Archive for the ‘Charlie Adler’ Category
Cooking with Rum – Legg Mason Chef Challenge Monday, August 1st, 2011
Hey – you get to watch Professional Tennis and you get to taste these two chefs competing while cooking with Rum! I’m not really doing anything other than enjoying the event, but remember – I Drink on the Job – Cheers!
Chef Challenge – Experience the Flavor of Puerto Rico hosted by Rums of Puerto Rico Reception: 6pm-8pm
Tickets: $70/person – PURCHASE TICKETS HERE – LEGG MASON CHEF’S CHALLENGE
Rums of Puerto Rico hosts Chef Challenge – Experience the Flavor of Puerto Rico, pitting Executive Chef Roger Villalobos of Mio Restaurant against Executive Chef Raynold Mendizabal of Lima Restaurant in a battle to determine who most masterfully creates flavorful and original Latin dishes infusing a variety of rums as theme ingredients.
The entertaining culinary showdown will take place on Monday, August 1st from 6 until 8 pm, in the tournament’s Hospitality Tent. Among the judges are International Tennis Hall of Famer Gigi Fernandez – the first-ever female Puerto Rican athlete to turn professional, Shannon Shaffer – Executive Chef of Design Cuisine, Mary Beth Albright – 2011 Food Network Star finalist and WTOP’s Man About Town Bob Madigan. Judges will sample both chef’s dishes and rate on taste, look/presentation and creativity to determine the Chef Challenge champion! NBC 4’s Eun Yang will be the emcee entertaining the audience throughout the competition.
The judges will prepare the First Course using DonQ rum, the Second Course using Bacardi rum and the Dessert Course using Barrilito rum.
Tickets for the Chef Challenge competition hosted by Rums of Puerto Rico includes food and drink during the reception, a ticket to all the Monday session main draw matches, and the chance to meet Hall of Famer Gigi Fernandez, all for just $70.
Availability is limited, so call the Tournament Hotline at 202-721-9500 or visit
http://www.leggmasontennisclassic.com to reserve your spot.
Kai Pee Ree Nyaaa
This video is an interview of Mark Lester at NYC Bar and Wine Show of Soul Cachaca – he discusses Cachaca and why it is becoming one of the hottest categories in the Spirits industry. My experience with Cachaca began about 10 years ago when I held a TasteDC event at the Brazilian Cultural Institute in Washington, D.C. and my staff and I mixed/muddled over 100 Caipirinhas – the traditional mixed drink of Cachaca consumed in Brazil (See Recipe Below). We also enjoyed the native dish of Brazil – Feijoada, a stew of pork and other goodies with Farofa (a toasted manioc flour mixture) and delicious boiled collards greens.
CaipirinhaAccording to the Press Release from RDP Group, the PR Agency for the New York Bar and Wine Show:
The Brazilian Trade Bureau will present Brazil’s Sexy Spirit, Cachaca, quoted by Bar Business Magazine as “America’s Drink of the Year 2011” for Patrons throughout the United States.
Cachaca is a drink obtained from sugarcane cuts and distillation in Brazil for over 400 years. Cachaca was discovered between 1516 and 1526; mere years after sugarcane plants were implemented in the Pernambuco region of Brazil. Being the first distilled drink of the Americas, produced before pisco, tequila, and rum, cachaca has been a product of local culture for upwards of 300 years. Today, bottles of cachaca can be purchased in a variety of flavors.
Cachaca is actually Rum, or better yet “Rhum Agricole” – you see, rum can be made with sugar cane, but most of the time it is made from the leftover remain of sugar production – molasses. I’ve had rum made from pure sugar cane and solely from molasses as well, and they are somewhat different in taste. Having said that, I got hell at the DC Rum Festival I organized for TasteDC a few years back when one of the rum importers told me that rum made from molasses was just as good if not better than rum made from pure sugar cane! I think the taste difference is more in it’s un-aged pure form, but when you start adding barrel aging to the equation, all bets are off – there are so many wood, temperature, climate and other factors with aging in barrels, that I’d have to do much more research in flavor profiles.
Cheers!
Charlie “I Drink on the Job” Adler – Purchase the Book on Amazon at I Drink on the Job
To Merlot or Not To Merlot Craft Beer – SAVOR Craft Beer Press Conference 2011
To Merlot or Not to Merlot..that seems to be the question according to Lost Abbey Brewing’s Tomme Arthur that is dogging the craft beer business. This Press Panel discussion lead by JT Smith of Flying Dog Brewery covered what motivates the craft beer industry to grow and yet stay small at the same time. In Tomme’s comparison of beer to Merlot, his concern that craft beer had to avoid becoming generic like the consumer readiness to focus on specific wine varietals and price points to the detriment of the character of the product.
I attended “The American Craft Beer Revolution” panel discussion held at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Friday, June 3rd in order to learn more about the American craft brew story. The panelists included Paul Gatza (Brewers Association), Tomme Arthur (The Lost Abbey), Jim Caruso (Flying Dog Brewery), Sam Calagione (Dogfish Head Craft Brewery), Rick Kempen (Bier & cO), Ken Grossman (Sierra Nevada Brewing Company), & J.T. Smith (Flying Dog Brewery). As the organizer of the Mid-Atlantic Craft Brew Festival – MAC Brew Fest my interest in craft beer has grown with the production of the event. Even though MAC Brew Fest won’t be held until the Fall (October 15th, 2011) I wanted to better understand the major players in the industry.
This video interview relates to the issue that all small craft beer producers are currently experiencing: fast sales growth with the ever-present nagging of bottom-line company concerns. If your market is growing at 60% a year, but you can only produce 20% more per year, what’s a craft beer producer to do? As Sam Calagione of Dogfish mentions, sometimes the best decision is to grow slow and re-focus marketing and distribution efforts in attainable markets. If you bite off more than you can chew, you could end up swallowing big debt, production problems and frankly some pretty watery brew!
Charlie “I Drink on the Job” Adler
Announcing the Mid-Atlantic Craft Brew Festival – MAC Brew Fest!
Brandon Skall, Founder of DC Brau, DC’s 1st Brewery in Many Years
So after spending the last 14 years focusing on learning about wine and food (and plenty of beer and spirits in between!), I’ve decided to re-dedicate myself to craft beer. I’m certainly not giving up on wine, but I’ve seen the light – growth in craft beer sales and consumption in the U.S. has increased consistently at over 10% a year for the last 5 years. But the real impetus for moving myself into the craft beer field is really that Washington, D.C. is a VERY under-served area for craft beer. For example, we only have a few breweries in the area including Baying Hound Aleworks, DC Brau, Port City Brewing Co., and Lost Rhino Brewing Co.. Although we do have some excellent brew pubs such as Franklin’s, Mad Fox Brewing and Capital City Brew Pub, there is so much room for growth in both local breweries and brew pubs. And did I mention that the beer wholesalers in the area tell me they can’t get enough craft beer to keep up with demand?
So here’s the official announcement – I’m organizing the Mid-Atlantic Craft Brew Festival, known as “MAC Brew Fest” on Saturday, October 15th, 2011 in Washington, D.C. at the Sphinx Club which is hidden gem of a venue in the heart of DC at 13th and K St., NW. The website is at MAC Brew Fest and will include 30 craft breweries – many from the DC/MD/VA area as well as delicious food paired with the craft beers. Right now my event planner and I are working on the event including developing the TasteDC Food Pavilion which will include a minimum of 30 American artisanal cheeses, locally sourced charcuterie, a gelato bar and extensive selection of sweets and desserts as well as international foods. The goal is to showcase craft beer as part of meal with regional specialties. I’ll keep updating the blog and website, but I’m looking forward to creating a beer event that makes people proud of our city – Cheers!
Temper, Temper – Shiny Chocolate Needs a Temper
This a video from a TasteDC Exotic Chocolate Cooking Class with Rob Kingsbury discussing the tempering of chocolates. Tempering is a term both used in chocolate and in food preparation, but the word is used slightly differently for each purpose. In food prep, when you use the term “tempering”, it’s often associated with tempering eggs – if you add raw eggs to a hot liquid, they will scramble, which is usually not the goal, you want to incorporate eggs in an emulsion evenly throughout. Rob, who owns both ACKC on 14th St., in Washington, D.C. and Del Ray, VA, as well as Kingsbury Chocolates in Alexandria, VA, mentions how his mother made Chocolate Cream Pie by tempering eggs. When it comes to chocolate, tempering is about creating shiny hard chocolate which is snaps when you break it or bite into it. This is caused by the crystalline structure of the cocoa butter and solids together, for an intense explanation check out Cooking for Engineers on Chocolate Tempering. If you don’t temper chocolate, it just doesn’t have the appearance and crunch that most people like.
Here’s the information from the TasteDC class:
TasteDC’s Chocolate Temptation:
Class on Making Exotic and Unique Handmade Chocolates
with Rob Kingsbury, Kingsbury Chocolates
Sunday, March 26, 2006
Chocolate Menu:
-Chipotle Cinnamon Truffle
-Wasabi Orange Lavender Truffle
-Cosmopolitan Truffle
-Margarita Truffle
-Demonstration of a White Chocolate bar filled with Cranberry and Lime Relish.
Oh, and plenty of wine was served – Port and dessert wines go with chocolate, but medium bodied reds like Merlot do nicely.
Cheers!
Charlie “I Drink on the Job” Adler
Working with Fillo – Spanakopita and Tiropita
TasteDC held a Great Greek Classics Cooking Class at Veranda on P Restaurant in Washington, D.C. on Saturday, June 6th, 2009 and this is a short video of using fillo in greek pie preparations. I grew up in Harrisburg, PA which has a large Greek community, so spinach and cheese pies (Spanakopita – Tiropita is basically the same filling without the spinach) where readily available. When I think about the buttery flakey fillo crunching in my mouth and the creamy, salty spinach and cheese oozing onto my tongue, frankly it brings back great memories! I was a bit critical of the food I grew up with in Harrisburg in my book I Drink on the Job but I was very fortunate to have had a great selection of restaurants run by Greeks to enjoy a mix of American and Greek cuisine. Lamb and Moussaka were often on the menu at these little neighborhood restaurants which opened up my awareness to real food.
This is the very basic recipe for Spanakopita we used in the cooking class – you can vary the cheeses if you like. The video is more for demonstrating using fillo which I think scares people a bit to cook with because it’s temperature sensitive and pretty easy to break while using. Give this recipe a try – enjoy!
Spanakopita Recipe
Ingredients:
One box of fillo dough
one box of frozen spinach
8 oz ricotta cheese
one lb of feta cheese
One bunch of spring onions (Chopped)
Dill (a small bunch)
one or two eggs
salt (to taste)
white pepper (for seasoning)
Olive oil
Butter (melted)
Method:
Defrost and strain well the spinach. Place all the ingredients (except the fillo) together and mix. Cut the fillo in three or four long rectangles like lasagna pasta. Take one strip of fillo and place a small amount of the mix on one of the corners of the fillo. Fold the fillo to form a triangle and use a little of the melted butter to keep it together during cooking. Brush a baking tray with butter and place the finished pies on the tray. Place it in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes at 350 degrees UNTIL it’s only brown on the outside, then lower the temperature to 300-325 degrees and cook until the interior is crispy, don’t overcook.
P.S. You can decide the shape and the size of the pie.
Charlie “I Drink on the Job” Adler
Living the Dream – the New Farmer
This was a fun interview I did at the Taste of Atlanta in 2010 with a great lady – Belinda Wernau, one of the owners of Little Red Hen Farm Belinda is part of the renaissance of farming as more than just a way of life, but a philosophical “back to nature” movement. Belinda has a full-time job outside of farming in a technical industry as a chemical engineer and she has 4 kids to raise as well. Somehow she balances her life and provides an idyllic setting for raising chickens for their meat and eggs and she has become financially successful at it, beating her financial expectations by becoming profitable in under 3 years.
Enjoy the video, it’s enlightening. Is working on a farm really living the dream? If you come away with a more realistic understanding of the ups and downs of running a small farm, then this post was successful. It’s OK to romanticize leaving your job and having a better, simpler life in balance with nature, but that’s probably not going to happen for you (or anyone for that matter!). There is a satisfaction to working with your hands and to producing something tangible that people can appreciate. In a world where 90% of people work indoors for over 40 hours a week, sitting in front of a computer, checking email, meetings, cell phones, etc. appreciating the realness of an animal being raised and the associated pitfalls of nature seems to resonate with many. Personally, I’d rather just enjoy the fruits of this labor, but if you have a hankering for going all the way, talk to a farmer – you’ll be surprised what you might discover!
Cheers!
Charlie “I Drink on the Job” Adler
Chesapeake Soft Shell Crabs – the Hard Truth
This video comes from an “I Love Crab” cooking class I organized at TasteDC in the Summer of 2007 with Chef Brian Boots of Elegance ala Carte.
In the Maryland/Chesapeake area, we love soft shell crabs, here known simply as “Softshells” – you can buy them frozen, but I think they come from Vietnam and its actually a different species of crab, but for a few months in the Summer every year you can get fresh ones. In order to clean a softshell, you want to cut the lungs out..and cut off the head with shears/scissors..yes, I’ve seen them served with the head on, but they taste better with it off! When it comes to wine, crab meat is very sweet and light, so a crisp white wine like a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc works great, but a cool pilsener works too – generally throw out the rules with softshells, especially because they’re almost always fried in a rich fat and that adds weight and flavor.
Here’s some info on how to clean Softshells from Cooking Light – Cleaning Info.
Recipe from TasteDC’s I Love Crabmeat Cooking Class
with Chef Brian Boots, Elegance ala Carte
Saturday August 25th, 2007
Mango and Guava Glazed Soft Shell Crabs
3 T Olive Oil
1 T minced and peeled fresh ginger
2 T minced shallots
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 mangoes, peeled and chopped
1 cup Mirin
1 ¼ cups guava nectar
3 scallions, thinly sliced
1 c vegetable stock
Salt and pepper to taste
1 lb soft shell crabs
½ c Julienned basil
3 T Old Bay
Cooking Directions: In a skillet over medium high heat, heat olive oil. Add the shallots, ginger, and garlic. Sauté for 3 minutes. Add the mango; continue to sauté until mango is tender. Add the Mirin and guava nectar. Reduce by half. Add the vegetable stock. Bring to a boil and reduce to form a glaze. Season soft shell crabs with Old Bay. Add to the glaze and cook until crabs are done, about 5 minutes. Add the green onions, basil and salt and pepper.
Carolina: The Dogs, The Pits and the Vino!
I got my Spring wine festival circuit kicked off with a wine seminar at Great Grapes Wine Fest in Cary, North Carolina on this past Saturday, April 17th. Over 30 North Carolina wineries were pouring their wines and all in all, there were some really delicious wines! I brought the book “I Drink on the Job” with me to sell, and even though there were about 100 people seated for my wine seminar from 3-4 pm, I only sold a handful, so lesson was learned – selling a book at a wine festival is going to be tough..On the other hand, it was a really special weekend for me because it was the first time I had ever spent real time in North Carolina. Yes, I had stopped a few times in the past during long drives, but I had never stayed there for a few days to get a sense of the place. And I’m a serious BBQ lover, I even own a Big Green Egg in my backyard in Georgetown, so I had to try some examples from the State.
During my stay in Cary (which is basically an upscale suburb of Raleigh), I decided to go into downtown Raleigh a few hours before my speaking engagement to see what it was about. I just happened to walk right into a few thousand dogs that were frolicking (and pooping all over the place!!) with their owners on a 3K dog walk through the city, below is a short video (less than 20 seconds).
(The guy almost got bit by the 3 dachsunds!!)
So of course, I started to get hungry for something to eat, and there just happened to be a BBQ and Blue Grass Festival a few blocks away at “The Pits” CueGrass Festival so I enjoyed me some ‘cue!
I had the pulled pork BBQ sandwich, and it was really good, definitely a keeper.
After that I headed back to the Cary Wine Fest to taste some Carolina wines and include them in my one hour seminar with “I Drink on the Job”.
The audience was very responsive to my message, but as is true with alot of these events, there were many different levels of knowledge and interest in attendance. My goal is to reach those who respond to my message – that wine shouldn’t be put on a pedestal, it’s something you enjoy to make a meal taste better. I really think my message is reaching the audience and possibly influencing more wine purchases, it’s very hard to tell. Unlike cooking and chefs, wine is poorly represented on TV and by the media in general – it just has a stodgy/academic air to it, and frankly most people get bored pretty fast when a wine professional talks about wine – you can tell by their glazed over faces. On the other hand, I think I’m on the cutting edge of a new world of wine entertainment where exciting new ways to approach wine are just evolving. Wine has often been associated with the arts such as Jazz and painting, but what about going in a completely different direction – what about introducing wine with magic or yoga or even hypnosis? I think if the stage drama-level is increased, then people might associate wine with more pizzazz in their life. I’ve seen enough photos of Chateaux, oak barrels, vineyards and grapes on the front labels of wines and their associated media to know that that is way too trite. I think I’m on to something, and I think if I stick with it, the audience will catch on, the media will follow and eventually more wine “entertainers” will appear in many guises.
And who knows, maybe even wine as comedy – it seems like wine and tragedy have already been covered – Cheers!
Charlie “I Drink on the Job” Adler
