It was with great interest that I read an article from the Wall Street Journal touting Japan’s recent eclipsing of France as the king of Michelin three-star restaurants. It has been percolating for some time and this year the Japanese surpassed ‘les Français’ with 29 such establishments in comparison to France’s 25 in the new 2012 publication.

According to the article’s authors, Mariko Sanchanata (Japan), Katy McLaughlin (LA), and Max Colchester (Paris) this news has sparked great controversy within the international culinary community with scores of culinarians weighing in. The just published 2012 edition rated a dozen restaurants in the Kansai region, the bastion of Japanese cuisine that encompasses Osaka, Kyoto and Kobe, and in doing so gives the three-city zone more three-star ratings than any place on the planet, ahead of Tokyo’s 11, Paris’s 10 and New York’s five. WOW? Continue reading »

I was lucky to be in Europe on holiday a few weeks back, Paris and Madrid, bookending a lovely and delish ten days in Andalusia’s Sevilla, Cordoba, Granada, and, of course, Jerez. While I cringe at the thoughts of my soon-to-arrive credit card bills, the trip was well worth it on so many levels. The experiences, the family time, the food and within the food….the cheese. I am a sucker for all cheeses from cows, sheep, goats, water buffaloes and any mixes of same. Hard or soft, fresh or aged, washed rinds or blues, they all make me swoon. High on my bucket list is a cheese trip through Western Europe with wine as the sideline and not vice versa. In the meantime, I will comfort myself in knowing that there’s a lot that you can get close to home—in your store and increasingly on your local cheese maker trail. And you don’t need to be in Europe to partake. Continue reading »