Nikolai Petrenko is the Roasts & Sunday Dinners Editor at The Cooking Recipe, where he has spent 15 years perfecting meals that anchor a week. Born in Sacramento to a Ukrainian father and a California-born mother, he grew up in a house where the aroma of roasting chicken meant someone was leaving or coming home. His grandmother Oksana taught him that a roast bird is measured by its juices, and she left him her enamel pan, chipped but loyal. That pan appears in nearly every header photo he shoots
