For a French-toast master on his 76th

My father loved to play in the kitchen. For him, relaxing after a long day of patients and paperwork meant pouring a Scotch and taking up residence at the butcher-block island. Sometimes Burg would scour our overflowing shelves of cookbooks for ideas or techniques, but mainly he’d work by feel and taste, stewing, sautéing, melding this and that—and never keeping the slightest note of the path