Author
Daniel Ruiz
Editor of Sobremesa Press
I grew up in New York City. That is where the appetite started, and where I spent more than a decade in restaurant kitchens, working my way up the line from cook to sous chef to executive chef. Franchise concepts, fine-dining rooms, some of the city's busiest spots, corporate and executive dining, catering. I learned how food actually works in the one place that never slows down long enough to let you forget it.
Long before any of that, there was a table. I come from a family that treats a good meal as the main event of the day, not the thing you hurry through on the way to something else. Almost everything I care about as a cook traces back to those long lunches and the people I shared them with.
Over the years I started spending more and more time in Colombia, until the back and forth became the actual shape of my life. I split my time between New York and Colombia now. A lot of that pull came from the food itself. I wanted to live closer to where it comes from, so I built a small farm: my own chickens, my own vegetables, a slower and healthier way of eating that you cannot really fake from a city apartment.
Some of the best hours I know still happen after the plates are cleared, when nobody is in a rush to leave the table. That is what sobremesa means, and it is the disposition I try to bring to everything here: sit with the food, the people, and the conversation long enough to say something honest.
After I hung up the apron, I spent more than a decade in tech and marketing, learning how to build an audience and tell a story that actually lands. I am the co-founder of Crewli, a software platform built for restaurants, which means I have now seen this industry from the back of the house, the front of the house, and the spreadsheet behind both. Sobremesa Press is what came after: a publication about food, kitchens, and the business of feeding people, written by someone who has worked every side of the door.