Through the Kitchen

Lessons from the kitchen that keep turning up at work -- salt, mise en place, resting the meat, the knife in your hand. Same problems, different rhetorical mode.

Consulting and Craft · Through the Kitchen

The Quiet Jar in the Fridge

My last sourdough starter died through a quiet chain of postponed feeds. I'm starting a new one today. Most of what I'm learning as I begin again, I wish I'd known a decade earlier about codebases.

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Consulting and Craft · Through the Kitchen

The Knife in My Hand

A sharp knife is safer than a dull one. Pick the right tool for the job, then put in the practice. Speed comes from practice, not pressure. A few focussed, well-maintained, well-practised tools will more predictably take you further than the latest beautiful shiny offering.

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Consulting and Craft · Through the Kitchen

The Salt in the Dish

There are four kinds of salt in my kitchen drawer and they are not interchangeable. This post is about salt. Most of it is actually about dependencies, and about the discipline of knowing what you're putting into the dish before you put it in.

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Consulting and Craft · Through the Kitchen

The Probe in the Meat

I own four kitchen thermometers, each for a different kind of cooking, and the differences between them are the differences between the kinds of decisions they help me make. Most of what I've learned about observability, I could have learned from a brisket, a vat of hot oil, a batch of caramel, and a steak.

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Consulting and Craft · Through the Kitchen

Resting the Meat

You take the steak off the heat and the hardest part begins: doing nothing. Most of what I've learned about shipping software, I learned from a piece of resting beef.

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