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An indelible imprint was made on East End food by chef Starr Boggs. (Photo courtesy of Judy Carroll)
There’s a lot of focus on what’s new in the Hamptons. New shops, new restaurants, new chefs. New, new, new. This focus on what’s coming down the pike can crowd out the stories of the people who got us here to begin with (and wow, is that a rabbit hole).
When it comes to the current culinary scene, Starr Boggs was a pivotal figure not just in what we ate, but in who was influenced by him behind those swinging kitchen doors. I’d actually really wanted to write this piece myself, but in my gut I knew that the wonderful writer Charity Robey was the right person to get to the heart of Boggs’s story and influence.
She did it with two words: crab cakes.
And, of course, through a feast of insight, interviews and stories that honored the East End chef who died in the spring of 2022.
Chefs Jack Clark of Daphne’s and Tim Trill of the Westhampton Country Club were deeply influenced by working alongside Boggs. Seen here standing in front of Boggs’s former eponymous restaurant, now Fauna. (Photo credit: Doug Young)
Amy Zavatto is the Editor-in-Chief for southforker, northforker and Long Island Wine Press. She's a wine, spirits, and food journalist whose work appears in Wine Enthusiast, InsideHook.com, MarthaStewart.com, the New York Post, Liquor.com, SevenFifty Daily, Imbibe, Men’s Journal and many others. She's the author of The Big Book of Bourbon Cocktails, Prosecco Made Me Do It: 60 Seriously Sparkling Cocktails, Forager’s Cocktails: Botanical Mixology with Fresh, Natural Ingredients, and The Architecture of the Cocktail. She is a respected judge for the American Craft Spirits Association’s annual small-production spirits competition, and has moderated numerous panels on the topics of wine, spirits, cocktails, and regional foodways. She is the former Deputy Editor for the regional celebratory publications, Edible Manhattan and Edible Brooklyn, as well as the former Executive Director of the Long Island Merlot Alliance. She is a member of the New York chapter of the international organization of women leaders in food, wine, and spirits, Les Dames d’Escoffier. The proud daughter of a butcher, Amy is originally from Shelter Island, N.Y., where she developed a deep respect for the East End’s natural beauty and the importance of preserving and celebrating it and its people.
