Category Archives: Food TV

Highlights From Florida — Beyond the Pillsbury Bake-Off

Posted on by 7 comments

When I wasn’t sequestered behind closed doors as a judge of the 45th Pillsbury Bake-Off last week, I did manage to get out and about to discover some other fun things in Orlando. Here are other highlights of that trip:

* Poached farm egg, aleppo pepper hollandaise, California asparagus and pork belly at Luma on Park in Winter Park, Fla.

A perfectly poached egg that oozes a bright orange yolk to make a dish of juicy pork belly even richer. It doesn’t get better than that at this sophisticated restaurant with a glam two-story glass wine “jewel box” that displays bottles upon bottles of fine vintages.

Not your average edamame.

* Togarashi spice stir-fried Japanese edamame at Emeril Lagasse’s Tchoup Chop in Orlando.

Read more

All-Star Foie Dinner, Giada De Laurentiis & More

Posted on by 3 comments

Chef Victor Scargle of Lucy at Bardessono will be one of the chefs headlining the all-foie-gras dinner at the Plumed Horse. (Photo courtesy of the chef)

Plumed Horse Celebrates Foie Gras April 9

With California set to be the only state in the nation to outlaw foie gras starting July 1, a bevy of chefs have been rallying to raise grass-roots support for the luxurious delicacy.

The latest to join in on the action is the Plumed Horse in Saratoga, which will host a top toque-studded $200 per person prix fixe on April 9 in which every course will feature the decadent fattened liver of a goose or duck.

Among the chefs cooking that night alongside Plumed Horse Executive Chef Peter Armellino will be Victor Scargle of Lucy at Bardessono in Yountville, Ron Boyd of the Daniel Patterson Group, Marc Zimmerman of Alexander’s Steakhouse in San Francisco, and Joey Elenterio of Chez TJ in Mountain View.

Scargle will be serving his Sonoma Artisan foie gras and sauteed Petrale sole with spring onions, ramps and Granny Smith apples. Armellino will serve smoked chicken and foie gras dumplings. And Ted Romero, executive pastry chef of Lucy at Bardessono, will be turning heads with a Guittard chocolate, hazelnut and foie gras nougat with ruby port poached pear.

Half of the $200 per person price for the dinner will be donated to the Coalition for Humane and Ethical Farming Standards, which is made up of pro-foie gras culinary professionals. For tickets, click here.

For those who want to bring their own wine, corkage will be waived that evening.

Giada De Laurentiis To Visit the Bay Area

Food Network star Giada De Laurentiis will be signing copies of her newest book, “Weeknights with Giada” (Clarkson Potter) at three upcoming Bay Area events.

The cookbook is filled with go-to dinner recipes that take about half an hour to prepare.

Read more

Judging the 45th Pillsbury Bake-Off

Posted on by 18 comments

My guy. (Photo courtesy of Pillsbury)

The Dough Boy and I — we go way back. We’re tight — like this (fingers intertwined). He’s even let me poke him in the tummy.

So, I was thrilled to be united with my doughy guy earlier this week, when I was invited to be a judge for America’s oldest and most lucrative cooking contest, the Pillsbury Bake-Off in Orlando.

It was my third time as a judge in this competition. And my third time having a hand in deciding who went home with the grand prize of $1 million.

Started in 1949, the event celebrates the joy of home-cooking as only amateurs are allowed to enter. Each time, tens of thousands of entries from home-cooks are whittled down to just 100 finalists who compete to create an original, great tasting dish that will impress not only a panel of discriminating judges, but the entire nation, which has grown up with this iconic contest.

The judges are chosen almost a year ahead of time. From that moment onward, we had to avoid reading, seeing or hearing anything about the contest so that the contestants remained completely anonymous to us. You almost felt like you’d been selected for a secret ops mission, where information is strictly on a “need to know” basis. Hmm, good thing I packed a lot of black clothing.

The ballroom with 100 kitchens set up for the Bake-Off. (Photo by Carolyn Jung)

A day of quiet before all the action started. (Photo by Carolyn Jung)

We 12 food professionals took our mission seriously, too. A few of us were veteran Bake-Off judges, having done it once or twice before. But others were first-timers, nervous and excited about what the judging process would be like. Should we do stomach exercises to gird ourselves for so many dishes? Should we wear XL elastic pants that day? Just how many hours would we be stuffing our faces? Would we have to arm wrestle one another if we couldn’t agree on a winner in the end?

Read more

Lights, Camera, Action — and Chef Bradley Ogden

Posted on by 13 comments

Chef Bradley Ogden's sliders.

The chef who co-founded Lark Creek Restaurant Group in the Bay Area and made farm-to-table cooking his mantra long before it was fashionable, has returned to the Bay Area after being gone for eight years.

Bradley Ogden, who most recently opened Root 246 restaurant in Solvang, moved to San Jose’s Evergreen district in January to start a new phase in his culinary career. It includes a new multimedia company with partner Chris Kelly, Facebook’s first general consul.

Ogden and his son, Bryan, greet guests on Super Bowl Sunday.

A film crew was on hand to capture the cooking.

In the works is a new cooking show, “Real Food with Chef Bradley Ogden,” which will be shopped around to various TV networks. I got a sneak peek on Super Bowl Sunday, when Ogden invited me and a host of friends to his home for a cooking extravaganza, which was filmed in part for his show.

Read more

San Francisco’s Ritz-Carlton Goes From Staid to Hip with Parallel 37

Posted on by 11 comments

Kampachi sashimi at Parallel 37. One of the prettiest dishes you'll ever eat at a bar.

It used to be a place you’d never venture on a whim.

No, the Dining Room at the Ritz-Carlton, high atop San Francisco’s blue-blood Nob Hill, was reserved for special times, when you got dressed to the nines to celebrate a planned, lofty occasion.

Those times have changed — dramatically.

The prim-and-proper Dining Room, the last of those concept restaurants at any Ritz-Carlton, finally was bid adieu late last year. In its place, the swank Parallel 37 opened, named appropriately enough for the geographic latitude running near the Bay Area.

With cocoa banquettes, bare tables and a focal point wall aglow with the image of a backlit oak forest, the new restaurant has gotten a fresh, contemporary makeover. It has a much larger bar, too, complete with two flat-screens, something unthinkable before. And parking for the restaurant has been dropped to a reasonable flat-rate of $10 to lure more folks to drop in on a regular basis.

Chef Ron Siegel at the bar of Parallel 37, the restaurant formerly known as the Dining Room at the Ritz-Carlton.

Amid this whirlwind of change, one constant has remained, thankfully. Executive Chef Ron Siegel, who has been at the helm since 2004, is still in charge.

“I like the new look,” he says of the transformation of his restaurant. “The other was a little stuffy. People in San Francisco love to eat out and to them, this has the right feel now. I like the energy it has.”

Read more

« Older Entries Recent Entries »