ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Believe it or not, this unreasonably large book started as a
very manageably sized book nearly five years ago.
Actually, I take that back. This unreasonably large book
started out as a teeny-tiny blog post about boiling eggs that
ended up transforming my life in the way that a meat
grinder can transform pork shoulder into a sausage. With the
help of dozens and dozens of people, I was systematically
broken down, re-formed, stuffed, extruded, stretched,
kneaded, seasoned, and perhaps even cooked a little, and
ultimately came out the other end as a better writer, better
cook, better photographer, and better person.
I’d like to thank my wife, Adriana, who had to put up
with an apartment that smelled eternally of hamburgers and
roasted chickens and Brussels sprouts and steak and
everything else that ended up going into the bellies of our
friends and neighbors. She’s humored me when I dragged
her along on 18-meal-per-day “research” trips. She’s been
OK with the fact that I’ve cheated on her—several times, in
fact—with a hamburger-shaped mistress. She’s spent years
going to sleep in an empty bed while I clack away on my
computer only to be woken up deep in the middle of the
night when I decided that I just needed to fry another batch
of chicken wings to answer a burning (literally) question.
All this and she’s still urging me to start writing another
book.
I don’t know how my family puts up with my near-fascist