PHOTO COURTESY OF BISTO TO GO

I gazed quizzically at the chilled display case. Multiple strawberries were everywhere, placed with precision and care. Look alike petals, cut to resemble flowers, set like glittering jewels on every salad. Hmm … I looked side to side, then over the counter to the cutting board. Head down, knife poised above the next creation, contemplating. Our new chef was in a serious endeavor. From that moment on she was “sugarplum.”

Chef Kate’s Story

I don’t remember ever wanting to become a chef. I remember food though. There was always food. It starts the same way, first a memory, sparked by conversation, or a smell, or a distant laugh of a familiar voice. Then there was the farm….

That’s where I began, where food began. Fresh. Clean. Up at four in the morning, not quite ten years old, out in the pasture with a flashlight bringing in the dairy herd for milking before school. There wasn’t any weather permitting, or vacation or sick days. Just the family farm. Fresh milk from the bulk tank, homemade yogurts setting in cups on the back of the stove, a refrigerator full of different cuts of meat, nicely wrapped in white butcher paper in my lovely rose-colored memory of youth. Summer brought bounties of fresh vegetables, fruits and herbs. With Autumn, the canning jars appeared, and gallons of fresh pressed apple cider overflowed from every empty plastic container we had.

Family is food. From the cows and pigs, we cared for, to the gardens we planted and tended. We worked as a family. We cooked as a family.

Today, “family” encompasses so much more; my friends, my co-workers, have all become extensions of my family. Bistro to Go, my extended family shares in our triumphs, holds together, united in our failures. We celebrate the many occasions that mark our lives with food. From a simple birthday cake to breakfast, our food brings us together for our customers. And in the far away years to follow, there will be a memory, or a smell, and once again I will be seated around a table in the front of the café.

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