Jennifer Pensoneau of JFires' Market Bistro, a Q&A

This the Q&A portion of Robin Wheeler's profile of Jennifer Pensoneau of JFires' Market Bistro. Part one can be accessed here. Pensoneau's recipes for suckling pig and cherry cobbler are available here.

Robin Wheeler

​Did your family cook when you were a child? If so, what meals stand out? Oh yeah, we cooked. The most significant one to me is when my dad made shrimp and okra gumbo. I thought it was absolutely amazing. I remember cooking the okra forever, it seemed. When the final product was finished, it had so much flavor. And an unusual one; one I had never tried before.

I soon went to Louisiana and had my first shrimp and okra gumbo in the South and found out that Dad's was the real deal. It made me proud of my dad for going out on a limb and trying and sharing new ideas with us.

The best memory of homegrown food is my mom's sauerkraut. Wow, there is nothing that can compete with sauerkraut made in a crock pot. My mom and I would shred head after head of cabbage. Mix in a enormous crock pot and set it with towels and bricks on top. Every day we would skim the top and change out the towels until it was ready to jar. Yum! I am in the process of making it again!

How old were you when you started cooking? My first memory of actually feeling productive in a kitchen, I was around eight or nine, in the basement of the church kitchen helping all the ladies prepare for the church picnic. My duty was to help with slaw and potato salad. My fiancé's mom was the first lady, besides my mom, that I stood next to to cook. They had a farmhouse and supplied the town with chickens and eggs. The best chicken around, also the best chicken-and-dumplings and pan-fried chicken around. I think people always look at their past, but it's not until you live that you realize the impact it had on you.

Robin Wheeler

​What do you eat? Well, everything! I tend to go towards grains and legumes -- quinoa, barley, rice, lentils, any beans or peas, fava beans and English peas are my favorite. I make a big batch and toss them with olive oil, garlic, nuts and dried fruits and eat that for breakfast and lunch, I'll add vegetables, meat or seafood on the side. On the meat side I like the hanger steaks, London broils, flank or [flat-]iron steaks and rib eyes. Anything with lots of flavor. Seafood -- my favorite is shrimp, then crab, then any fish with flavor, escolar, monkfish.

We'd be most surprised that you eat _____.. Candy. I'm a sugar junky. I know, it's terrible.

What do you cook at home? I went through two years when I renovated and opened [the restaurant] when I didn't cook anything. Very depressing, but I finally in the last two weeks have been able to cook at home. And I made grilled oyster mushrooms with olive oil, garlic and herbs; fava beans with stewed tomatoes; and a grilled marinated iron steak. The next day I made scrambled eggs with tomato and fava beans, some pan-fried potatoes and the leftover steak.

Three favorite restaurants in St. Louis, besides yours? Terrene, the sushi restaurant on the corner of Grand by Tower Grove Park [Sekisui], and.... Wow, that's hard, because there is a long list of restaurants I want to try and am sure will be favorites -- like Erato on Main, Fond, Niche, Scape, many more.

I don't know if I have favorites to food or food places. Every place I have been has had their own share of amazing food. I love all food and culture. They are all unique and special in their way.

Favorite recent food find? I did find an awesome Vietnamese restaurant, Truc Lam. I love Vietnamese po-boys.

Most essential ingredient in your kitchen? Eggs and flour.

Favorite local ingredient and where you get it? Honey from Kruse Gardens.