Twenty years in restaurants. Then my son handed me a spatula and said "let's film it."
Food has been my world for as long as I can remember. I spent over two decades in the restaurant industry -- front of house, back of house, all of it. I've worked alongside line cooks under pressure, watched chefs turn simple ingredients into something special, and developed a deep respect for what it actually takes to feed people well.
Along the way I picked up my ServSafe certification, so when it comes to handling food safely -- proper temps, cross-contamination, all of it -- I'm not winging it. That foundation just became part of how I cook at home.
"Two decades in restaurants teaches you a lot. The most important thing? Good food doesn't have to be complicated. It just has to be done right."
Almost a decade behind the camera gave me a different way of seeing food.
About ten years ago I picked up a camera and never really put it down. I built Steve Lunden Photography shooting portraits, weddings, and the Twin Cities skyline -- sometimes at 2am with a drone and a thermos of coffee. When you spend years training your eye to find the story in a frame, it changes how you see everything, including what's on a plate.
That instinct carries straight into the kitchen. Presentation matters. Light matters. The moment a dish comes together -- that's worth capturing. It's a different kind of subject, but the same idea: find what's beautiful about it and show people.
My son started this. The rest of us just kept showing up.
None of this was planned. My son wanted to cook together one night, we hit record almost as an afterthought, and the response caught us both completely off guard. There's something about cooking side by side that opens people up -- the conversations, the mistakes, the "wait, is that burning?" moments. Turns out people connect with all of it.
My wife Samantha is in the mix too, bringing her own personality to whatever we're tackling. Jerk chicken, cornbread, marry me chicken -- she's game. Some episodes it's the two of us, some it's the whole family, some it's just me going solo. You never quite know who's showing up, but it's always genuine.
No scripts. No retakes. No culinary school diploma on the wall. Just someone who has spent a long time around food, a camera, and a family willing to eat whatever comes out of it.