Fresh Tart

Minnesota Food Bloggers heated up a frigid, Minnesota morning by hosting our first educational event on Saturday, January 21, 2012, at Minnesota History Center. Bloggers, farmers, food advocates, chefs, journalists, and concerned eaters gathered to view the morning session of the live TEDxManhattan: Changing the Way We Eat webcast.

The morning session's focus was sustainability. After the viewing, Minnesota Valley Country Club executive chef, Tour de Farm founder, host of In Search of Food, and local food advocate Scott Pampuch spoke to the group about the evolution of his thoughts, menus, and purchasing decisions at his restaurant Corner Table. Scott then joined a panel discussion with Barth Anderson of Fair Food Fight, Debbie Morrison of Sapsucker Farms, and myself, moderated by Brett Olson of Renewing the Countryside, to continue the conversation as a group.

See the event summary at Minnesota Food Bloggers. An overview video of the webcast, panel discussion, and reception is below.

TEDxManhattan: Changing the Way We Eat Viewing, Panel Discussion & Reception from Minnesota Food Bloggers on Vimeo.

Most-viewed Fresh Tart recipe in 2011...Pasta Amatriciana from the Muir Glen Vine Dining Tour dinner I attended at Corner Table Restaurant back in February. Chef Scott Pampuch shared his recipe, I made it at home and included it with my post about the event, and kablam.

You all LOVE pasta! And pork! I don't blame you one bit!

Coincidentally (or not!), that was a very special event for me. I met so many new friends, all on the same night, I look back and shake my head at the evil food fun that has spun out of that night. Joy! Dave! Minnesota Food Bloggers! Not kidding.

I didn't realize it then, but 2011 was just starting to simmer. I couldn't possibly have known that it would boil over into the most significant year of my life, short of the year that Nathan was born. (I chat about a few highlights in my recent Twitterview with Joel Carlson for Minnesota Monthly Magazine.) I am in awe of the friends I've met, the relationships that have blossomed, the work that has come my way, the food I've been able to cook/photograph/write about, the opportunities to grow and push and do crazy shit that blow my mind from the moment I open my eyes each morning.

Thank you for reading what I write, cooking my recipes and letting me know (truly, nothing makes me happier, nothing), chatting on Twitter, sharing your pictures and stories on Facebook and your own blogs. We are very lucky here in Minnesota that we've been able to turn our social media connections into real and lasting friendships, good work, delicious food, charitable contributions, and the energy of connecting with people who love what they do.

There's so much more coming! Amazing. Cheers to 2012, much love, Stephanie

I inhaled the gorgeous plate of food above two weeks ago, which feels like two years ago, given that between now and then my mom had major emergency surgery and time has sped up and stopped both at the same time. It's almost impossible to imagine that I was ever running around stunning Star Prairie Trout Farm, at the Tour de Farm/Celebrity Chef Tour Dinner, in a sun dress, laughing with my friends, snapping too many pictures, eating perfect food perfectly paired with perfect wine...

...but there I am. I'm so grateful that I have the pictures to remember that I was there, having an awfully good time, with my lovely friends Molly McNeil, Joy Summers, and Shaina Olmanson.

About those pictures. There were seven of us bloggers at the event, all with big cameras and a passion for taking pictures of food and chefs and pretty things, and we were...overwhelming.

While it was a rather perfect storm of elements not likely to recur anytime soon - a very special event, a gorgeous setting, an unsual mass of photographers, a level of comfort with chefs that we all know and like and have photographed before, lots and lots o' wine - we did have a long discussion on the Minnesota Food Bloggers Facebook page about blogger etiquette, as it were, concluding with a general consensus  to 1) be aware of our impact as a whole (to avoid a paparazzi effect), 2) be respectful of chefs and staff and their space, 3) not bother other diners/guests, 4) ask permission to take photographs, and 5) remember to sit back and enjoy the food and setting.

When deciding if it's appropriate to bring a big camera, it's obviously important to bear in mind the mission of the event. I worked on the Eat Ramen Help Japan event held earlier this summer, and our stated goal was to raise awareness and money to help feed Japanese families affected by the March earthquake and tsunami.

In that case - bring on the paparazzi, right? We courted as much media and social media coverage as possible.

In the case of Tour de Farm, the stated goal, via the TDF website, is "...to gather people with their family, friends and new friends to share an experience that generations of farm families experience all the time. By celebrating the harvest, the goodness it provides and the toil at the hands of those who provide it, we hope people are inspired to consciously live and eat the way we should, naturally, healthy and as a family and community.  We want people to escape the city to unwind in a tranquil setting and appreciate the wonderful farms where our food is produced."

Click click click click click. Not particularly tranquil. As someone who loves to take pictures, pretty much all the time, I confess that I didn't even consider not bringing my camera. I was so excited to be away with my friends, in a lovely place, with so many people that I respect and admire, that I couldn't wait to photograph the farm, guests, food, chefs, all of it. While I've so enjoyed looking at and sharing my images, I'll never go to an event like this again expecting to document it from beginning to end, unless I'm hired to do exactly that.

What do you think?

Details about the evening, including a recipe for one of my favorite parts of an overall breathtaking meal, in Tour de Farm/Celebrity Chef Tour Dinner, Blogger Etiquette & Sweet Corn Panna Cotta: Part II.

Don't miss my colleagues' beautiful and varied spins on the same evening:

Amy Peterson at Green Your Plate
Joy Summers at City Pages Hot Dish Blog and Eating the Minneapple Part I and Part II
Shaina Olmanson at Babble Network's The Family Kitchen

Make sure to see the results of the long and scrumptious panna cotta discussion I had with web designer/photographer/cook/Tour de Farm organizer Kris Hase, including her recipes for Goat Cheese Panna Cotta with Honey & Berries and Sweet Corn Panna Cotta with Bacon & Blue Cheese, at Dara & Co./Minnesota Monthly Magazine.

I was honored to throw a small amount of time toward the beautiful #BigEVOONight event that Minnesota Food Blogger Will Hsu planned with Chef Adam Vickerman and Mike Forbes of California Olive Ranch. Held last Wednesday, July 6, at Cafe Levain, the event featured a gorgeous, seasonal menu planned around California Olive Ranch's incredible extra-virgin olive oil.

The food was stunning and delicious - good combination. I particularly loved the kohlrabi/pea puree soup and can't wait to mess around with the concept.

The eaters were primarily food bloggers doing their food blogger thing: snapping pics, tweeting, oohing and ahhing over the fabulous food, talking a blue streak, laughing their brains out...

...and licking their plates. Yeah!

Minnesota Food Bloggers are a fun group, yes we are. Even the ones (Shaina Olmanson) who insist on putting their nametags on my butt. It started with one at The Local. I found five at the end of this event. Apparently I don't notice people patting my backside. Hmmm...

At home I used my California Olive Ranch extra-virgin olive oil to finish off these gorgeous soisson beans. I first had them at the home of Deborah & Scott Pikovsky, after spending the day at Star Thrower Farm, their sheep farm and cheese-making venture outside of Glencoe, Minnesota. Scott made us an incredible meal - details of the day and meal forthcoming - including soisson beans. Creamy and rich, they need nothing more than a drizzle of lovely olive oil, and a sprinkle of coarse salt, to finish. Sublime.

Thank you Mike Forbes/California Olive Ranch and Adam Vickerman/Cafe Levain for such a perfectly delicious summer evening!

Soisson Beans with Rosemary, Arugula & Olive Oil
Serves 6

Soisson beans are large, white lima beans. Substitute these Bob's Red Mill large lima beans for the same buttery, creamy texture. Or, use any dried white bean! Soak the beans at room temperature for 12-24 hours ahead of time and your digestive system will thank you.

8 Tbsp. fruity extra-virgin olive oil, divided
1 small sprig rosemary
1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper
1/2 c. diced onion
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tsp. dried thyme
1 lb. large, dried white kidney beans, soaked for 12 hours, soaking water discarded
4 large handfuls of small arugula leaves
Kosher salt & freshly ground pepper

Set a Dutch oven over medium heat and add 4 Tbsp. of olive oil. Stir in the rosemary and stir around for a few minutes, then add the cayenne pepper, onion, garlic, and thyme. Saute for 10 minutes, or until the onion is nicely softened. Stir in the drained beans to coat them with oil. Add water to cover by 2 inches, bring to a simmer, and turn heat to low.

Simmer the beans over lowest heat, uncovered, for 30 minutes, then add 3 tsp. of Kosher salt. Continue simmering for another 30 minutes to 1 hour or until beans are tender but not falling apart. Add more water if necessary so that beans don't dry out but juices remain thickened and starchy. When the beans are done, remove from heat and set aside.

Set a skillet over medium heat and add 1 Tbsp. of olive oil. Stir in the arugula and a generous pinch of salt and saute until arugula wilts, about 3 minutes. Scrape arugula into the bean pot.

To serve, spoon beans and arugula into small bowls, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with a bit of salt, and finish with freshly ground black pepper.

Over the course of an intensely sucky non-spring in Minnesota, a bit of an obsession developed among the Minnesota Food Bloggers for gathering on a patio. It began on Twitter with the wistful hashtag #BigPatioNight, while the average high temperature was 40 degrees at best, and roared into a full-blown fantasy when we were generously invited to spend May 23 on the brand-new patio at Heidi & Stewart Woodman's lovely restaurant, Heidi's 2.0.

Would it be a nice night? I'll confess...I thought no damn way. The forecast was for clouds at best, rain at worst.

I was ready for the worst.

But then...a stroke of luck! The clouds drifted away, the sun shone forth, and we all gathered outside, for real, on the patio, for real. For real!

It was...magical.

The sense of sparkle was enhanced, I suspect, by the absolutely delicious - and KILLER - cocktails being concocted and named by bartender extraordinnaire Johnny Holder (@film_cocktails) and sommelier James Parsons (@jsommplus). Several drinks were named, of which I sampled (inhaled) two. The first was The Stephanie, named for Minneapolis/St. Paul Magazine food editor Stephanie March (@stephmarch), an evilly fabulous mix of Makers Mark, chartreuse, brandied cherries, with muddled orange, sugar cube, and tobacco banana bitters.

Ka. Blam.

The second sashayed around after Tracy Morgan (@segnavia) & Molly Herrmann (@tastebudtart) of Kitchen in the Market (@KitchenInTheMkt) - two girls who know their way around a cocktail - challenged Johnny to create a champagne-tequila beauty. Dangerously comprised of champagne, tequila, ginger syrup, celery bitters, and lime juice, The Blonde Bombshell kind of blew everyone away, both at the party, and on Twitter the next day. I've been thinking about her ever since...

Platters of lovely food made the rounds as well, escorted by servers in "Cheese is the New Black" t-shirts. Awesome. Salmon spring rolls, blue cheese-topped poundcake, tender rabbit meatballs, lamb, and a serious chocolate mousse (on gluten-free spoons, for me, how sweet!) were devoured. There might have been some licking going on.

The best part of the night? The Minnesota Food Bloggers raised $500 for Emergency Foodshelf Network plus an additional $205 for American Red Cross Minnesota for North Minneapolis tornado relief. Amazing.

Huge thanks to the Woodmans, JSomm, Johnny, Liz, and the whole Heidi's team for hosting such a beautiful party.

Happy Patio!

These Minnesota Food Bloggers events must end! They're just so damn fun that the next day is a bit of a let-down. Who's making me dinner? Pouring me glasses of prosecco? Making me laugh maniacally? Chatting endlessly about food, cooking, ingredients, restaurants, events, new projects, and when we should next have dinner?

Spoiled food blogger brat, me.

Wednesday's event was hosted by chef/owner Scott Pampuch, his right-hand-otherwise-known-as Meghan Likes, sous chef Dan Zeroth, and the rest of the awesome staff at Corner Table Restaurant. I put up the event registration a couple of weeks ago and within hours it was sold out with a long waiting list to boot.

Minnesota Food Bloggers Unite! Wow.

I think we have something amazing going on here, friends. Very exciting. (More coming soon, so stay tuned...)

In the end, 40 lucky bloggers arrived to find the dreamy spread pictured up top: Corner Table-cured meats, pickled vegetables, eggs, mustard, butter... Crostini with goat cheese and roasted beets... Perhaps other treats but I was talking, talking...

Needless to say, beautiful, local, delicious things.

Mmmm.

As crazy-fun as we food bloggers are, Pampuch didn't invite us to Corner Table (CT) for the sole pleasure of watching us empty his kitchen and drain his bar. He had a pitch to make, and he picked a good group to toss it to. As the cocktail hour wound down and he pulled together chairs to speak to the group, out came the cameras and phones: Twitter lit up with #MNFoodBloggers @CTKitchenTable @ScottPampuch; Andrew Zimmern tweeted in that he wished he could be there; and I had people from all over the world tweet-asking me what party they were missing.

Turns out, we kind of rock.

Pampuch welcomed the group and introduced CT's latest endeavor, Farm & Table Community Supported Kitchen (CSK). All of the lovely treats everyone had just inhaled? Similar items will be available in CT's single purchase or 4-, 6-, or 8-week CSK membership boxes, to be picked up at the restaurant on Friday evenings, starting April 1.

The contents of the boxes will vary each week, but will contain the ingredients for serious meals at home: Seasoned (marinated, brined, stuffed...) meats (pork, chicken, beef, duck...), ready for the oven or grill. Seasonal produce (radishes, carrots, ramps, beets...), cleaned, peeled, and ready to cook. Sides, stocks, seasonings, cured pork, cheeses, preserves or other good and lovely things to set in your empty fridge.

(For CSA veterans, the idea of a box of a few pretty, clean vegetables alongside the makings of an entire meal is kind of mind-blowing, right? I don't know how many cabbage recipes I wrote the year of my first CSA share, but I pushed my marriage to the edge. I think John finally drew the line at a cabbage tart, although I thought it was pretty fabulous.)

CT had given out CSK test boxes to three busy couples a week before the event, then invited the group to chat with us about how easy it was to pull together meals from the box and even better - how much they enjoyed what they had prepared.

And then...

All hell broke loose when two real-live sample boxes made an appearance and we bloggers were invited to dig in and get cooking in CT's kitchen. Whoosh, the dining room emptied, the kitchen filled, and things got wild. It turns out that food bloggers like to cook!

Or talk and eat and drink and watch and photograph each other cook.

In a flash there was marinated chicken stuffed with goat cheese, wrapped in bacon, and fried until crispy and melty and bacon-y ridiculous. I heard a rumor about sauteed cabbage, apples, and sausage (actually, I saw the pictures from my own camera, kindly taken by Dania Miwa - thanks dear) which I'm sorry that I missed.

.

The women in the kitchen swooned at the sight of a sunny-side-up egg sandwich, layered with bacon into a Rustica Bakery miche roll, topped with CT's housemade kimchi...someone cut it in half (Pampuch?), eyelids fluttered, and I could not stop laughing.

Ditto the smoked trout cake topped with bacon, topped with pickled cabbage and carrots, topped with an egg poached in chicken broth, topped with sauce remoulade (photo by Amy B. Peterson).

Ooh, ahh, attack, inhale. (Guys, here's a tip - poach an egg for your girl and be very glad. It takes 3 minutes.)

In case you're too busy to cook anything at all, there's also a membership for what CT is calling Farm Dinner in a Box, in effect a box of fully cooked, scratch-made meals, ready to heat-n-eat. Menus will be posted weekly on the CT blog. As with the CSK box, order one at a time or subscribe for the summer. All good.

And if you can't commit to a whole box of food, or you're in CT having a fab din, or you're picking up your box and decide you need more, more, more...there's now a deli case full of bacon, sausages, preserves, eggs, butter, chicken liver pate, and other treats.

In addition to the Farm & Table CSK offerings, Pampuch also announced that beginning Sunday, April 3, CT will be offering breakfast-not-brunch. I predict bacon on the menu. Likely eggs too. If I weren't going to be eating bacon & eggs in NYC that very day, I'd be there. You should go in my place.

He also announced that CT plans to soon close on Tuesday nights and instead offer cooking classes, including for children, details forthcoming.

Needless to say, huge thanks to CT for hosting us crazy bloggers. To say that the group had fun is like saying cured pork is amazing. I confess that I stood back and watched everyone food-geeking out and thought: I am never going to top this night.

It was a good feeling.

For more and other fun takes on the evening, check out:

Eating the Minneapple
FoodStoned
Green Your Plate
Joel's Views
She Said She Said
Minneapolis/St. Paul Magazine Foodie File
Twin Cities Foodie

Did you feel the earth shake around 7 pm last night? Your tummy rumble? Both at the same time? Blame Minnesota Food Bloggers, who gathered for the first time at lovely 128 Cafe in St. Paul to sip wine and say hello face-to-face.

Bloggers chatted with farmers. Social media experts chatted with podcasters. Chefs chatted with food producers. Foodies chatted with PR reps. Restauranteurs chatted with home cooks. Journalists chatted with interns.

We all basked in the glow of proprietress Jill Wilson's gracious hospitality while inhaling Chef Ian Pierce's famously addictive, sticky-tender pork ribs. Alongside frittatas with creme fraiche, vegetable samosas, almond-crusted manchego-stuffed peppers, and mole sirloin skewers...yeah, we enjoyed a serious, impressive feast.

It may have been cold outside, but baby it was cozy delicious fun inside 128 Cafe. When I looked around the room, my heart sang, lalalaa! - so many talented, wonderful people all in the same room. Incredible.

For more pics and other recaps, check out:

FoodStoned
Green Your Plate, Parts I (food) and II (people)
Joel E. Carlson
Eating the Minneapple

Let me know if you write about the event and I'll add your link! Thank you Jill, Ian, 128 Cafe, Dania Miwa (for taking most of these pics - huge!), and all who attended the first-but-not-last gathering of Minnesota Food Bloggers!