Cooking from the source
a. Celebrates local, seasonal ingredients;
b. Fosters relationships with the people who grow our food;
c. Recommends proper cooking techniques to enhance an ingredient’s distinct flavors and natural beauty.
The Beginning
Cooking from the source is an ideology, a kitchen creed distilled from 40 year’s experiences as a chef, mentor and instructor in various regions of the country. The kernel of this philosophy was planted in 1971, in the Pacific Northwest, where I harvested oysters from my family’s Yaquina Bay aqua farm near Newport, Oregon, and worked at Dan & Louis Oyster Bar, the restaurant founded by my great grandfather in 1907. I grew up thinking that all restaurants harvested at least some of the food they served their customers.
“Cooking from the Source in the Pacific Northwest” is also the subtitle of Wildwood, my first cookbook, which was named for my Portland, Oregon restaurant. Looking back to that young boy working in his family’s restaurant, I find that, as much as my approach to food and cooking has evolved, to keep pace with the modern age, it has stayed the same. It’s still rooted in carefully sourced ingredients, prepared simply using straightforward techniques, with an emphasis on good health and the creativity that food and cooking encourage in eaters.
I hope you’ll enjoy exploring the twists and turns in my path, the culinary landscape, and in the notion of cooking from the source. I welcome your feedback and comments.
Cory Schreiber
About Cory Schreiber
A native Oregonian, Cory Schreiber grew up in Dan & Louis Oyster Bar, his family’s Portland restaurant founded by Cory’s great grandfather in 1907. After working for 13 years in restaurants from San Francisco to Chicago to Boston, Cory returned home to the West Coast in 1994, to open Wildwood Restaurant. He quickly joined the ranks of leaders of the region’s bustling culinary scene, winning the James Beard Award for Best Chef Pacific Northwest in 1998. In 2000, he published his first cookbook, Wildwood: Cooking from the Source in the Pacific Northwest (Ten Speed Press). For a man who cherishes the land, its people, and its produce with the same ferocity that native Oregonian Beard did, there could hardly be more fitting professional accomplishments.
In 2007, Cory left Wildwood to apply his deep knowledge and considerable experience with local, seasonal food as the Oregon Department of Agriculture’s Farm-to-School Program Manager. During his tenure with the ODA, he wrote his second cookbook, Rustic Fruit Desserts (Ten Speed Press, 2009), which he co-authored with Julie Richardson.
In January 2010, Cory joined the faculty of the Art Institute of Portland as its “culinary artist in residence,” a post he held until 2016. During his time there, Cory brought a contemporary focus to seasonal cooking, with an emphasis on sourcing and preparing high quality ingredients. Sharp, the school's restaurant, was the outlet for Cory's detailed curriculum, which examined how ingredient selection, technique, flavor and texture are directly tied to success on the plate.
Currently, Cory is a chef consultant for Sysco, the nation’s largest foodservice marketer and distributor. Whether cooking in the kitchen or meeting up with producers in the field, Cory is excited to have the opportunity to affect change by working for a company committed to conducting their business sustainably, especially in the areas of food, operations and community.
