Shepard Fairey, Fab 5 Freddy and Jeffrey Deitch on Keith Haring
97 Warren Street, New York, NY 10007, 212-587-5389
ALSO: Part two of James Beard Foundation Awards.
Some of tonight's nominees and inductees include:
OUTSTANDING RESTAURANT DESIGN
For the best restaurant design or renovation in North America since January 1, 2007
Design Firm: Project M
Designer: John Bielenberg
Project: PieLab, Greensboro, AL
John T. Edge
The Oxford American
“In Through the Back Door”
A restaurant in the United States that serves as a national standard-bearer for consistent quality and excellence in food, atmosphere, and service. Candidates must have been in operation for at least 10 or more consecutive years.
Highlands Bar & Grill
Birmingham, AL
Chef/Owner: Frank Stitt
Owner: Pardis Stitt
OUTSTANDING WINE AND SPIRITS PROFESSIONAL AWARD
Presented by Southern Wine & Spirits
A winemaker, brewer, or spirits professional who has had a significant impact on the wine and spirits industry nationwide. Candidates must have been in the profession for at least 5 years.
Julian P. Van Winkle, III
Old Rip Van Winkle Distillery
Louisville, KY
OUTSTANDING WINE SERVICE AWARD
A restaurant that displays and encourages excellence in wine service through a well-presented wine list, a knowledgeable staff, and efforts to educate customers about wine. Candidates must have been in operation for at least 5 years.
Blackberry FarmWalland, TN
Wine Director: Andy Chabot
RISING STAR CHEF OF THE YEAR AWARD
Presented by Food Network NYC Wine & Food Festival and Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival
A chef age 30 or younger who displays an impressive talent and who is likely to have a significant impact on the industry in years to come.
Gautreau’s
New Orleans
BEST CHEFS IN AMERICA
Presented by Visa Signature®
Chefs who have set new or consistent standards of excellence in their respective regions. Each candidate may be employed by any kind of dining establishment and must have been a working chef for at least the past 5 years. The 3 most recent years must have been spent in the region where the chef is presently working.
Cathal Armstrong
Restaurant Eve
Alexandria, VA (VA falls under mid-Atlantic)
Best Chef: South (AL, AR, FL, LA, MS)
Zach Bell
Café Boulud at the Brazilian Court
Palm Beach, FL
Scott Boswell
Stella!
New Orleans
John Harris
Lilette
New Orleans
Christopher Hastings
Hot and Hot Fish Club
Birmingham, AL
Michael Schwartz
Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink
Miami
Best Chef: Southeast (GA, KY, NC, SC, TN, WV)
Hugh Acheson
Five and Ten
Athens, GA
Sean Brock
McCrady’s
Charleston, SC
Linton Hopkins
Restaurant Eugene
Atlanta
Andrea Reusing
Lantern
Chapel Hill, NC
Bill Smith
Crook’s Corner
Chapel Hill, NC
Who’s Who of Food & Beverage in America Inductees
Leah Chase -Chef/Owner, Dooky Chase Restaurant, New OrleansLeah Chase has lived in Louisiana her entire life, moving to New Orleans when she was 14 years old. Her first job out of school was at the Oriental Laundry in the French Quarter. A week later, Chase was hired by the Colonial Restaurant on Chartres Street and she has been in the restaurant industry ever since. Chase married a musician whose family owned the Dooky Chase Restaurant. Once her children were old enough to attend school, Chase began to work at the restaurant three days a week. She started out as a hostess, but she was soon redecorating the restaurant and working as its chef. She eventually revamped the menu to reflect her Creole background. After Hurricane Katrina destroyed much of Dooky Chase’s 5th Ward location in 2005, the restaurant community got together to host a benefit in 82-year-old Chase’s honor. The guests raised $40,000, and Dooky Chase reopened in 2007 mostly for take-out food and special events. Chase is also a cooking show host and cookbook author.
Paul C. P. McIlhenny
President and CEO, McIlhenny Company, Avery Island, LA
Paul C. P. McIlhenny is the fourth generation of McIlhennys to produce Tabasco® pepper sauce, an American staple found in countless kitchens and restaurants throughout the United States and abroad. As were his forebears, he is directly involved in overseeing and maintaining the high quality of all products under the 142-year-old Tabasco® brand. McIlhenny grew up in New Orleans and has lived and cooked on Avery Island for more than 40 years. He is an accomplished fish and wild game cook and counts as friends such food-world luminaries as Emeril Lagasse, Jacques Pépin, Ella Brennan, Pierre Franey, Paul Prudhomme, Mimi Sheraton, William Rice, and the late R.W. Apple, Jr. McIlhenny is the co-author of The 125th Anniversary Tabasco® Cookbook and a contributor to Eula Mae’s Cajun Kitchen and Tabasco®: An Illustrated History. He is also a member of the Société des Escargots Orléanais of New Orleans and the New Orleans Chapitre of the Confrérie des Chevaliers du Tastevin, and serves on the Louisiana Governor’s Advisory Commission on Coastal Protection, Restoration and Conservation, as well as on the board of the America's WETLAND Foundation. Susan Spicer
Chef/Owner, Bayona, New Orleans
Susan Spicer began her cooking career at the Louis XVI Restaurant in New Orleans in 1979. After a four-month stint at the restaurant, Spicer lived in Paris and California, but eventually came back to New Orleans, where she opened Bistro at Maison deVille at the Hotel Maison deVille in 1986. In the spring of 1990, Spicer and Regina Keever opened Bayona in a 200-year-old cottage in the French Quarter. From 1997 to 1999, Spicer owned and operated Spice, Inc, a specialty market with take-out food, cooking classes, and a bakery. In 2000, Spicer and three partners opened Herbsaint, a casual restaurant in the Warehouse district of New Orleans. She is a recipient of numerous awards, including the 1993 James Beard Foundation Award for Best Chef: Southeast. Spicer is also a cookbook author and an occasional judge on Iron Chef America.
America’s Classics AwardsPresented by The Coca-Cola Company
Restaurants with timeless appeal, beloved in their regions for quality food that reflects the character of their community. Establishments must have been in existence at least 10 years and be locally owned.
he Bright Star
304 19th St. North, Bessemer, AL
Owners: Jimmy Koikos and Nicky Koikos
A clump of feta, tucked in a salad of iceberg and cucumbers. A stipple of oregano on a broiled snapper fillet. At the Bright Star in Bessemer, Alabama, an old steel town southwest of Birmingham, the vestiges of Greece are few.
Greek immigrants built the Bright Star, a vintage dining hall of intricately patterned tile floors, nicotine-patinaed woodwork, WPA-era murals of the old country, and brass chandeliers.
The Bright Star opened in 1907. Descendants of Bright Star founding fathers—Tom Bonduris and his cousin Bill Koikos, natives of the farming village of Peleta in the mountainous Peloponnesus region —still work the floor. Jimmy Koikos, a septuagenarian, and brother Nicky, seven years his junior, are in charge now.
The menu is an honest—and very old—fusion, Greek meets Southern, as interpreted by African American cooks: fried red snapper throats, house-cut from whole Gulf fish, are on the menu. Okra in a cornmeal crust, too. And field peas with snaps.
In the Birmingham area, many of the best barbecue and meat-and-three restaurants are Greek owned. And the Bright Star is the oldest and most storied of the bunch.
—John T. Edge, Director, Southern Foodways Alliance
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