March of Dimes

The March of Dimes is one of my favorite charities to work with - click here to read about them.
Every year the March of Dimes puts on a really wonderful event in Boulder (and many locations in Colorado and elsewhere) called Signature Chefs.  This foodie friendly gathering is a giant fundraiser for MOD where the best chefs from the area come together with samples of food that are paired with wine and beer.  The chefs and restaurateurs donate all of their time and food so the foundation can sell tickets and use all of the money for their amazing work.  I've been doing this event for the past 12 years and I've represented 5 different restaurants during that span.  It's not only a great cause, but it's fun.  As chefs we never get to be working together, at the same time, in the same place.  It's a lot of fun because we all know each other but we rarely get to cook and show off to each other.
As the Jax chef, I ALWAYS bring oysters.  They are the one thing people demand of us.  If I showed up with shrimp wrapped in hundred dollar bills being served by supermodels but no oysters, there would be a riot.  So...the oysters were served with a cucumber-chile mignonette.  I also brought poached shrimp with creole remoulade and Alaskan wild king salmon with celery root-pear puree and porcini mushrooms.  Vince, Aaron and Nate helped me out and everything was as smooth as that tequila we kept sipping from the Centro table (sorry Devlin!)
Now for the funny part.
As a representative of MOD, they asked me to promote the event Thursday morning (day of event) on Fox 31 and KWGN 2 television stations.  I had just driven back into town the night before and was exhausted.  I got up at 5:30 am, drove to Jax, and started prepping some samples for the shows.  I got it all going, made some coffee, checked emails, and was generally moving slowly.  All of a sudden I realized I had 45 minutes to get to the studio (they needed me there at 7:45).  I started freaking out and packed up as quickly as possible.  Of course the traffic was the most clogged it had been in centuries.  I hopped on the HOV lane (yeah, just me) and did my best to beat the clock.  When I finally got to the block where the stations are - 20 minutes late at this point - I took the wrong turn.  All of a sudden I'm on a one-way street heading the wrong way.  After a few near wrecks and a lot of angry drivers saying things to me I can't repeat, I finally found the building.  As I raced in the front door, my friends at the station gently reminded me I had LESS THAN 5 MINUTES before I was on the air.  When I got to the studio, I put together three dishes faster than anything I did on Top Chef.  The sound guy was wiring me as the camera was turning towards me.  The interview/demo went great, despite being out of breath and sweat beads forming on my forehead.  If I had run into one more snag on my way, the spot never would have happened.  Talk about pushing time limits....
Anyway.  The event was a success.  The TV spots were a success.  The food was all eaten.  And now there are more happy healthy babies being born with the assistance they need.  All good stuff.

Montana Master Chefs

Don't be fooled by the title.  I am not officially a "master chef," but it sounds pretty cool.

MMC is a culinary weekend set in one of the most beautifully remote places in the country.  I was invited by the crew organizers at Paws Up Resort and the mirthful John Romfo.  I have been looking forward to this event for some time, as I was invited in March.  Stephanie Izard (Top Chef Season 4) had told me it was one of her favorite events of the year.  I was asked to put together a dinner with Stephanie where we paired our courses with some of Stag Leap's finest wines.  Not the worst mission I've ever been tasked.  The dinner was to be followed by an "Iron Chef" style cook-off the following day.  So all I had to plan was the dinner and figure out if I wanted to fly fish, shoot skeet, ride horses, atv, hunt mushrooms, just relax, or all of the above.  Again....not the worst thing I've gotten myself into this year.

I flew out last Thursday in a VERY small airplane.   This was one of those rides where we had to move seats until the plane was balanced.  It was a really cool ride, however, as we flew fairly low over the newly-snow-dusted Rocky Mountains of Colorado, Wyoming and Montana.  When I arrived, I was picked up at gate 2 of 2 in Missoula Airport by Brandon (one of the MANY incredibly happy-to-please employees) and rode in with John of Frog's Leap Winery.

I met up with Stephanie and her sous chef Dave and we did some prep work for the dinner the following day.  That night we attended the Frog's Leap wine dinner cooked by Wes Coffel of Paws Up.  The meal and wine were both killer but the highlight was the stories told by John.  My favorite quote of the night was, "wine is like people:  if you're ugly when you're young, you'll be ugly when you mature!"  Quips like that kept the room in stitches all night.

Dinner was followed by even more wine consumption back at the massive cabin Steph, Dave and I were staying in for the weekend.  The snow started dumping and we dipped into the hot tub.  Let me tell you, if you've never soaked in a hot tub surrounded by wilderness with snowflakes falling, you haven't lived!

Friday was our big dinner with Stags Leap Winery.  We ended up prepping and serving 7 courses with 6 wines.  The condensed menu:  1) dungeness crab trio with avocado panna cotta, fennel pollen and citrus;  2) seared squab breast and braised leg with squash and shrimp hash;  3) braised pork belly with brussels sprouts, fingerlings, and pomegranate brown butter;  4) local elk with kohlrabi and smoked apple butter  5) local bison with porcini crust, sunchoke puree, local foraged mushrooms, and huckleberry demi glace;  6)  smokey blue cheese with caramelized honey and bacon breadcrumbs;  7) chocolate cake with frozen nougat, peach, and red wine caramel.

The dinner was very well received.  One of the invited chefs was Kent Rathbun.  When he had the pork belly he winked at me and gave me the thumbs up.  He was either asking me for a date or loved the dish.  I'm going with the latter.   I felt so good about the success of our dinner that I may have celebrated a little too much that night.  More wine...more hot tubbing...and not enough sleep....

Saturday morning I was supposed to go fly fishing on the Blackfoot River with the guides at Paws Up.  Between the 2 hours of sleep, the headache, and the fact that it was six below zero that morning, I didn't make it to the shove-off at 8am.  I felt terrible.  I not only made the reservation to fish with these guys, met them and talked fish the day before, but I knew my buddies back in Boulder were going to give me a very hard time for not going out.  Oops.

Later that afternoon, after a power nap, Stephanie and I made our way to the refurbished cattle auction that housed the chef competition.  We had to act as advisors to the two couples that competed in the first round.  I was happy to lend a hand and not be on stage that first round as it gave my shaking hands time to settle (and they weren't shaking from the nerves...it was the lack of sleep and the alcohol poisoning).  Our "Iron Chef" style battle included eggs as the secret ingredient and we had 20 minutes to make a dish.  I beat her with the trivia question and had the advantage of choosing which variety of eggs we would each use.  I tried to be nice by not making Steph use the black eggs (Chinese 100 year eggs as they're called) and just gave her the pickled eggs.  I used caviar on some oysters as a first course and followed up with "steak and eggs" - filet mignon with bacon-chile hash, poached quail eggs, and brown butter hollandaise.  Steph threw together some bowl of who-knows-what that she couldn't even describe.  I think the judges were so surprised that she pulled together something edible considering her mood and the presentation that they gave her the win.  Total score:  135 to 134.  So close.....

her messy station

We celebrated one more night and had a blast.  Overall the experience was fantastic and I feel like I definitely made some new friends.  I hope to be back soon and I think there is already something in the works for the spring.  I can't wait.

timeless

Today we took a field trip to Timeless Travel Trailers in Wheat Ridge, CO.  They are a one-of-a-kind trailer refurbishing and customizing company specializing in vintage units.  The owner, Brett Hall gave us a great tour of the facility and showed us what they can do.  I didn't want to leave the warehouse.  He had all kinds of old and new trailers (almost all Airstreams) in every state of build-out you can imagine.  I felt like a little kid surrounded by toy cars.  Only these toys cost up to $250,000.  We were there to find out what it would take to convert a 23 foot Airstream into a mobile kitchen.  Turns out Brett and his crew are experts at this and all it takes is a trailer and a little (OK, a lot) of cash.  He has built Airstreams into everything from tiny coffee shops to massive movie-set catering trailers.  It looks like there may be something with my name on it coming out of this warehouse one of these days....

my new bacon air freshner

nuff said

thanks ash!

Broncos!!

Big thanks to my boys at Old Style Sausage for the killer seats at Sunday's game at Mile High!  The Broncos took it to the Cowboys and are now 4-0.  What a great game.  Came down to the last few seconds.  And we saw Brandon Marshall bring in the winning TD right in front of us.  Gotta plug Old Style (not just because their name is so cool).  They make everything in house and their product is amazing.  They make the best Andouille around, amazing chorizo, and any custom sausage you might need.  If you call them, ask for Mike or Scott and tell them that I sent you.  Great for restaurants or your back yard.  They are in Louisville, CO, so if you're in Colorado definitely check them out!  303-666-8240

street food

This past Tuesday I put together some examples of street food for a group of very accomplished food professionals.  The group was assembled to hear a pitch from my good friend Laura (and possible future business partner) about a concept called Streat Chefs.  The idea is to take the iconic Airstream Trailer, pimp it out with a bunch of nice equipment, and hit the road.  The food needs to be simple, inexpensive, and killer.  I sketched some ideas, called up my friend Laura (apparently I'm surrounded by women with that name) at Whole Foods Market for some product, and started prepping.  I came up with a few dishes:  Munson Farms Butternut Squash Soup, Pork Belly Sliders, Habanero BBQ Chicken Tacos, Curried Lamb Flatbread, and a few sides.  The presentation went very well, the food was a hit,  and it looks like there may be some more work in line for me in this arena...

Oktoberfest

Yesterday I did an Oktoberfest demo at the Pearl Street Whole Foods Market in Boulder.  It was less of a demo and more of a free food giveaway, but everyone seemed to like the food.  I had a few German women tell me the offerings brought them right back to Munich.  I think that was a good thing?

Having never been to Germany, I did a little research on the holiday.  Turns out Oktoberfest is the largest people's fair in the world.  It draws over six million people each year, and that's just in Munich!  I was always confused by the name and why it's in September.  Turns out the Munich Oktoberfest, traditionally, takes place during the sixteen days up to and including the first Sunday in October.  So there you have it...

I made some bratwurst (cooked in Oktoberfest beer, of course), roast pork with caraway and apples, braised cabbage, potato dumplings with slow cooked onion, and some kick-ass german potato salad.  We fed about 400 people and I was definitely beat after this one.  

The most bizzare part of this whole thing was the duo of musicians playing some crazy music with an accordian and bass just a weiner's throw from my table.