Excellent article in this months issue of Wine Spectator magazine on Chef Thomas Keller. The article focused on his numerous failures, with some mixed in successes, that eventually paved the way for one one America's greatest restaurants, The French Laundry in Napa Valley, California. And in time the empire of great restaurants he runs, Per Se, Bouchon, Bouchon Bakeries (and yes Tiffany they make macarons there), and Ad Hoc. And the Creator of culinary dishes on the big screen, the ratatouille dish created by a rat, and the sandwich created by Adam Sandlers character in Spanglish.

The article described his failures in opening a restaurant in New York (leaving so much debt he almost couldn't open French Laundry), lying in France to get a apprenticeship, working with Daniel Boulud in the early 1980's at the Westbury Hotel (well before either were famous chefs), not going to culinary school, and the job hoping in between all those events. Then to the chaos of the first night, with no menu plan and no saute pans. To the single biggest event for the restaurant, two paragraphs by columnist Herb Caen of the San Francisco Chronicle that followed a description of cab drivers using whistles to scare deer away.

His theory on the dining experience is the idea of diminishing returns. The first taste should make you say WOW and soon it is gone. "We want you to say, 'I wish I had one more bite of that,' and then the next plate comes arrives and the same thing happens, but in a different way, a whole new flavor and emotion."-Thomas Keller.

For his books and the running of his restaurants Thomas Keller believes that collaboration with everyone has been key. Kellers book Bouchon was mostly written by chef Jeffrey Ceriello and the rest of the team at Bouchon, and Sous-Vide was mostly written by Chef Jonathan Benno and the team at Per Se. He is said to be a calm chef who no matter how busy, behind or overwhelmed hew becomes, he still goes for the touchdown with every dish.

Last year Thomas Keller Restaurant Group employed over 1,000 employees and served about 1.6 MILLION meals at nine locations.

"I look at wine as another way to share the experience of the table. It's part of the equation" -Thomas Keller

"We tend to over analyze cooking, and people become intimidated by it. At whatever level, it's product and execution."-TK

"... where I learned what cooks actually do. We nurture people, we nourish them. I thought, what's more honorable than that?" -TK

"Thomas was not a yelling and screaming kind of guy. I'm not either. He taught me to put a big emphasis on responsibility. Creating a team is not something every (chef) does well. For Thomas it means knowing what you need to do, and what the next guy needs to do, and stepping in to help without getting in the way." - Eric Ziebold of CityZen, Washington DC about working for Thomas Keller