Home Cooks Guide

A professional chef's guide to the home kitchen

About the Blog

Welcome to the Home Cooks Guide.  For 20 years, I worked in commercial kitchens as a line cook, executive chef, restaurant owner and manager, catering director, and CDFA-licensed meat processor.  The Home Cooks Guide is my latest project where I share professional tips for the home kitchen including recipes, cooking lessons, ingredient information and recommendations.  Whether you like following recipes or geeking out on the how and why of cooking, you’ll find interesting to-the-point information here. 

You’ll notice that this blog is Ad-Free.  I’m not interested in writing articles based on trending keywords or vouching for products I’ve never tried for the affiliate commission.  I simply write about what I am most interested in and knowledgeable about, in a way that I would want to read it if I was the reader – without the extra filler.  I hope you appreciate this approach, subscribe and support this blog as you are able to.  Most of all, I hope you enjoy reading, sharing, and commenting on my posts.  

About the AUTHOR

Kara Taylor

I am a self-taught professional chef with 20 years of experience in a variety of commercial settings.  I learned on the job, by trial and error, by devouring cook books with a voracious appetite, and by observing the many talented chefs and homecooks I’ve spent countless hours cooking beside.

I started cooking the line when I was 15  at an Italian Restaurant in a small coastal New England town.  In college, I cooked at a fine French Restaurant in Missoula, Montana.  At 25, I launched a gourmet Charcuterie business in Northern California and became a CDFA-licensed meat processor specializing in sausages, duck confit, pate, and bacon.  At 29, I opened a Farm-to-Table Restaurant with my husband where I was the executive chef, general manager, and catering director.  I was awarded Best Chef in 2018 and 2019 in Style Magazine Reader Choice Awards.   

I developed seasonal menus and recipes, trained kitchen staff, oversaw ordering and inventory and planned and coordinated catered events and winemaker dinners.  In May of 2020 I had my second child and at the same time, the restaurant closed due to the pandemic.  I took that as my cue to exit the restaurant industry.  Since then, I’ve been putting all these skills to work, cooking made-from-scratch meals for my husband and 2 daughters while working full time.  We made our way back to Montana to build our forever home and started turning 5 acres of bare ground into a little homestead.  It is very much a work in progress right now.  This blog is my passion project, a way for me to stay connected to my love of food and cooking.

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