/or (b) gets halfway decent at some part of it through sheer repetition, or (c) is doing it from a prison cell.

Point is if you pay attention, you tend to learn a thing or two. One other point; if you’ve done something for thirty years, I know I’d like to hear some stories from you. (Good reason to send something in to NeighborsGo.)

What I’d like to do if y’all will indulge me is expose my passion (Hey now!), pour cold water on some myths, maybe toss out some food science goodies, and let you know when I run across a restaurant where I enjoy a home run.

As to the idea of restaurant reviews, here’s my problem. There are enough folks having supper at restaurants today who will post their sound thrashing of the place because it didn’t meet their criteria for this or that. And some poor soldier who only (literally) mortgaged everything to open the place will fall as a sacrifice on the altar of blogdom because he or she dared to run their business with human beings, who as we know, have a tendency to screw things up now and then. I don’t mean to be so vague and milquetoasty; sorry. Next time I’ll step out and write what I really mean.

If you’ve followed these blogs before today, you’ll notice I don’t do brand names. I’d rather have my opinions be just that…opinions. In other words, if I have a bad deal at XYZ restaurant, it’s not important to me to keep people away from it; if it simply a bad shift then hopefully the next one will be better. If they have real problems, they won’t be around long. When someone blows me away with their blazingly brilliant food and easy-going, attentive service, do I want to write about it? Well, to quote 2048 Republican presidential nominee, Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnson…you betcha.

(Trumpets sounds, the crowd stands, catching their collective breath…)

So today we’ll begin a sixty-eight part series entitled,”Pot lock etiquette: should you leave some bok choy or take a leek?”

Not really. But we’ll begin soon.