Lori MidsonMario Batali at the Food & Wine Classic in AspenSee more photos at westword.com/slideshow.As expected, the first night of the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen was a culinary red carpet of celebrity chefs and the giggling, starstruck fans who couldn't stop pawing them. And then there were the blowout parties, like the charity event hosted by Mario Batali, where guests got (among other things) a pair of the star chef's signature orange Crocs. (I snagged a pair for Sheehan to go with
You didn't miss all this good stuff, did you? No problem, we've rounded up the best of the Cafe Society week for you below.Hot dog eating champs battled it out in a Denver qualifier for the big 4th of July competition in Coney Island. Jason Sheehan sought your opinion on where to take Dad for a good meal on Father's Day.Fear not, MillerCoors employees of Golden: you're still set to receive your 864 free beers this year.Jason Sheehan: unmasked!Our Weekly Bread went slumming at Lakesid
Lori MidsonTop Chef winner Hosea Rosenberg and knifed cheftestant Fabio Viviani
By the time the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen ended yesterday afternoon, I'd already seen a whole posse of amateurs puke; another man suffer a seizure just after chef Michael Symor ended a fantastic cooking demo devoted to pork belly; Top Chef winner Hosea Rosenberg locking arms with knifed Top Chef contestant, air-kisser, fan favorite, flirt and fabulous dresser Fabio Viviani; Giada De Laurentiis, who weighs all of
Lori MidsonThe pea soup heard 'round the world.
A few days after my return from Aspen Food and Wine, I'm still digesting the experience. The worst part of the event was listening to everyone's opinion about everything there. Opinions on food (if I heard one more person opine about pork belly I was going to lose it). Opinions on celebrities (I love Mario Batali, I hate Mario Batali). I've always lived by the quote, "Opinions are like assholes, everybody's got them." And boy, were there a lot of
While y'all already know that Westword's Cafe Society blog is far and away the best place to digest all your local food and restaurant news, it just so happens that three of our favorite food places -- Rioja, Table 6 and Biker Jim's -- got some well-deserved love and ink from Bon Appetit and Maxim magazines recently.The nod to Jim Pettinger and his insanely amazing dogs was part of Maxim's 2009 Food Awards, in which 77 restaurants listed in categories like "holiest cow" (the bone-in fillet at
John Broening"We'll have head cheese at Olivéa on Friday -- I expect to see you there," summoned the e-mail. The note - short and to the point -- was from John Broening, the executive chef at Duo and Olivéa: the former a restaurant in Highland with a field-to-plate, seasonal approach to food; the latter a three-month-old restaurant in Uptown that embraces the same elemental philosophies, but pushes the culinary envelope by serving, among other things, head cheese, a gelatinous loaf comp
Lori Midson"I got my ass kicked, but man, did I learn a lot," recalls Tyler Wiard, talking about the early '90s and his days as a line cook for Dave Query and John Platt at Q's Restaurant in the Hotel Boulderado. He must have been up to the task, because Query pulled him off that line and into the fray of Jax Fish House in Boulder before Wiard was eventually lured to Denver by Cliff Young, a former Mile High City restaurateur who opened Napa Cafe and stationed Wiard at the helm.
But whi
Photo: Courtesy of Getty ImagesFirst, Michelle Obama caught the attention of carrot stalkers when she corralled a group of Washington, D.C., schoolkids to help her garden grow on the White House's South Lawn; she also pimped her garden on Sesame Street. Then Spike Mendelsohn, burger wizard, former Top Chef Chicago contestant and the exec chef of Good Stuff Eatery in D.C., named a burger after the First Lady. Made with free-range turkey, Swiss, caramelized onions and several of the herbs grown
