When I was in college, I majored in journalism and dreamed of being a music or film critic at either Rolling Stone, Spin, or Entertainment Weekly. Food was always an interest but not a passion, and I never thought that writing about it was very exciting. More than a decade later, this Web site was born.
My wife and I like to throw dinner parties, and friends would often ask for the recipes. I started compiling them online so I could keep track of some of my favorite recipes and make it easier to share them with everyone.
In August 2006, I stumbled upon Yelp.com when I was looking for some new places to eat. I didn’t think much of my reviews when I first started, but as I kept writing, I found it to be a worthwhile creative outlet, allowing me to write for pleasure instead of just for work. It also introduced me to a lot of new places to eat, and I met a lot of like-minded people who share the same passion for food.
Yelp led me to Thomas Keller’s Ad Hoc, and during my first visit, I had a major culinary epiphany. If you read my review of that dinner, I think you can actually see the light bulbs going off in my head as dinner progressed, and the entire experience made me reevaluate how I thought about food and cooking. In September 2007, I launched the unofficial Ad Hoc Menu Archive.
If you’re curious, inuyaki means “grilled dog” in Japanese. I’m Filipino, but I thought it was funny name since my people do have a history of dog eating. I’ve never actually eaten dog, but the name popped into my head one day, and I thought it would be a funny name for a food blog. My wife, who is Japanese American, is a graphic designer and designed the Inuyaki logo.
Thanks for stopping by, and I hope you find this site useful and fun.
Arnold
Editor, inuyaki.com