For some, cooking is simply a way to nourish the body. For others, it's a way to nourish relationships and feed the soul. "Cooking brings people closer together," said Patty Smith, co-owner of the Fireside Bar and Grill in Sellersburg. "You have that intimacy. To me, that's the essence of cooking."

Smith spent much of her childhood in her mother's Boston kitchen along with her brothers. "She always had us in there," she said. "My mother was a fabulous cook. We were always part of the preparation." "She would sometimes do catering for a friend or someone who heard what a good cook she was."

For Smith, cooking and socializing came to be synonymous. That social aspect helped fuel her desire to open a restaurant. She completed a two-year culinary program at Northern Essex Community College near Boston and went to work for TGI Fridays.

Smith met her husband, Neil, in Boston where he was working for a Mexican chain restaurant after completing his culinary degree in restaurant management at Purdue University. The couple married in 1983 and in 1985 moved to his native Sellersburg, where they purchased and renamed an existing restaurant.

"I want to be the creative one," Smith said. "Neil is really good with the numbers, so we balance each other well. He's a wonderful cook, and he is on the line in the kitchen most nights keeping an eye on things."

Smith carried her mother's inclusive kitchen policy to her own home with her three children, Stephanie, Lauren and Ryan. "My kids would say, 'What are we cooking tonight?'" Smith said. "They're not afraid to experiment with food." Sometimes those experiments do not go well. "It's not the end result necessarily," she said. "We laugh about some of the meals we've made that have been really bad."

Many of the dishes served in the restaurant started in the Smiths' home kitchen. "Depending on the response, I'll adapt them to the restaurant," she said. "If you are a chain restaurant you can't just decide to add granola" to the menu."

After Smith had moved away, her mother, Mary Young, opened The Runway Inn, open only for breakfast and lunch. "Up on the East Coast there are tons of breakfast diners," Smith said. "When I'm up on the East Coast, I'm always checking out restaurants and seeing what everyone else is doing." Her mother's restaurant served as a model for A Nice Restaurant in New Albany, which the Smiths opened in 1994. They sold that venture in 1999 to focus on their original restaurant. The Smith added breakfast at the Fireside, focusing on providing the freshest ingredients possible. "People are becoming more health conscious," she said.