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An Epicurean Memoir that spans a lifetime dedicated to good food, great wine and close friends, Uncorking and Forking: It’s Been a Good Life is the laugh-out-loud trip of food and wine writer Bill Stephens through all things culinary from gourmand, to passionate amateur cook, to bon vivant, to chef, to restaurateur, to cater, to employee feeder, and, finally, to restaurant consultant and culinary journalist. From his first catastrophic culinary attempt at age six through feeding the people, popes, and princes, he never lost sight of the overriding fundamental epicurean axiom: “Great meals are prepared for enjoyment – not as an exercise in esoterica.” Good food and great wine can lift us to a higher plain of spontaneity, creativity, and adventure. Publishers Weekly predicted over 600 million food and wine books would be sold this year. Bill Stephens would tell you that every one of these books, as well as The Food Network’s hugely successful 24/7 cornucopia of culinary knowledge, is crammed with advice about “what to,” “where to,” and “how to,” but there is little “why to” in all of this. Why to? Because the same God that gave us poverty, disease, fire, famine, floods, wars, petulance, social and political injustice, also gave us a respite. He gave us a time to refresh and rejoice away from the cares of the world. He gave us good food and great wine to celebrate everything that’s good in life. The amazing popularity of the 2004 Golden Globe and Motion Picture Academy Award winning movie, “Sideways,” showed that the public (both male and female) are ready to move up the epicurean ladder to enrich their own lives. Uncorking and Forking: It’s Been a Good Life maps the trail blazed by the author for those seeking that good life. The time is right to share the wisdom gained from a lifetime of uncorking and forking with a national audience. About The Author Bill Stephens started My Place Restaurant in1972, and his food service empire grew to include a leading San Antonio, Texas, white tablecloth restaurant, three airline in-flight kitchens, three employee feeding facilities. He catered a dinner train, and his company was the third largest off-premise caterer in South Texas. His notable catering clients included Texas governors, presidential candidates, the family of the King of Saudi Arabia, The Prince of Wales, Pope John Paul II, Tom Jones, Neal Diamond, Willie Nelson, and many others During these three decades he wrote over 1,000 weekly food and wine columns
for Harte-Hanks, Murdoch, and Hearst newspapers. His features appeared
in Wine News, Wine Enthusiast, Wine Spectator, Food &
Wine, Chef, and Field & Stream. His short story, “The Decanter-
A Christmas Story,” is the only fiction ever published in The Wine
News.
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