Whitney Otawka, whom some listeners might remember from her stint on Top Chef, just released a new cookbook, The Saltwater Table, based on her exploration and interpretation of the terroir of Georgia's Cumberland Island. It's a fascinating read, and Whitney's story--she grew up as a wannabe archeologist in Southern California, discovered cooking in a first job in a two-person kitchen in Berkeley, and flowered as a chef after moving to Athens, Georgia--is compelling, to say the least.

In our second interview, Andrew visits with husband-and-wife chef-restaurateurs Laura and Sayat Ozyilmaz of San Francisco's hit restaurant Noosh. They share the story of how they met and how their stories and sensibilities--one's a lifelong cook, the other a career-changer--complement one another, and how Noosh came to be.

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THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW:

Andrew is a writer by trade. If you'd like to support him, there's no better way than by purchasing his most recent book, The Dish: The Lives and Labor Behind One Plate of Food (October 2023), about all the key people (in the restaurant, on farms, in delivery trucks, etc.) whose stories and work come together in a single restaurant dish.

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