In the kitchen with Celine Costa

Celine Costa of Newton is the owner and head chef of Up Street Food Truck (upstreetfoodtruck.wixsite.com/upstreet, [email protected], and on Facebook and Instagram), which she runs with her partner, Scott Magnusson. Up Street gets its name from its “upscale street food” concept, offering a rotating menu of options like fish tacos, sandwiches, hand-breaded chicken tenders, Thai curry fries or tater tots, fried pickles and more. Since launching the 32- by 10-foot trailer last year, Costa and Magnusson have parked at several spots all over New Hampshire, including Lithermans Limited Brewery in Concord and North Country Hard Cider in Rollinsford, and have participated in local events. Up Street is also available to book for corporate events, weddings and private parties and gatherings.

What is your must-have kitchen item?

Herbs are such a big part of our cooking, whether they’re in the dish or as a garnish. I like pairing herbs with different things that you wouldn’t think would necessarily go together.

What would you have for your last meal?

I would definitely do malai kofta from Gypsy Cafe in Lincoln. It’s a north Indian potato dish with vegetables, rolled into little balls in a tomato cream sauce, and they serve it with basmati rice. It’s so delicious.

What is your favorite local restaurant?

Cafe El Camino in Plaistow. They’re right down the street from us and they’ve been really good friends. … I would say their beef empanadas are probably one of the best things on the menu, but they have a new guava and cheese empanada that is also really good.

What celebrity would you like to see ordering from your food truck?

Conan O’Brien, because he is my favorite. … I had a dream one time that Scott invited him to my birthday party, so now I just have this whole scene in my head of him showing up. … Scott said Adam Sandler would be pretty cool, too.

What is your favorite thing on your menu?

We recently did a sandwich that we called One Hot Honey. It’s a hot honey fried chicken sandwich with a chile-infused hot honey and a spring mix. That’s probably my No. 1.

What is the biggest food trend in New Hampshire right now?

One thing that definitely comes to mind is charcuterie boards. I feel like everybody is doing their own version of their charcuterie board, or something to do with charcuterie. … There’s also an emphasis on buying local. I feel like I see that growing more and more, especially as we travel around.

What is your favorite thing to cook at home?

I would say my grandmother’s cranberry chicken recipe. It just brings back good childhood memories and it’s wicked easy to make.

Beama’s cranberry chicken
From the kitchen of Celine Costa of Up Street Food Truck

8 chicken breasts (totaling 4 pounds)
1 16-ounce can whole-berry cranberry sauce
1 8-ounce bottle Catalina dressing
1 package onion soup mix

Place chicken breasts in a greased baking dish. Preheat the oven to 355 degrees. Combine all other ingredients in a pot and simmer on low heat, stirring until ingredients have combined well. Pour cranberry mixture over chicken and bake for roughly one hour, or until the chicken reaches an internal temperature of 165 degrees. (Suggestion: serve with rice pilaf, grape goat cheese garden salad and cranberry gin and tonic with a sprig of burnt rosemary).

Featured photo: Celine Costa. Courtesy photo.

On The Job – Barry D’Andrea

Barry D’Andrea

Shoe store owner

Barry D’Andrea is the owner and operator of The Shoe Box, a family shoe store in Amherst.

Explain your job.

I pretty much do everything from buying products, hiring employees, selling, scheduling, marketing and advertising, maintaining the store website and email list and physical upkeep and maintenance of the building and property.

How long have you had this job? 

I’ve been in the retail footwear business since 1974, so going on 48 years. I’ve owned and operated the Shoe Box in the Amherst location for the last 26 years.

What led you to this career field and your current job? 

I met my wife of 45 years in high school, and her father was in the shoe business. This led me to get involved.

What kind of education or training did you need?

I attended UMass-Amherst for a year back in 1974. I took a long break after becoming involved in the family business. Mostly, my education was learning on the job and from my father-in-law, who was a great mentor and teacher. I then decided, later in life, to get a degree in business entrepreneurship.

What is your typical at-work attire? 

Khaki pants and a dress shirt, or, on occasion, dress jeans.

How has your job changed over the course of the pandemic?

I was able to adapt and survive during the Covid shutdown. … I provided home delivery and … contact-free service by using my drive-thru window. I promoted [the store] on social media for being the only drive-thru shoe store around. … The pandemic continues to affect our business because of supply chain issues and employee shortages. This results in my having to buy much further in advance of when I need product. I’m buying product now to ship next fall. The shipping issue is also causing a much higher freight cost, which I haven’t passed on to my customers.

What do you wish you’d known at the beginning of your career?

Retail has changed tremendously from what it was when I first began almost 50 years ago. I wish I knew how fast these changes would have occurred, especially just within the last 10 years. I believe some retailing strategy of old is quite relevant, but I wish that I had embraced some of the newer techniques and innovations sooner.

What do you wish other people knew about your job? 

How difficult and demanding being a business owner is. There were many sacrifices and challenges throughout the years, building this business and to get where the Shoe Box is today.

What was the first job you ever had?

Where I grew up in western Massachusetts, there was an amusement park called Riverside Park. Six Flags is now located there. As a child, I loved amusement parks, and I applied for a job there back in the early 1970s. I thought it was great earning almost $1 an hour. My first job was working at a concession stand at that park.

What’s the best piece of work-related advice you’ve ever received? 

That customer satisfaction comes first, and the need to realize that they are why your business exists. Our company mission is to be honest with customers, provide great product at a good price and to treat customers with respect. If you do this, your customers will be loyal. I have parents that I waited on when they were a child who are now shopping at my store with their own children.

Five favorites

Favorite book:
Fictional history, especially the Jeff Shaara Civil War series
Favorite movie: Planes, Trains & Automobiles
Favorite music: Gospel
Favorite food: My wife is a great cook, so just about anything she cooks, especially scallops.
Favorite thing about NH: There’s nothing like the landscape of New Hampshire, the four seasons, mountains, hiking and camping

Featured photo: Barry D’Andrea. Courtesy photo.

Kid stuff

A look at child care accessibility in New Hampshire

Amy Brooks is the executive director of the Early Care and Education Association, a nonprofit organization that works to expand and improve pre-K child care in New Hampshire and Vermont. Brooks discussed some of the biggest child care issues affecting child care providers and families with young children in the state.

What are some child care challenges New Hampshire has faced, even before Covid?

The funding structure for child care obviously just doesn’t work. … When children aren’t successful in school, it’s rarely because they’re not smart; it’s because they struggle emotionally or socially. … About 80 percent of a child’s brain is developed by the age of 3, and 90 percent by the age of 5 … so investing in high-quality programming for children under 5, especially for children under 3 and for children living in poverty … [would result] in a lower need for special education … and help to stabilize the child’s life so that they’re ready, especially socially and emotionally, to go to public school. … The fact that people who work with these young children are paid very low, and rarely with benefits, just doesn’t reflect the value of what is required of them. With the funding structure we have right now, the only way to raise wages for child care providers sustainably is to raise tuition, which falls on the family’s back. We need to start looking at a different model.

How has Covid made it more difficult for New Hampshire families to access child care?

When a child at a public school has a symptom, the school nurse does a screening, which may include a [Covid] test, to decide whether the child stays at school or not. Child care centers don’t have an RN like public schools do. When they’re dealing with a 2-year-old who is teething, [child care centers] have to make that judgment call: Are they just teething, or could they have Covid? They aren’t doctors or nurses they don’t know so most of them just turn the child home. … So the biggest issue is really keeping the kids in care.

Has this led to any child safety concerns?

One of the ramifications [of limited access to child care] for families is that they’re having to go into unregulated situations. At the beginning of the pandemic, it was encouraged by DHHS and the governor to create neighborhood ‘pods’ where [families] would take care of each other’s kids during remote learning. Well, now, some of those people … [who also] have a 3- or a 4- or a 5- year-old are keeping those pods [for child care] because they’re so desperate. [The families hosting the pods] are not becoming licensed … and some of them are charging sometimes as much as what a child care center is charging.

What ripple effect does child care have on the state as a whole?

The entire pipeline of every [business’] staff has been disrupted. Just look at how many people are home after losing their jobs or not being able to go back to work because they have kids and can’t find child care. That includes people in high-need positions. … Health care centers are having to cancel clinics and cancel regular appointments because they’re lacking staff because their staff can’t get child care. … I know of a grandmother who [worked in] a senior position who left her job to take care of her grandchildren because she was the only one financially stable enough [in the family] to leave her job, and now, her [former] employer is struggling because a senior position is difficult to fill. These are key people being pulled out of the workforce, all because they don’t have child care.

What can New Hampshire families do to help improve the child care situation in the state?

[Share] their story … about the impact of the loss of child care on their family, whatever that may be. … Right now, it’s important that we keep giving [the issue of child care] adequate attention so that we can really move things forward on a state level.

Featured photo: Rick Rossi. Courtesy photo.

In the kitchen with Shepard Bassett

Shepard Bassett of New Boston is the owner of Shepard’s Pie Baking Co. ([email protected], and on Facebook and Instagram @shepardspiebakingco), a homestead bakery specializing in cinnamon rolls, cookies, cupcakes, waffles and other items available to special order for any occasion. Originally from Hampton Falls, Bassett attended culinary school at the former McIntosh College in Dover before going on to work in a few Seacoast-area restaurants over a period of several years. She moved to New Boston with her family in 2016, also leaving the restaurant industry around then to pursue a career in finance. When the pandemic hit, Bassett had been on maternity leave — she turned to baking at first as a stress-reliever before eventually starting what became Shepard’s Pie Baking Co. in late 2020. Orders can be placed via email or social media for local pickup with at least a week’s advance notice.

What is your must-have kitchen item?

My go-to appliance is definitely my KitchenAid mixer. My husband just bought me a new one for Christmas. … Other than that, I always have a good pair of tongs.

What would you have for your last meal?

I think it would have to be tacos. I’d have a whole buffet of options for them.

What is your favorite local restaurant?

I love The Riverhouse Cafe in Milford. They have great breakfast.

What celebrity would you like to bake something for?

Mary Berry [formerly of The Great British Bake Off]. I think about her constantly when I bake and I’d love someday to be able to present her with something. Even if she didn’t like it, I know she’d have something nice to say.

What is your favorite thing that you’ve made for a client?

I did a Twin Peaks cake and it was probably the most fun thing that I’ve ever done. I ended up doing a whole forest of pine trees out of rosemary stalks.

What is the biggest food trend in New Hampshire right now?

The farm-to-table movement. It’s something that has been around for a while but I feel like it’s only going to get more and more important. Using local suppliers is probably the most positive trend I’ve seen in cooking.

What is your favorite thing to cook at home?

I love making curry, because it is so versatile. I really like making some kind of delicious combination of a protein and veggies that you can put on rice or noodles.

Baba’s cherry pie
From the kitchen of Shepard Bassett of Shepard’s Pie Baking Co.

2 frozen pie crusts, thawed
4 cups pitted cherries (frozen is fine)
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
1 egg, lightly beaten for egg wash

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Roughly chop half of the cherries, leaving the other half whole. In a medium saucepan, combine the cherries and sugar. Cook over medium heat and stir occasionally, allowing the cherries to release their liquids. Add vinegar and extracts and continue cooking until liquid thickens slightly. Dust cherries with cornstarch and stir thoroughly. Remove cherries from heat. Press one pie crust into a pie pan and add cherry mixture. Top pie with second pie crust and cut vents into the crust so that steam can be released. Crimp edges with your fingers or with a fork, then use a pastry brush to apply egg wash. Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes, then drop the oven temperature to 350 degrees without opening the oven door. Bake for another 20 minutes. Remove pie when crust is golden brown and shiny. Allow to cool to room temperature before slicing.

Featured photo: Shepard Bassett. Courtesy photo.

On The Job – Jordan Poole

Jordan Poole

3D printing specialist

Jordan Poole is a 3D printing specialist and co-owns Filament Forged 3D Printing and Design with his wife, Samantha MacDonald, in Barnstead.

Explain your job.

My standard day-to-day is talking to clients [about] what they’re looking for, modeling … in 3D using a CAD program, and having the printers … bring their idea to life.

How long have you had this job?

Filament Forged has just come up on its one-year anniversary.

What led you to this career field ?

My wife got me my first 3D printer a few years ago, and I instantly fell in love. … I spent the next year learning everything I could. … Eventually a few friends and family members asked me to make some things for them, and I started to see … the machines can provide people a cheaper and quicker alternative to having completely custom pieces made for them.

What kind of training did you need?

Trial and error was my educational tool. Luckily, the 3D printing community … loves to teach newcomers. … Being part of social media groups has [taught] me common issues … and some of the harder-to-figure-out problems. … Now, I help … people just starting out or [join] the conversation for harder-to-diagnose problems.

What is your typical work attire?

Professional sweatpants and slippers. A lot of our customer communication is done remotely, and the printers don’t judge me

What was it like starting this business during the pandemic?

We thought we’d see hobbyist and crafty people trying to keep themselves entertained while being home, but actually … people starting their own small businesses [used] our services to manufacture their products, which was a shift … we had to adjust to quickly.

.What do you wish you had known at the beginning of your career?

How important a local community can be. When we first started, we were [offering services] nationwide. … Once we … focused more on … New Hampshire, we noticed a stronger uptick in positive customer reviews and our name gaining some traction.

What do you wish other people knew about your job?

A common response I get when I mention what I do is, ‘Oh, like T-shirts or business cards?’ It’s a newer technology, so not only are we trying to get our name out there, but we are also trying to get 3D printing as a whole recognized as a way of providing custom pieces. The good thing is a lot of schools and local libraries now have 3D printers, so I don’t think we’re too far away from them being very commonplace.

What was the first job you ever had?

A local farm, planting flowers for the summer. It was hot, boring, and made me realize I have a dislike of putting dirt in buckets for eight hours a day.

What’s the best work-related advice you’ve ever received?

‘If you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life’ took on some new meaning once I finally found something I love. Also, understand your value and worth with the services you provide. Coming up with how much to charge for [services] in a fairly new industry took some time, and I found I was way underselling some of the skills required.

Five favorites

Favorite book:
Paddle Your Own Canoe by Nick Offerman
Favorite movie: Interstellar
Favorite music: I’m a man of my era; Fall Out Boy and Jimmy Eat World are still my jam.
Favorite food: Steak tip salad wraps with some croutons in there for razzle-dazzle.
Favorite thing about NH: The vibes. When I travel, I always say I move at a New Hampshire pace — I have no rush to get anywhere; I like to enjoy the ride.

Featured photo: Filament Forged owners Jordan Poole and Samantha MacDonald. Courtesy photo. Courtesy photo.

Tech protection

New Hampshire welcomes Cybersecurity Advisor

Meet Rick Rossi, New Hampshire’s first Cybersecurity Advisor, a newly created position within the Integrated Operations Division, Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency of the Department of Homeland Security.

When and why was this position created?

This position was created by Congress in the fiscal year 2021 National Defense Authorization Act, so I’m a federal employee funded by the Department of Homeland Security. It was created to improve communication as well as awareness of resources and collaboration between the federal government, state and local governments and critical infrastructure owners and operators.

What is your background in this type of work?

I come into the role with prior experience with the Department of Homeland Security and the Intelligence Community. … I’ve been with the Department in some form or fashion for almost 16 years now. I’ve done a lot of work with critical infrastructure owners and operators in terms of hardening their defenses and mitigating threats from our foreign advanced adversaries and other significant criminal cyber actors.

What exactly does this position entail?

My role as the Cybersecurity Advisor for New Hampshire is to offer cybersecurity assistance to critical infrastructure owners and operators, as well as state, local, tribal and territorial governments. That assistance can take the form of many different things, including introducing organizations to the myriad cybersecurity services and products that are available to them at no cost, as well as other public and private resources. … Additionally, my role includes providing cyber preparedness assessments, protective resources, strategic messaging, working group support and leadership, partnership in public-private development, as well as incident coordination and support in times of cyberthreat disruption and attack.

What do you hope to accomplish?

One of the primary goals is to make contact with as many critical infrastructure owners and operators, municipalities and government entities as possible … and [develop] a robust partnership between the public and private sector in terms of information sharing, cooperation and thought exchange. It’s not ideal to be exchanging business cards in the middle of an incident; it’s very useful to develop those relationships in advance. The secondary [goal] is to make sure that entities are aware of the cybersecurity resources available to them. … Oftentimes, we find that municipalities and smaller organizations … are very reticent about cybersecurity in terms of the investment monetarily … and aren’t always aware of the breadth of resources that are available to them at no cost through … public and private means.

What is the biggest challenge?

[Cybercriminals] generally gravitate toward targets of opportunity. New Hampshire has a number of very small towns and small businesses, and oftentimes those smaller entities don’t have the budget to put together a robust cybersecurity program. Oftentimes, there’s a misconception … smaller entities [have]: ‘Why would anybody want to attack us?’ The truth of the matter is, to a cybercriminal who’s after monetary gain, the size of the organization doesn’t matter. If it’s an easy buck, they’ll take the easy buck. So one of the challenges I have is [increasing] the knowledge that … the size of an organization doesn’t always [factor] into [cybercriminals’] targeting decisions.

Has Covid contributed to cybersecurity threats?

Early on during the pandemic, we saw the cyberthreat environment really ramp up, the reason being that most organizations weren’t prepared for a near-100-percent remote work environment. You had a lot of smaller businesses and organizations that don’t traditionally have people working from home having to employ remote access solutions to their networks, and when you’re trying to do something in haste, oftentimes, unfortunately, security doesn’t always take a front seat. We saw a lot of [criminals] … looking to take advantage of that situation where we didn’t always have security at the forefront.

How can New Hampshire residents protect themselves and their families from cybersecurity threats?

They can create strong passwords for their home WiFi network … as well as email accounts and social media. … If you have a simple password, like a dictionary word or something that can be easily guessed, like your pet’s name … [cybercriminals] could enable a password cracker [that uses] algorithms to guess your password. … You want to use passwords that are more complex, that aren’t dictionary words, that can’t be easily guessed, and that involve uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers and special characters.

Featured photo: Rick Rossi. Courtesy photo.

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