#obeythepalate

[obeythepalate]

Green plum jam. Green apricot. Rye sourdough English muffin. Abbaye de Brebis. Honey comb& honeysuckle. Radish blossom. Sliced almond. Cheese course by chef Ashley Wentling

[obeythepalate]

Salted caramel doughnuts

Milk chocolate tahini doughnuts

Chef Ashley Wentling

Bartone, Kuwait City

Obey the Palate

[obeythepalate]

international Oyster model nbd

[obeythepalate]

Pistachio date muffins in Dubai

[obeythepalate]

Pasteis de Belem <3 <3

[obeythepalate]

For the love of broccoli

I am starting my full blown website/food blog soon. So I have been practicing my blogging. Here is a little snippet of how Obey the Palate came to be.

Although I no longer work in restaurants, they still haunt me. The smells, the sounds, the commotion, but mostly, the flavors. The food you eat in a good restaurant is the entire reason why I went to culinary school. Everything is so flavorful and well seasoned. My first time at Chez Panisse (on my 19th Birthday) changed my life. The food was complex in it’s simplicity. Clams and mussels steamed in a bright and flavorful tomato broth with blistered chili peppers that were sweet with a creeping heat. Fresh plum sorbet in a pool of liqueur with little vanilla scented butter cookies.

These were some of the flavors that opened my eyes. I hated shellfish. I didn't even like tomatoes very much actually. But the things that Alice Waters can do to a pot of mussels is inexplicable. She changed my mind which made me realize something; that my mind could be changed on the foods I 'didn't like’. Now it is my life goal to prove people’s poor first impressions of food wrong. If someone tells me ‘I hate broccoli’, I feel the need to be broccoli’s defender! All that broccoli needs is a sautee with some sea salt, garlic, lemon, and brown butter, and I know that broccoli nay sayer will be saying HEY HEY HEYY! Brocolllaaayy! Sorry that was pretty lame.

When I first started discovering the difference between plump little heirloom carrots and snap peas compared to those frozen little cubes of freeze-dried flavorless confetti they market as ‘peas and carrots’, or the difference between a fresh baked profiterole and a store bought soggy cream puff, I could never go back. Whether it be cheap, processed mayonaise, or crappy pre-shredded cheese; there is such a difference between these and their delicious fresh counterparts. Food snobbery? Maybe. Or maybe us culi-nerds (heehee) are on to something?

For example, my boyfriend (to my complete horror) was a taco-bell 4 times a week, folgers crystal coffee, tuna sandwich man when I first met him. We are talking years of processed food. He mocked me for the first few months of our relationship; I was a ‘food snob’ or just damn picky. But I wore him down. With each delicious latte or crispity crunchity truffle grilled cheese, he began to turn his nose up to fast food or instant coffee. I am proud to say I have changed that man into the food snob, or should I say, great ingredient enthusiast, he is today.

That is what quality food does to you. It changes not only your palate, but your expectations of what food should taste like; and believe me, once it has happened there is no going back. The restaurants I have worked in transformed me from an eager home cook, to a full on palate pleaser. That is the quest of foodies. To obey the palate that you have worked so hard to form.