Janine, Author at Janine Latus

Out in the Wild

Sweat bees swarmed over Nick Nichols’ hands, sucking the salt off him, deep in the jungles of central Africa. They crawled up his nose and into his eyes. Still he crouched, frozen, his lens on the naive chimpanzees who had never seen humans before. He didn’t know which shot would be iconic, which would tell…

Rooted in the Shore

In Chatham’s vines, centuries of tradition come together. There is a minerality to these Eastern Shore wines, a hint of slate and granite and the shells of creatures tossed ashore by the long-ago meteor that cratered out the Chesapeake Bay and scrambled the soil. There is salinity – from the wind or the Bay or…

The Shaman of Ramen

Animal, vegetable, mineral: Kevin Ordonez melds them in ways that keep Alkaline packed. (Try the tater tots.) Kevin Ordonez knows noodles. He knows broth and bones and aromatics, and how to cook pig feet at a ripping boil for days, until the calcium and marrow break down to create the milky white stock that is…

Ain’t It Grand

Small restaurant. Big taste. So worth the wait. Steve Marsh holds an octopus by its head cavity and lowers its body into boiling water, blanching the legs to make them tender before he cuts them off and cooks them sous vide in olive oil. Later he’ll throw each on the grill for a quick char…

A Sacred Sound

Dramatic classical music soars and swells through the neo-Gothic arches of Norfolk’s Christ and St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. Kevin Kwan’s hands range over the three levels of its organ’s keyboards, pulling out a knob to make the notes ring like trumpets, another to make them trill like flutes, his leather-soled shoes heel-and-toeing over the foot pedals.…