“Food is our common ground, a universal experience.”

-James Beard

My name is David Niemann, and I do the cooking here. The food is well-seasoned, but everyone has different tastes, so salt & pepper are allowed on the table.

I’m a line cook working in New York City, currently doing Italian food. In the past I’ve done Mediterranean, French, and Swedish. I was planning to go to culinary school, but since the majority of the people I talked to, including culinary school graduates, basically said it’s not worth it, I decided to save my 10 months and $30,000. Instead of going to school, I’m learning as much as I can on the job, reading books, and cooking at home.

Cooking is easy. Simple. You don’t need school for it. Anyone can do it, you just need to learn the feel.

Please enjoy these pages, read the recipes, learn flavors and techniques, and hopefully be inspired by something on here.

Also, please contact me if you really like something, or improve on something, or create a different version, or if you think everything sucks. I like to know what people think.

Email: heatandknives [at] gmail [dot] com