Max is a self-taught cook who has been in the restaurant industry for seven years. He got his start cooking and running kitchens in Boston, and Dartmouth, Massachusetts, before moving to Providence, Rhode Island, and ending up in Chicago. Though he has had some success in restaurants, earning a James Beard Award nomination, and winning a Starchefs Rising Star award, He is now glad to be taking a step back from the kitchen to be able to connect with the passionate home cooks that come to learn at The Chopping Block.
Recent Posts
Amaro Never Dies
I came late to the enjoyment of bitterness. In my late teens, I had to ease myself into drinking coffee one heaping tablespoon of sugar at a time. It’s not just me though. In the U.S. we have a ...
Well it's not ‘new’ exactly, but it's an uncommon fruit you may not have run into before. And not exactly ‘just’ since it was first described in western sources by Phillip Franz von Siebold and ...
As a self-taught chef, I have always enjoyed watching other chefs and cooks work whether in-person or on screen. Even if I’m just watching something for leisure I will always file away any ...
Often times home cooks will be curious about what makes restaurant food taste different from home cooked food. This is actually a very interesting question, and there is no simple answer, but an ...
I woke up on this day with plans for a couple of kitchen projects, but a mid-morning delivery from a nearby friend inspired an expansion of the plans. We had recently visited her new home on Memorial ...
The last year (or so) has been unique in so many ways. Most of them are bad ways. Pretty much all of them. However, one of the good things was that many of us found ourselves with enough free time to ...
We are finally past the spring of deception and third winter which means we are inching ever closer to True Spring here in Chicago. That means that even though there is still snow in the forecast, ...
You know, for a minute there I thought we might never see each other again. It has been over a year since my last blog post was published on The Chopping Blog, and what a year it has been. We’ve all ...
There are few dishes as shrouded in mystique as the venerated French omelette. Egg cookery in general but especially the ability to make a French omelette has been used as a metric to determine a ...
We’re in that time of year when we could all use a reminder that yes, in fact, summer will come again. In my mind one of the best glimpses of summer is the Margarita. A cocktail synonymous with good, ...
