Chili Cook-off results

Well as predicted, a good time was had by all.  This year there were only 16 chefs.  I have become friendly with two of the other chefs of the competition as we have all competed for the past 6 years together.  We all said that this year, the promotion and organization left much to be desired. I actually had to hunt down the person who ran it last year so they could give me the info for who was running it this year.  Everyone said it was really poorly run this year.

As I said, it was a fun time.  They actually had burners set up this time so that we can keep the chili warm instead of the double boilers from the past few years.

Since the weather was a tad overcast the crowd was smaller as well.  But the usual faces showed up and everyone was in Chili Heaven.

The first year I participated, there were three judges who would give a first, second and third place finish.  There was also a peoples Choice award.  That year, my friend Chris who you see two photos up, took second place and I took Third.  I also took Peoples choice that year.  After that year, they switched it over to a people's choice only with a first, second and third place based on votes from the patrons.  Last year I took second place.  It was also coincidentally the year that most of my family and friends came around.  Coincidence that I took second place?  I don't think so.

When I was standing there serving, I saw many people make a b line to this years winner.  I would say, hey your passing right by me.  They would say, they will be back as they want to say hello to someone.

Personally I thought I had the best chili I have ever made.  I changed up the cut of meat as well as added bacon fat to sauté the onions in.  It was really great.  But in the end, I didn't have many friends there and it showed in the awards.  I don't know what place I came in but it wasn't first second or third.  I spoke to Chris and he agreed that we need some sort of unbaised judge to come to do the judgeing rather than it being a popularity contest.

I don't want to come off as being bitter here. The winner's chili was very tasty and real unique.  But everyone that tried mine said I stood out from the others because my chili had chunks of meat rather than ground beef.  That was a comment that was said by most.  Most people would go for a piece of meat rather than ground beef.   I know many times you just want a burger, but given an opportunity to have a steak or a burger, most people would go for the steak.

It was again a fun day and I really love talking to people and see the great reaction they get when they eat what I have made.  it's one of the things that keeps me cooking.

Plus I had my boys help me.

Cooking the Chili

Well I know for many of you, there are much better things to do other than cook chili.  But for me, this time of the year is great.

I'm taking a small break after prepping a ton of ingredients including 15 pounds of meat.  it's a meat lovers dream and a vegetarian's nightmare.

Attached is a photo of my Mega Mise en Place.

That is about 5 times the amount I usually make when I make a batch.  Two things different in this batch. Bacon and two different types of meat.

Come down to Georgetown tomorrow to give it a taste.

Al

Georgetown Day 2010........Chili Cook-off here I come

The time has again come for the annual Georgetown day festival in Georgetown CT.  Georgetown is a small section of rural Redding CT.  It's basically a one street town. For one day a year in June they close the street and have vendors, bands, kids events and of course, a chili cook-off.

I have participated now for about 6 years and each year it's a blast.  The cook-off is basically a popularity contest.  When I first joined it, it was a cook-off with judges for 1st 2nd and 3rd place.  Plus there was a people's choice.  That year I took 3rd place and people's choice.  Since then it's been a people's choice only award.   You come and pay $10 and get a cup and spoon and go from Chili to Chili trying each and vote for your favorite.  Each chef has their own group of people that come to support them which usually weighs heavy on the voting.  But the bottom line is that its fun.  it's fun interacting with the people, it's fun interacting with the other cooks.

So if you want some Chili and want to have a good time please come out to Georgetown this weekend.  I can certainly use your vote.

For more information please click here: http://www.georgetownct.org/gday/gday.html

Taiwan trip day one. Let the feast begin.

So I arrived in Taipei Monday night and was exhausted.  Anyone would be after a 24 hour journey.  Had a crappy night sleep as I always do but the thought of good business and great food lifted my spirits to start the day.

One of the things I love about Asia is it is never unusual to eat anything at anytime.  There are your traditional meals at the specific meal time but it is common to see salad at breakfast and fried eggs at dinner time.  Since I'm traveling and staying in International Hotels, The breakfast buffet is very common.

My first morning had nothing to do with your normal American breakfast.  And I loved it.

Lo Mein, dumplings, kim chee, pork sausage, and salted cod.   Ok, the salted cod can be seen on some breakfast meals from time to time. The great breakfast meal I always get when I'm in Asia is Porridge.   Now in the states this is not very common but in Asia it is.  Its basically a hot cereal made mostly of rice but it s more soupy than your normal hot cereal.   You can add salty or sweet items to the dish to enhance it to how you like it.  I like mine with nori.

Yeah I couldn't get the photo to flip but you get the idea.

Lunch time was a lot of fun. Most meals in China and Taiwan are family style like you would get in most of the Chinese restaurants back home.  Big dishes on a lazy susan spinning around for all to share. When we sat down, we had edamame and a tofu like appetizer that was firm and spicy.  Cut up into small bits it made it easy to grab a bite as it spun by.

As many of you know, Taiwan is an island so much of the protein that they get is from fish.  Many of the restaurants show off lots of fresh and freshly caught fish on display for you to see.  You select from the display and tell them how you would like it cooked.  The shimmery and colorful fish offer a great feast for the eyes.

Our main dishes started to arrive.  the first to arrive were the shrimp.  They were boiled complete with heads an all.  They were served aside a clarified butter as we would have lobster.  They are basically peel and eat shrimp but with a head.

Next came a rice noodle dish with fresh corn in it.  but the corn was almost creamed and smoothed.  It added a nice texture and flavor to the noodles.  They were a big hit among all of us.  Also because they were pretty easy to eat for those that were chop stick challenged.

My favorite dish came next.  it was my favorite because it was so simple and clean tasting.  It was a summer leafy vegetable similar to a mix of celery, lettuce and bok choy.  It had a great crunch and was served in a simple broth like sauce that had hints of ginger and garlic but neither were too overpowering.

There is always some sort of soup served at meals here and this one was a great one.  Basically it is a Fish base soup.  This soup had dumplings and fried tofu in it.  It was a delicate flavored soup with nice chunky bits.

The final dish was a small fish cooked whole.  I'm not sure what kind of fish it was but it was tasty.  Toasted ginger, onions and garlic were sautéed with this fish and it came to the table whole.  Everyone had their own fish to nibble on and spit the bones out from.  There is so much slurping, spitting, snorting going on during this meal that it's a symphony of gastric noises.

This rounded out day one.  We were too exhausted to go for dinner that night so we called it a night.

The next day we ended up going back to the same place.  The owners of the company we represent really get treated well there, it's close to the factory, and it's really good food.  The meal was basically similar to what we had before and I didn't take photos but should have.  There were two dishes that really stuck out as so unique that I never thought i'd ever have a dish like this before.

The first one was shrimp.  I think I have had shrimp in every way imaginable.  And almost every way I have had it, I have enjoyed it.  I have found one I didn't enjoy.  I can't imagine anyone enjoying this.  I should have taken a photo because you won't believe me when I describe it.  Imagine boiled shrimp like well....... Cocktail shrimp.  Nice round plump shrimp.  Next take vanilla frosting.  Yes vanilla frosting.  Put it in a pastry bag so you can squirt it in a line form and make lines back and forth over the shrimp.  Not my cup of tea.  But wait.......theirs more.  Top it off with Rainbow sprinkles.  Boom, your done.  I was waiting for someone to start singing happy birthday.  But no singing happened.  I did like most things, try it.  As I thought, it was awful.  But the people I was with loved it.  Hey, to each their own right.

The next thing was calamari.  Well not calamari.  Squid.  Baby squid.  little tiny squid not cut up but whole.  About the size of your thumb.  In a pile on a plate looking at me saying eat me.  Well I didn't want to but I'm always up for an adventure.  It was short lived.  I thought I was on the show Fear Factor and someone was going to jump out and make me next walk a tight rope over bubbling lava.  I grabbed one with my chopstick and looked at it.  The Frightening thing was that is was looking back at me.  So with one brave moment, I put it in my mouth.  That then got my gag reflex going and started to mildly panic.  All I thought about was how bad this could turn out.  So I chewed through it and got it down quickly followed by a nice small glass of beer.

That ended my trip in the southern town of Tainan.  Well I had one more meal in my hotel but I didn't pay attention because I had to actually pay attention to the conversation.

But the next day was fun.  Read on to the next post to see what happened next.

Match in South Norwalk.......This place lights up

Last weekend found us in South Norwalk CT (SONO) dining with our good friends the LeBeau's at Match.  Executive Chef Matt Storch has put together an excellent menu that has had him at his current location for almost 10 years.  We have been there a few times before and enjoyed the meal each time and this visit was no different.

It was a nice night out so they had the large doors open in the front which had some small tables that spilled out onto the side walk for a little alfresco dining.

I wasn't able to take photos that evening so my words will have to do for this review.

The LeBeau's (who own the wonderful Marly's in Wilton) are good eaters like us so we enjoyed perusing the menu.  It was pretty obvious that the menu was strong with the appetizers so we quickly decided to have a completely shared meal.

We started off with some drinks. I don't remember what the others got but I got the Cucumber lemonade Vodka martini.  It was ridiculously smooth.  Served in a chilled glass I looked like the complete idiot drinking it. There is no masculine way to drink out of those glasses.  No matter what is inside the rim, men look like schmuck's drinking out of them.  But after two drinks, who the hell cares what you look like, right?

So our first round of plates came out. Short rib nuggets were served first.  The menu describes them as glazed with pomegranate, orange and 50 cloves of garlic.  Now you put 50 cloves of garlic into anything, it's going to be a strong tasting dish.  It was strong tasting but not from garlic.  The glaze was delicious and the meat was tender.

The second dish was the spicy sausage pizza.  In the back of the dining room is another bar area that houses a large wood burning oven specifically designed for pizzas.  They have Five pizzas to choose from and we made a good choice with the Spicy Sausage.  Jalapeños and chili oil give the pizza the heat.  It would be good as a lunch portion of to share as an appetizer as we did.

The third dish was Tuna Tartar Cracker.   Three large crackers had two generous scoops of raw tuna.  Onions and capers added some excellent flavor to the dish.  Again, the portions were very generous here so sharing was very easy.

The last of our first round was the Scallop Special.  Three large Sea Scallops were seared to perfection and served over a salad of Frissee lettuce that had a lemon vinaigrette.  If this ever comes up again, please get it.  it should be put on the regular menu it was so good.

Next came two salads that we ordered to split up the meal.  Both salads were also very generous so it gave each of us an ample amount of roughage to share.  The first salad was the Arugala salad.  The best part of this was the large pieces of shaved Parmesan cheese.  The second salad was the Steakhouse salad.  huge pieces of bacon and feta cheese covered a nice hunk of crisp and crunchy iceberg lettuce.  The balsamic dressing was drizzled all over the salad and mixed nicely when you dove in to get a big bite of everything.  Again, portions very generous.

Trying to figure where to go from here, we went with two orders of the sliders so that each of us had a little burger.  The menu calls the Banh Mi Sliders which is Vietnamese for a pulled pork sandwich that was topped with Hoisin sauce, spicy mayo and cucumbers.  The buns were soft and the sweet potato chips that accompanied the dish were excellent.  I have a soft spot for sliders.  Something so cute about a little burger.  it's like going to a seafood restaurant and getting that little fork.  I could eat a whole meal with that thing.

The last dish as the Forest Pizza.  Sautéed mushrooms with spinach and garlic topped with Mozzarella and goat cheese. It was a perfect way to end the meal.

Well almost the perfect way.  We got a dessert sampler that was pretty good too.  

Match can be found in South Norwalk CT and can be found here: http://www.matchsono.com/index.html

Rao's in las Vegas.........The Last Supper from this latest Las Vegas trip

I put together a group of friends for our final meal in Las Vegas and we all decided after a few suggestions to go to Rao's.  This was the same group pretty much that went to Mesa Grill so I knew we all would have the opportunity to try many different dishes.

The New York Famed eatery is located in Caesar's Palace on the strip and is decorated from what I'm told, similar to the New York landmark.

We had all heard about the famous Meatballs and the simple order of 6 went out.  These massive meaty spheres came to us bathed in their famous sauce.  Top it off with some fresh grated cheese and you have an appetizer worth oohing and aahing about.  I think at that point was the quietest our table was the entire evening.

After we devoured the meatballs and mopped up all the sauce, we waited patiently for the mains.  Two of us got the Chicken Scarpariello that had tender chunks of Chicken laid next to hot and sweet sausage.

My friend Roger had mentioned to me when we talked about coming here that Uncle Vincent's famous Lemon Chicken is supposed to be really great.  I'm not one for ordering chicken when I go out for a meal just because I make it so much at home.  But this Chicken was so delicious.  It had a refreshing flavor that wasn't sour which is what you might expect from lemon chicken.  Charbroiled chicken sat in a shallow layer of lemony broth that kept the whole dish moist.  If you are a chicken fan, you must try this.

One of the things I really love about a restaurant like this is that if there is something that you want and don't see it, just ask and more times than not, you'll get it.  Such was the case with the Veal Piccata that made it to our table.  Not on the menu, the caper dotted dish was a welcome addition the well rounded selections that we had chosen.

One of my friends who had come here a few days later said that the Osso Buco was over the top.  And I had to agree with him because it was my dish.  Problem is with this dish is that you really need a completely empty stomach to finish this dish without feeling over full when you finish it.  The problem is that it tastes so good that you don't want any of it to go to waste.  leaving any of this dish not eaten is food abuse.  The fork tender veal sits on top of risotto which is bathed in a veal reduction sauce.  Yeah, it's a little rich.

Finally I'm sorry to say that I didn't take a photo of the Veal Parmesan.  This dish is the most popular and after trying it, I can see why.  The door mat size of pounded Veal came to the table hanging over the plate.  This is not an exaggeration.   It was huge.  As was the flavor.  Next time I'm here, that is what I will get.

If you love old school Italian food and happen to be going to Las Vegas, make a reservation and prepare your stomach for a great meal.

For information about Rao's and to see the menu please go here: Rao's Las Vegas

Mesa Grill...........The Southwest Grill Master finds his home in Las Vegas

Bobby Flay as many of you know specializes in southwestern cuisine. His Charismatic dance around the grill makes you want to be his best friend.

Bobby found his Las Vegas home at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas and is showing everyone that visits that he knows what he is talking about when you see him on TV.  His menu is all southwestern with a good mix of burgers, steaks, salads and anything grilled.   We went there for lunch and were at a table that expanded from 5 to 7 as we were joined by our friends.

I started out with a drink that turned into two as it was delicious. I'd love to learn how to make the Cactus pear margarita.  It was sweet but not too sweet.  It went down way too easy as I said I had two.

We decided to get some apps to start our meal and with the help of the server at hand, we decided on the Queso Fundido which is basically cheese dip.  But not any cheese dip.  Goat Cheese dip.  For many, goat cheese is not tops on the list.  For me, it is.  I have really learned to love the stuff.  As you can see below, it's served with blue corn chips.

The other Appetizer that we got was a Shrimp Tamale.  I'm also a sucker for Tamales.  When they are done right, there is nothing more comfort food like.  It is hearty and warming and you can sit in front of a fire with two of them and be so satisfied.  Instead, I was surrounded by 6 close friends.   Fire has nothing on that.

The great thing about our group was that we all really enjoy food.  I think everyone got to try everyones dish. forkes were being passed around with things to try.  we were all oooh-ing and aaaah-ing over the meal.  A big surprise in the lunch was the pressed Cuban burger.  Tender burger topped with ham and swiss cheese with a pickle.  It was really delicious.  The Mesa burger was also really good as it was served with Vidalia onions and a horseradish sauce.

I don't know why I can't turn the picture.  turn your head.  It tasted as good as it looked.

There were three of us that got the lamb cobb salad.  Instead of the traditional turkey, we got grilled lamb.  The lamb was so good.  It had no gamey taste that you sometimes get with lamb.  The best is that it sat along side two thick slices of hardwood smoked bacon.  I just can't get enough of that stuff.

If you have ever watched him on TV and said, "I'd love to try what he cooks" you would be happy if you went to his restaurants.  Bobby Flay does a good job of creating a great atmosphere and a fabulous menu.  I looked at his Dinner menu and it looked great too.

Mesa Grill can be found at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas.  For more information go to www.mesagrill.com