I've written about Chef Paul Gerard in these pages before, and from the first day I met him in September of 2017 I began taking photographs of him and the amazing food he creates, and there are always reminders and memories of him and his exquisite perfection of culinary artistry appearing in my photograph files. There was a period of time when I was working on a few projects that he either directly inspired or in some way was a catalyst for, and I have photographs of him meeting with Artists and friends I introduced to him and of a class I taught on nutrition and health and wellness at one of his restaurants where I had first met him. The class was part of a pilot program for a community kitchen project I was developing with an organization on Manhattan's Lower East Side, and he contributed his expertise, recipes and philosophy of food to the discussion which brought the work that we were doing in the community to a new level. It's been my goal for many years now to assist every person and family with resources for food and nutrition education and the ability to provide the highest quality of food possible regardless of income level or background, and that pilot program became the jumping off point when I began to create the Love & Plenty project in March of 2020 to help the restaurants that had been shut down get funding to provide meals for people in need. As I've noted in these pages, Love & Plenty keeps growing, and Chef Paul Gerard was the foremost inspiration behind that project. It's his food and who he is as an inspirational creative force that has been an integral part of how the project continues to grow and become much more than I could ever have imagined.
It had been some time since I had seen him, and though I had been keeping him updated on the progress that was happening with Love & Plenty, his presence in the actual events of this past year has been heartily missed. His not being around for so long has made it so that my focus has had to go elsewhere and the project has continued to grow in ways that are wonderful, but I've been missing his food and wishing I could see him during this time, and so when I heard that he'd be speaking at an event at a community space that is affiliated with a brewery in Stamford, Connecticut, I looked up the directions and was happily surprised to see that I could easily take the Metro North Harlem Line from Grand Central Station to get there. That particular train is one that I have always loved since I was a child and it has so many beautiful memories for me, of trips taken with my mother, of my college years at Sarah Lawrence, and of my father's history at Yale. The address where the talk would be held looked to be an easy walk from the Stamford train station, and so I began to plan the trip.
I like taking adventures, and I thought it would fun to make a day of it, and so I began to look around for other things to do that were near the area of the Brewery. A few years ago I visited an Artist I had met in Stamford, and the Brewery website mentioned that it had a gallery in the same building, and so I started looking online to find other galleries nearby. I found some antique and artisan galleries and shops and mapped it out and found when I arrived that the walk to each was even easier than the online mapping explained. Maps used to be much easier to use for walking, but now everything is geared toward driving or taking a car service, so I was pleasantly surprised when I got off the train and began what I thought would be a more difficult and confusing hike to find out that it was a breeze. I'll share more on those wonderful places I found to browse that day when I write about them in upcoming weeks. For now I'll focus on Third Place by Half Full Brewery, the brewery and community space where I went to see Chef Paul Gerard speak at a very special event called Appetite For Connection.
Taking the train from Grand Central on the Harlem Line hits every chord of my childhood and young adult happiness, and I'm also a big fan of breweries. My mother's father was a baker who always brewed his own beer, and my mother's mother's brothers who were also originally part of my great-grandfather's bakery family left the family business to start a bar in Brooklyn that prospered because of their skill in brewing and distilling. Third Place by Half Full Brewery is one of those spaces that feels comfortable from the moment I walked into it. They describe on their website that the name comes from the idea that we have two places where we spend most of our time, our home and our work, and that we need to have another place to relax, have fun and connect with others and they want to be that place. I'd say they've done what they set out to do because my evening there was so enjoyable I'd go back on the train any time for a visit.
The talk Chef Paul Gerard gave was part of an event series by the Stamford Literature, Art & Culture Salon, which is known as SLACS, and they have the wonderful mission of Building Community & Enriching Lives Through Creative Pursuits. Their website and Instagram are a play on words, cutmesomeslac.org and @cutmesomeslac, which adds some levity to the mix, and their motto is Vitae Melius Est Cum Arte, or "Life Is Better With Art" as I was able to translate it to online because my own Latin was much too long ago to remember. I agree with that sentiment thoroughly, and just reading the Latin made me want to go back in my memory and tease out the nuances of the language as I used to love to do once upon a time. According to the website, "SLACS is a collective of like-minded individuals who come together to enrich each other's lives by sharing their creative interests." It was founded by Mark Gottlieb, Sarah Mastroni, Russ Redgate, Matt Terry, and Maria F. Sanchez. On the evening I attended, Mark Gottlieb interviewed Chef Paul Gerard and was the facilitator for the conversation. From what I have seen on their Instagram page and their website, along with what I experienced that evening, they are a great organization that hosts a variety of different types of events that all have a community focus and give audiences a view into a topic or a person or a business or a way of life that is unique and refreshing and inspiring.
Over the course of the evening, Chef Paul Gerard shared information about his current pursuits as well as some of his history. He is the star of his new show Hungry For More and he has been working on his cookbook and memoir, which will combine stories of his well traveled life with recipes from his well seasoned history. One thing that I will share is that though I'm sure it will be a wonderful book because he is a wonderful writer, there is no way to recreate the food this Chef makes. All the recipes in the world can't take the place of the magic that happens when he's in a kitchen. He has shared recipes with me which I am so grateful for, but though they have a hint of the goodness that is found when he makes them, the richness of flavor and texture and scent and the sensory experience that is inspiring and life changing about the food he creates is something only he can do.
As I write this I find myself wishing that there was some place like Third Place at Half Full Brewery and an organization like SLACS to host events closer to home, but taking the train to Stamford is an enjoyable adventure, and I'm very happy to have found a new place.
