At The Fresh Approach we celebrate our first year with a statement of our commitment to good food, community, and sustainability. We have always seen the meal as a center of the human experience. At the table we are nourished and gladdened, put in touch with the source of life, and reconnected to traditions and creativity. This is true of everyday life as well as special occasions.

A good kitchen respects its sources, chooses ingredients that are sound, seasonal, local when possible. Garnish and presentation play supplemental roles, not principal ones. Respect for traditions, both artesian and sophisticated, is equal to respect for inventiveness and improvisation. Good service at the table understands and respects the kitchen, linking it to the diners, coordinating choices of food and wine, and maintaining the comfort and relaxation necessary to a sound and enjoyable meal. We see farming, foraging, cooking, and table service as an unbroken sequence. I have always been committed to soundness and sustainability. With the controversies surrounding genetic manipulation, global marketing and food miles requires a clear statement of that commitment.

It is very simple: The Fresh Approach gathers its material from known and trusted purveyors, known to be committed themselves to sound and sustainable practices, and trusted to remain informed and responsive to these values in a rapidly changing society. By soundness we mean healthful products and practices, as pure and natural as possible, without synthetic additives or pollutants, without unnecessary complexities of packaging and marketing. By sustainability we mean conservation of resources, both natural resources like the families, businesses, and networks that plant and harvest and provide. We seek farmers who know their seeds and soil, which care about the food their livestock eats, winemakers who know what their grapes have known, fish merchants who are concerned about the health of the seas. To them we add kitchen and restaurant staff that care about the material of their work, knowing they will enjoy and take pride in the technical expertise they add to it. We reaffirm our commitment to all this, knowing that it is central to both the deepest and the most joyous of human activities: generosity, companionship, nourishment and growth.