Naturals

I'm still reeling from having just watched this video about an accomplished (and adorable) 5-year old with some amazing God-given, natural talent (not to mention having beautifully overcome more trials than most adults, let alone children the age of five).

Kyle Lograsso @ Yahoo! Video

And, while you might not recognize either my cute little golf prodigy or this guy who I'm about to introduce you to, in terms of raw, natural abilities, they both shine.

But in very different ways (what?! I promised I'd get back to food around these parts... so here we go!).

I've mentioned this other guy before... our family's master chef, Ben. He's been around, this is nothing new... he's always been the brains (and brawn, to be sure) behind all of the deliciousness that we are treated to in Penn Yan and he was also the 'hired help' at Chris' 30th birthday shindig, complete with... you guessed it, ribs.

I should stop lest I mislead you into thinking our chef is a one-dish man, though. He just has some things (ah-hem, ribs) perfected so it's hard us mortals of the kitchen to get past them.

Poor Ben can't spend more than 5 minutes with all of us before we are inquiring when he'll finally be opening a restaurant and (since he asked our opinions) naming items that 'absolutely must' be included on the menu. Sure he's never had a formal cooking lesson - but you wouldn't know it visiting his kitchen (or grill, for that matter). Our last visit to his local kitchen produced a meal worthy of royalty... pan-seared foie gras, sauteed duck breasts, and mushroom risotto, all paired with the perfect crisp white wine.

With that said, you can understand why this last time that we saw him, we got down to business... coming up with the perfect name for his restaurant - and an advertising campaign to boot.

I know I'm hedging bets pretty quickly but I think it's fair to say that you should keep an eye out for both of these guys. There's just something about hard-working, figure-it-out-yourself-types that gives me the confidence to know they could go the distance.