How I Found eGullet

[heidih]

@Kim Shook in another topic suggested this so I will start. We are in odd nostalgic times in general. I even texted my old neighbor in adjacent cottage - oddly he is now in Austin near our other neighbor.  Life!

 

I read about new food sites in the Los Angeles Times maybe 2007 and liked the global conversation vibe. You guys?

 

Starting splinter groups is hardly a new impulse. Chowhound users have left the site before, dissatisfied over changes or after being banned, and set up new sites. Steven Shaw started eGullet after leaving Chowhound, and Opinionated About Dining, Chicago’s LTH Forum and Mouthfulsfood.com were all started by ex-Hounds.

Edited August 21, 2020 by heidih (log)

[Margaret Pilgrim]

I was active on RecTravelEurope on Usenet in 2001 when internet friend Robert Buxbaum told me that this guy, Steven Shaw, was starting a forum on food.    "What's a forum?"   So he described how special interest groups were going to take the place of cumbersome usenet.    I joined in August, as member #80..

 

(Steve was the real pioneer.  The progression was, AFAIR eGullet ->  OA ->  Mouthfuls and, separately,  Chow.)

Edited August 21, 2020 by Margaret Pilgrim (log)

[heidih]

I will re post Steven's obit here for people who don't know who he was https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/11/nyregion/steven-a-shaw-44-founder-of-an-early-blog-about-food-dies.html

Edited August 22, 2020 by heidih (log)

[IndyRob]

Searching for Sous Vide on the internet brought me to the epic topic here.

 

[gfweb]

It's been so long I'm not sure. I think it might've been sous vide.

[Darienne]

It's been 11 or 12 years for me now, and much like gfweb...I can't actually remember why.  I know I started out in learning about glacé fruits with the help of andiebasenji and how to make ice cream with paulraphael.  And heidih guided me through the maze of the many errors in posting I made when I first joined.  

[weinoo]

Shit, this is eGullet?!

 

I'm in the wrong place!!!

[Toliver]

I was Googling about butter and eGullet popped up as a hit, of course.

I've been here ever since.

[heidih]

10 minutes ago, weinoo said:

Shit, this is eGull

I'm in the wrong place!!!

 

I am planning to throttle you but will save for when you and wife come - we will do it together. I do think it is interesting how one ends up on sites. Some of the best I have found were through the old fashioned "blog roll" that others did How I landed at ever engaging @David Lebovitz through @Abra

[IowaDee]

The Des Moines Register did a short interview with Steven and it made me curious.  I had no one near me that enjoyed cooking and trying new foods so I checked this place out and joined as fast as I could.  Never been sorry for a second!  I tell people we live at the intersection of the bible belt, the corn belt and the Hairy Nation. (google that one).

[robirdstx]

I was researching knife skills. 

[liuzhou]

Googled something (forget what) and eG was first to answer.

[heidih]

1 minute ago, liuzhou said:

Googled something (forget what) and eG was first to answer.

 

I think responsiveness and not being snippy has drawn in folks who might have been hesitant. I might not get the answer I want but I also may get input from all over the world.

[Margaret Pilgrim]

25 minutes ago, heidih said:

 

I am planning to throttle you but will save for when you and wife come - we will do it together. I do think it is interesting how one ends up on sites. Some of the best I have found were through the old fashioned "blog roll" that others did How I landed at ever engaging @David Lebovitz through @Abra

What???  You actually meet face to face?    You really have an in!!!

[heidih]

4 minutes ago, Margaret Pilgrim said:

What???  You actually meet face to face?    You really have an in!!!

 

I wish. The ever curious woman who entered a winemaking program after her husband died. She inspires me. And did her choice of name implode - umm honey that is condoms,,,,  https://frenchletters.wordpress.com/  The kids who did get to cook wth her 

 

[pastameshugana]

My family and I lived in India, and our favorite pastime was buying masses of books at the western mall. They were dirt cheap, so we bought literally hundreds. Somehow I got onto a roll reading about food, and Stevens book Turning the Tables ended up in the pile. The bit about learning to dice an onion captured me, and I’ve been here since. 

[TdeV]

Like @IndyRob and @gfweb, I was searching for information about sous vide. And thank you, everyone, for the unending education!

[MetsFan5]

I loved the abundance of food Blogs here when I would check in after working 8-26 hour shifts in restaurants. 

[heidih]

3 hours ago, MetsFan5 said:

I loved the abundance of food Blogs here when I would check in after working 8-26 hour shifts in restaurants. 

 

It can be both fun and interesting to re-read the old ones. They are locked to comments but the views of life in other parts of the world - fascinating and without "promotion". 

[Maison Rustique]

Apparently I joined in 2003. I have absolutely no idea how I found it!

[chromedome]

I first posted in January of 2004. I don't remember the circumstances, but I was in culinary school at the time so it was probably a "rabbit hole" scenario where I stumbled across the forum in a Google search and spent WAY more time than I could afford in reading through the threads.

[lindag]

I don't remember how either but I do remember it was a post by @Fat Guy that got me hooked.

[Shelby]

 I don't remember who wrote it or what publication, but I remember I read an article online about Anthony Bourdain (I really liked him a lot) and it mentioned that he was posting at a place called Egullet.  I immediately searched for it and spent I don't know how many hours browsing.  I couldn't get enough.  But, I was also totally intimidated --I mean how could I, this home cook that lives in Kansas, join a place where the great Bourdain posts??!!!   We didn't (and still don't) go to restaurants so I couldn't even fit in that way.   I'd guess this was around 2005????  I finally gathered the courage and joined in 2007 in part because the What's For Dinner thread showed me that all different types of cooking were shown.  I remember it was a while before someone "talked" back to me.  Not because people were snobbish or anything, but I think there were just so many regulars that already knew each other so well.  I'm so glad I took the plunge because I literally cannot imagine my life without this place.  I have learned SO MUCH.  And made such wonderful friends.  The people here are invaluable.  Egullet is still the first place I read at every morning and the last place I read at night.

[Alex]

It's August 10, 2003. I see a reference to eGullet in a long article in the New York Times, "A Laboratory of Taste," which ranges far and wide but focuses on progressive cuisine in Spain. In the second paragraph is a quote from Charlie Trotter -- OK, I know him -- followed by one from Thomas Keller (ditto). I keep reading, and at the end of the next paragraph is:

Quote

"Everybody on eGullet wants to know what is happening in Spain,'' says Grant Achatz, the young chef at Trio, a foodie favorite in Evanston, Ill.

(Here's a 2003 eGullet thread about Trio.)

 

Trotter was the big dog in Chicago at the time, but I knew that Achatz had worked at both Charlie Trotter's and The French Laundry, so I say to myself, "Self, what is this eGullet of which he speaks?" I order it up via the intertubes and commence browsing. After a succession of "Oh, this is interesting!" threads, what should I see but this one, about the first Heartland Gathering, in, of all places, Grand Rapids. (Unfortunately, all of the pictures were lost in a software changeover.)

 

I sign up that very day, send a PM to MatthewB offering my assistance, and the rest, as they say, is histrionic. Or something like that.

Edited August 22, 2020 by Alex
to fix a typo (log)

[Porthos]

In late 2006 I was googling for information about knife sharpening and found Chad's Knife Skills and Sharpening (not the title) tutorial, looked around the site and was hooked.