Hey y’all! I’m Cecilia.
Most people call me Ceci, though! I’m a recipe developer, food writer, private chef, line cook, and an eater of good food/sipper of good drink based in New York City.
I was born and raised in the south—Nashville, Tennessee and Greenville, Mississippi—and I’ve been obsessed with cooking since I was about 5 years old. I graduated from the University of Arkansas in 2023 with a B.S. in Food, Nutrition, and Health and a minor in Journalism. I then packed up my kitchen gear and moved north to New York, where I attended culinary school at the Institute of Culinary Education in lower Manhattan. Post culinary hool, I am currently working as a line cook in the NYC restaurant scene and developing recipes for my personal food medias, as well as working in freelance food media and as a private chef.
I started this site as a blog (formerly named “Apricots + Sage”) when I was 11 and have used it as a channel to document my cooking and food writing progress while sharing my recipes with whoever happens to stumble through. My culinary style can be described as bold, seasonal, innovative, and funky and is inspired mostly by the food I grew up around—southern Delta soul food and Middle Eastern cuisine stemming from my Lebanese roots. Along with that, I credit this love of mine to treating Food Network and The Cooking Channel like it was my Disney Channel growing up, my ever-growing cookbook collection, the ridiculous amount of times I've watched "Julie and Julia," many a trips to New Orleans, Louisiana (a.k.a, my favorite city in the world), and watching my parents cook dinner, drink wine, and dance together in the kitchen nightly throughout my childhood.
For private chef and catering inquiries please fill out this form.
For freelance food writing/recipe development work or brand partnerships, please email me at ceciliadazar@gmail.com.
