Marsala-Braised Beef with Fennel and Onion Slaw Served on a Garlic-Mint Aioli
Recipe by Peter Wilson.
a cook's life
A Cajun Kind of Love: Peter Wilson
Walking into the Franklinton home that Peter Wilson shares with his wife, Amanda, and their two dogs, one of the first sights that greets visitors is a 25-gallon stockpot perched in the front door’s entryway. For the past three years, Peter has used the pot to cook a crawfish boil at Rehab Tavern, one of his neighborhood hangouts. Prior to this, he hosted friends and family for a day of the Cajun-inspired fare at his home.
Peter cooks the crawfish with sausage, corn and potato. “I absolutely love anything Creole: jambalaya, gumbo, etouffee, po’ boys. I’ve always sort of been drawn to the cuisine—it’s one of the first that I learned to cook,” he says.
Though Peter isn’t formally trained in the culinary arts, he has continually been drawn to the kitchen both personally and professionally. “I’ve paid for a lot of school working in restaurants,” he says with a laugh.
While we talk, Peter plates a Marsala-braised beef brisket, slow cooked and sandwiched between a layer of fennel and onion slaw and garlic-mint aioli. He perfected this recipe while the executive chef at Sandman Gourmet, a Central Ohio catering company that also operates a deli and cheesesteak shop. Currently, Peter serves as a kitchen manager in Condado’s commissary kitchen, where he and a crew prep ingredients daily for the company’s nine taco joints across the region.
Peter has cooked at home for years. One fateful day in his youth, Peter’s family declared that he needed to prepare a meal each week. After he served French toast for months on end, his grandfather pushed him to try new recipes. As he grew up, his mother helped to foster his natural culinary instinct too. “When I was 19, and a little lost, my mom was great about encouraging me in the kitchen,” he says.
With a father who served as the pastor of a Worthington parish, Peter also credits the numerous church potlucks that he attended as a kid as providing further culinary motivation. “I modified and stole a lot of recipes from older church ladies,” he says with a laugh.
In his downtime, Peter relishes crafting creatively in the kitchen with family and friends. “A big part of why I cook is because I love hanging out with my friends,” he says. “Every time I’ve gotten together with friends and made a meal, it has created a happy moment. In a life with a lot of ups and downs, cooking food has always been an up.”
Recently in his home kitchen, Peter has enjoyed exploring his Eastern European heritage through schnitzel. Additionally, at the height of the summer harvest, he and his buddies gathered peppers from their gardens and spent a special day together making hot sauce. Their collective effort filled 24 bottles.
I ask him to tell me about an aspirational meal he’d like to make at home. “Caribbean curried goat,” he quickly answers, obvious that the adventurous cook has been daydreaming about this meal for a while. “A big goat shank, slow roasted, with a beautiful Caribbean curry spice rub. Definitely served with a delicious dirty rice with coconut milk, charred green onions and maybe some naan or a flatbread to sop it all up.”
Peter's Recipe
Marsala-Braised Beef with Fennel and Onion Slaw Served on a Garlic-Mint Aioli
Recipe by Peter Wilson.
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