From Lebanon, with Love
Angela Mualem Fout’s Sohha Savory line delivers home-cookery from the birthplace of civilization to your table. It comes courtesy of this teacher-turned-chef who is determined to pass on the culinary traditions of her homeland.
Love Language Spoken Here
At the worldly and welcoming Meta Café in Lambertville, a community is forming around a couple who knows warmth assuredly comes from spicing but also that it’s a foundation of hospitality that will lead diners to shared adventures in eating.
Origin Story
Jun Xu is an accomplished biochemist and research scientist for whom cooking is a never-ending experiment. She also is the mother and muse of Sean Yan, chef-owner of Ram & Rooster in Metuchen, where his own Chinese-inspired dishes riff on Mom’s home cooking.
Ji Bei Chuan
Rice noodles and ramen, seasoned to the nines, set in stimulating broths and even dry-tossed, are carefully fashioned at this storefront in a strip mall that’s become something of a Restaurant Row.
Bakers on the Rise: Dillon Gray
A confluence of circumstances has brought us to a most opportune moment in the history of Garden State baked goods, where professionalism and independent visions reign on an expansive scale. We’re talking today with Dillon Gray of Lafayette, one of the emerging talents engineering his own startup, to give you a baker’s eye view of our baking boom.
Spotted Horse Provisions
As a college professor, Amanda Newman guides students to developing the skills needed to become art educators. As the artisan behind an acclaimed line of preserves, she teaches much the same lessons using produce, sugar, spices and vinegar to craft pantry staples that fuse creativity with culinary precision. The result reflects a union of art and science – and her own blended heritages.
Stone Circle Farm’s Worldly View
A husband-and-wife team with deep roots in the food industry have grown their home vegetable garden into a community-focused organic farm that aims to educate as well as feed. Lauren Vitagliano reports from Cape May County.
One from Column Yan
If you’ve been wondering how the fascinatingly glorious “Chinese-inspired” dishes at Sean Yan’s Ram & Rooster in Metuchen come together, the chef’s first anniversary celebration special menu proves a study in dissecting his personal, provocative cuisine. Yan does that for TPW readers here.
A Storied Farmer
The fruits of Rose Robson's labors are on display at orchards in Burlington County where uncommon varieties reveal her prowess not only at growing, but educating an increasingly curious public.
The Little Organic Farm That Will
What Dave Watts is doing right now on his 18 acres in Salem County is building for the future: soil, community, relationships and an example that will feed the future in myriad and many ways. It’s a bounty designed to keep on giving.
Anchoring Down a Sea Change
At Mayer’s Tavern in Cape May, owner Alex Laudeman and executive chef Rob Marzinsky have teamed up to secure the fine-dining future of a one-time fisherman’s dive bar. It’s driven by what’s locally sourced, piloted by the needs of a community of locals and visitors, and powered by dual visionaries.