Gratitude opens the door to… the power,
the wisdom, the creativity of the universe.
—DEEPAK CHOPRA
Our hearts overflow with gratitude to some of the most extraordinary people we know across the universe who contributed their power, their wisdom, and their creativity to the creation of this book, including:
• The “dream team” at Little, Brown and Hachette Book Group for their efforts on behalf of Kitchen Creativity, especially my very creative, food-loving executive editor, Mike Szczerban (for such wide-ranging conversations, for coming up with just the right words at just the right moments, and for riding into town on his white horse at the 11th hour to save the day more than once!), as well as senior production editor Ben Allen; Little, Brown publisher Reagan Arthur; marketing director Pamela Brown, proofreader Robin Charney, senior production manager Lisa Ferris, editorial assistant Nicky Guerreiro, cover designer Lucy Kim, publicity manager Zea Moscone, Hachette CEO Michael Pietsch, copyeditor Deri Reed, proofreader Audrey Sussman, and marketing manager Lauren Velasquez. Thanks, too, to Ashley Prine, creative director of Tandem Books, for her ebullient interior design.
• All of the chefs and other experts you’ve met in these pages whose work has inspired us, and especially those who made time to speak with us personally and to be photographed—and/or who opened their beautiful restaurants and/or homes to us to photograph their exquisite dishes and drinks and lives, including: José Andrés and everyone at ThinkFoodGroup; Rob Arthur, Mark Levy, Emmanuel West, and everyone at Magdalena and the Ivy Hotel; Damon Baehrel; Dan Barber, Philippe Gouze, Irene Hamburger, and everyone at Blue Hill and Blue Hill at Stone Barns (especially for the honor of inviting us to speak about our work over family meal); Rick and Deann Bayless and everyone at Frontera Grill, Topolobampo, and Lena Brava; Daniel Boulud, Carly DeFilippo, and everyone at the Dinex Group; Chad Brauze, Scott Cioe, Greg Mosko, and everyone at Bevy and Nomi at the Park Hyatt; Raymond Brunyanszki and everyone at the Camden Harbour Inn and the Danforth Inn; Joanne Chang and Flour Bakery; Dan DeSimone, Alan Stenberg, and everyone at Glenmere Mansion; Curtis Duffy, Michael Muser and everyone at Grace; the James Beard House; Cameron Karger, Joe Maiurano, Jake Kipping, and everyone at the Point; Thomas Keller and everyone at the Thomas Keller Restaurant Group; Christopher Kostow, Martina Kostow, Katianna Hong, and everyone at the Charter Oak; Gabriel Kreuther, Eben Dorros, Joe Anthony, Marc Aumont, and everyone at Gabriel Kreuther; Corey Lee, Jasmine Peterlin, and In Situ; Danny Meyer, Michael Anthony, and everyone at the Union Square Hospitality Group and Shake Shack; Patrick O’Connell, Rachel Hayden, and everyone at the Inn at Little Washington; Michael Scelfo and everyone at Alden and Harlow; Michael Tusk and everyone at Quince; and members of other chefs’ teams who eased every step of the way, including Laiko Bahrs, Heather Freeman, Kristine Keefer, Chloe Mata, and Martha Tiller.
• Our family, friends, colleagues, and even strangers, for their kindnesses, large and small—including Rosario Acquista, Patricia Andrés, Carrie Bachman, Melanie Baker, Melissa Balmain, Steve Beckta, Bill Bratton, Priscilla Bright, Brian Burry, Susan Bulkeley Butler, Heather Carlucci, Belinda Chang, Howard Childs, Stephen Co, Fran Costigan, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Julia D’Amico, Blake Davis, Julia Davis, Susan Davis, Caroline Day, Laura Day, Samson Day, Sheri de Borchgrave, Susan Dey, Jessica Dibb, Deborah Domanski, Jill Eikenberry, Georgette Farkas, Bill FitzPatrick, Ashley Garrett, Michael Gelb, Richard Giles of Lucky Dog Farm, Sarah Girard, Diane Goldner, Gael Greene, Howard Greynolds, Glenn Hall, Glen Hansard, Sarah Hirshan, Russ Hudson, Marketa Irglova, Alan Jones, Erica Kane, Scott Barry Kaufman, BFF extraordinaire Rikki Klieman, Lisa Klinck-Shea, Matt Lambert of the Musket Room, Barbara Lazaroff, Dongmei Liu, Leonard Lopate, Tess Masters, Karen McCoy, Yana Morgan, Jeanne Nicastri, Jody Oberfelder, Heidi Olson, Kelley Olson, Scott Olson, Robert Peng, Cynthia Penney, Jeff Penney, Emilie Perrier, Joy Pierson, Bart Potenza, Steven Pressfield, Mike Randleman, Judith Regan, Jasper Riehm, Juergen Riehm, Lara Riggio, Stuart Rockefeller, Cheryl Rogowski, Troy Rohne, Anthony Rudolf, Amy Scherber, Stephen Schiff, Beth Shapiro, S&SO Produce Farms, Dana Sachs Stoddard, Katherine Sieh Takata, Mike Tucker, Jane Umanoff, Mark Varsano (of our favorite chocolatier in New York City, Varsano’s, which also makes a great caramel apple!), Valerie Vigoda, Earl Weiner, Steve Wilson, and Karen’s supportive friends and colleagues through the Council of 100 at Northwestern University, Les Dames d’Escoffier, and the New York Women’s Forum and International Women’s Forum.
Say the word and you’ll be free…
Have you heard the word is LOVE?
—JOHN LENNON AND PAUL MCCARTNEY, “The Word”
• For one of the most inspirational afternoons of our lives, let alone of our study of creativity: librarian DJ Hoek at Northwestern University, which holds one of the world’s most important collections of Beatles manuscripts. Karen, a lifelong Beatles fan, knew that even the “World’s Greatest Rock ’n’ Roll Band” got its start as a cover band, performing other musicians’ work. The privilege of holding in our hands Paul McCartney’s and John Lennon’s actual handwritten lyrics, jotted in ink or markers on pages of notebook paper or the backs of envelopes, prompted an unforgettable moment of clarity: Creativity stems from the inspirations and imaginations and initiatives of real people in the midst of living everyday lives.
• And, finally, each other—for taking the leap as newlyweds to sign our first joint book contract on August 25, 1992, in the hope that something good might come of it, and for being the other’s favorite co-creator and collaborator over the past 25 years…and still.
LOVE,
Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg
August 2017
The greater your capacity for sincere appreciation,
the deeper the connection to your heart, where intuition
and unlimited inspiration and possibilities reside.
—HEARTMATH INSTITUTE