Fabulously Fierce Friends, Andrew

I'm an Australian Ex-Pat violist, web and graphic designer/ real estate agent. I like orchids, knitting, embroidery, painting, cooking, hunting for dingy hole in the wall restaurants with great food. I have been called a renaissance man by some but really I feel like I'm simply an 18th Century English lady of leisure reincarnated into the body of a Chinese Australian man.


1. Who are your role models - food related or otherwise?

Jacques Pépin, Julia Child, Anthony Bourdain,

2. What is your drink of choice?

Amaretto Sour

3. What is your favorite cookbook or other food related book?

Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle and Simone Beck

4. What was your most memorable meal and why?

Standing at a street vendor in the snowy dead of winter in the city of Urumqi, Xinjiang China at the age of 4 inhaling cumin/chili powder seasoned lamb skewers with my father. This is the earliest memory I have of thoroughly enjoying a meal to the point of wishing that my stomach would never get full so I could keep on eating.

5. What is your favorite kitchen gadget or tool?

My All-Clad 7.5 inch non stick French Skillet

6. If you had to make dinner with ingredients at your home right now, what would you make?

Bacon wrapped filet mignon with sautéed asparagus and mushroom tarragon sauce and rosemary mashed potatoes. You caught me on a good day :-)

7. What kind of music do you like to listen to while you cook?

80?s power ballads, NPR news, anything from the 60?s and anything by Burt Bacharach? :-)

8. What is your philosophy on cooking and eating?

Never cut corners, Never do anything half-assed and eat like a ravenous orphan.

9. Are there any foods you can not stand to eat?

Sea Squirt, although I?m going to keep on trying to develop a taste for them. Oh and TEX-MEX?cheap ingredients a pound of bad melted cheese, grease and a bowl of fried nachos?BARF.

10. If you could use any super power in the kitchen, what would it be and why?

I wish I could do that trick Albus Dumbledore does with his wand where he can put everything back in it?s place with just a campy flick of his wrist. Failing that the ability to summon a Sous Chef out of thin air to clean up after me.