What’s with the name?

Blue Kitchen is the name of the mythical restaurant I will never open, because I’m smart enough to know that it would be punishingly hard work and that, realistically, I have neither the stamina nor the true culinary talent to make even a middling success of such an endeavor. But I do love to cook. I love it a lot.

The name Blue Kitchen evokes visions of a romantic, bohemian place— chalkboard menu, little wooden tables and mismatched kitchen chairs, art on the walls, candles on the tables and jazz on the sound system. But where the name actually comes from is that when the wheels start falling off things in the kitchen—both measuring cups are in use and I need another one, I can’t find the right pot lid, the pasta’s done and the sauce isn’t—I start cursing up a storm. The air in the kitchen can become quite blue on a bad night.

It used to be when I let loose with a string of expletives, my wife and daughters would come running to see what was wrong. Now they just laugh, knowing that it’s business as usual in the kitchen and whatever the problem is, I’ll figure something out.

Stick around—and come back often. You’ll like Blue Kitchen. I swear.