How did a BLT launch my career in cheese? Well let me tell you! In 2007 or so I went to a Bacon Tasting at Zingerman’s Delicatessen. My girlfriend at the time bought me a ticket and I went by myself. I was utterly enthralled by it all. So much information, the enthusiasm of the staff, and oh the food! One of the bites they brought out was a Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato sandwich. It was made with amazing bacon, on the Roadhouse Rye bread, with a tomato that was in season. I raised my hand and let everyone know, I was 23 at the time and that was my first BLT (I grew up in a Kosher house). My mind was blown, it was an epiphany I would have many more times in my career. Simple ingredients, put together well can result in something that truly transcends the base ingredients. The Ham and Butter sandwich from our kitchen at the RIND is a perfect example of this. After this fateful tasting I asked for an application and applied to Zingerman’s that evening.
Luckily I got the job! I had worked in food since I was 12 years old, washing dishes, and helping in kitchens at local kosher caterers. Then in college I cooked at restaurants in East Lansing. But now I entered Zingerman’s, which seemed to occupy a very different part of this “food industry” I had been in. At Zingerman’s, all the foods had a story. They had a season or a time and place they should be enjoyed. All the food seemed to have ‘context’ and as I have become fond of saying, I think context is delicious. I only worked at Zingerman’s for 2 years, but it set me on a path that I have been walking for almost 20 years.
To feed people is an act of love. To spread the stories of the people behind the food and ingredients extends that love even further. Farmers and producers are so often left out of the conversation their stories are left to the footnotes. Their stories are lost in the large industrial food complex that we rely on to distribute food efficiently throughout the world. What I saw that night at Zingerman’s was a different, more human, connected food system. Something worth celebrating. For the last 20 years, I have been fully trying to wrap my head around that BLT.