Welcome to outtathekitchen.com,  a magazine blog designed to encourage reflection on the meaning of a most ancient and basic endeavor- cooking. To cook not only brings people to the table but also makes them part  of an activity essential to the human race.   Once you step into the kitchen, you’ll be surprised about what comes outtathekitchen.

Here at OTK  you’ll catch the latest news from the culinary world, experiment with recipes from another era and from today,  share your cooking fun and foibles, get support, and discuss important food-related issues. You can test your culinary knowledge, expand your cooking horizons and skills, and be part of a community of creative and curious cooks like yourself.

Most of all, you can enjoy a good giggle about your own adventures with food as you accompany OTK both in the kitchen and on the road where we get outtathekitchen for some wild food safaris.

The creator of OTK ,Martha Esersky Lorden, is a culinary historian, food writer, and historical cooking teacher. Her culinary roots include her grandparents’ bakery and general store, a family of accomplished chefs and restauranteurs, and a rich cultural food heritage.

She has cooked and read about food all her life; her travels and education, particularly years of  living and cooking in Italy, honed her natural passion and instinct for good food. Martha has worked the wine harvest, plucked chickens, butchered rabbits, and made pasta with her Italian farming neighbors while living in the Umbrian medieval hilltown of Agello.

Martha completed food writing studies at Boston University and holds degrees in anthropology from Princeton and an MAT in social science from Brown. She has worked with food anthropologists, including Dr. Alice Ross, in their historical kitchens. Her  passion, and hard-headed experience (along with some very colorful adventures) contribute to her cooking talents and perspective on food, culture, and literature.

More than likely, you will find Martha in her backyard tending a 19th century cookstove in the kitchen shed studio, roasting trout in an in-ground oven, and from time to time, building a Paleo-Indian smoker for making pemican or jerky. She conducts workshops in 1950’s kitchen culture, macho kitchen culture, and la cucina italiana (d’Umbria), is a personal chef, and a member of the Culinary Historians of New York (CHNY).

A recently retired high school social science teacher, Martha continues to teach the humanities to college students. Along with  plans to  launch an online course on the history of food and nutrition, Martha is doing research about the Cornish colony kitchen of American sculptor, Augustus St. Gaudens.

Martha reviews cookbooks for Publishers Weekly and other trade magazines and writes reviews and food-related articles for the Hanover Coop News magazine. She lives in New Hampshire with her husband Bruce, their two Scottish terriers (Otis and Wally), and an extremely well-fed ragdoll cat named Purrl.

–Welcome to OTK–

Come on into the kitchen and watch what comes outtathekitchen!