NEW YORK - We’ve had three seasons of U.S. Bravo’s “Top Chef” and each one has gotten arguably better as the network wised up and chose a smattering of chefs with real skills to populate the program.

What will the fourth season bring? Well, if the 16 contestants’ resumes mean anything, this year could be a dandy when it kicks off Wednesday on American television. Many of them have worked at some top-notch spots and appear to have real seasoning and one is from Canada, Lisa Fernandes of Toronto. (The show is not on Bravo in Canada although the first season was shown on The Food Network).

“I think this season is tougher . . . because the talent pool is deeper,” said Tom Colicchio, a well-known chef and judge on the show. “There are more contenders this year. These are good cooks without a doubt.”

Colicchio said Bravo couldn’t attract such talented people in the past because the show was taken lightly in culinary circles, and few with major cooking aspirations wanted to risk their reputation in a venue as derided as a back-stabbing reality show.

But that has changed.

“It has become respectable,” Colicchio said. “A lot of the chefs who came in season four probably wouldn’t have come out in season two. More and more talented chefs are coming out because the show is being taken seriously.”

One of the reasons they’re taking a chance on “Top Chef” rests with the guest judges. Last year, Eric Ripert, Daniel Boulud and Andre Soltner landed on the program, raising the stature of “Top Chef.”

“I think that has really legitimized the show,” said Colicchio, who owns the popular Craft steak houses.

Colicchio said contestants know they also have a shot at parlaying their fame into a restaurant like first-season winner Harold Dieterle. Colicchio doubts Dieterle could have opened Perilla in New York without the exposure he received by taking part in “Top Chef.”

Colicchio, who helped vet the resumes, said he looked for pedigree. He found plenty.

Many of contestants have the credentials to go all the way, and in some cases, the egos to make for good television.

Richard Blais, Andrew D’Ambrosi, Dale Talde, Spike Mendelsohn and Manuel Trevino all seem to have the moxie and experience to take the title. Like their victorious predecessors, they’ve worked in some decent kitchens and withstood the pressure.

Trevino rose to sous chef at Mario Batali’s Babbo, an Italian restaurant and one of New York’s best. He’s currently executive chef of a Mexican place named Dos Caminos. At Babbo, he worked with author Bill Buford for about a year.

Buford says Trevino, or Memo as he’s known, “has got a crazy amount of talent, can’t believe there are other chefs on the program who have more skills or (have) as much elegant lightness under pressure, and, probably most important, he has a genuine creative fire, a wildness that will result in his coming up with a dish so unexpected and brilliant that he will be a finalist, or else will result in some kind of equally unexpected flameout and make Memo just too damn hot too handle.”

Buford, who penned the book “Heat” while slaving away at Babbo, added that Trevino gives the show “unexpected cred.”

Like Trevino and Mendelsohn, D’Ambrosi is doing a stint at Le Cirque 2000, a legendary spot in Manhattan that recently revived its reputation after getting three stars in The New York Times (the paper took one away in 2006).

Talde is a sous chef at perennially packed Buddakan, a big operation that can turn out exceptional food when the kitchen is on its A game. He helped open restaurant Jean Georges Vong in Chicago, where the show takes place this season.

Mendelsohn works as the chef de cuisine at MAI-House. The Times named it one of the best restaurants in 2007. Mendelsohn could have some tricks up his sleeve after spending time at Les Crayeres in France, which has two Michelin stars, and Thomas Keller’s Bouchon, a famous bistro in Napa Valley.

Blais’ curriculum vitae is also impressive. According to Bravo, he “studied under luminaries such as Thomas Keller, Daniel Boulud and Ferran Adria.” If he learned anything from those stints, the Atlantan could be formidable - though his knowledge of molecular gastronomy doesn’t guarantee victory.

OK, so what about the women?

In three seasons, a woman has never won. A female chef has come close, landing in the finals on the first and third seasons.

This season, half the contestants are women. And there may be a dark horse among them like Fernandes. She cooked at the popular Public in lower Manhattan, and now is doing catering gigs while waiting for the “right opportunity.”

“The female talent is huge,” Fernandes said in an interview. “All I’m gonna say is that we started out with more women than any other season and walking in there and seeing that many women definitely got my hopes up.”

But remember: The judges only care about one thing.

“I’m judging solely on who’s making the best food,” Colicchio said. “That’s it.”

[Source]

These days a significant number of people are interested in pursuing a culinary arts education. In fact a culinary arts education has become one of the most popular courses of further education in recent years.

The culinary arts are considered by many people as both an art and a science. Culinary arts are complex endeavors that involve not only the need for cooking talents and skills, but also knowledge about everything involved with the craft of preparing and presenting great tasting food.

As a result, it is no wonder that experts strongly advise modern chefs to wear many different “hats” at the same time in order to be successful. A culinary arts education generally reflects this school of thought, so to speak.

In this day and age a quality culinary arts education is available almost anywhere in the world. There are many different culinary arts education programs from which you can select if you are so inclined. According to a recent report by the American Culinary Federation - a leader of standards in the culinary professions - there are more than 100 accredited schools which offering culinary arts programs in the USA alone at this time.

As mentioned, a culinary arts education starts with choosing a particular program and specific course of study. It is important to know that culinary arts programs generally keep to the strict rules and guide lines of the American Culinary Federation in order to maintain their certification.

There are certain culinary arts programs that were created for those people who want to earn an associates degree or certification in culinary arts - that are designed to provide a person with a more in-depth course of education and study. These culinary arts education programs are designed to provide students with a significant foundation allowing them to pursue a satisfying and successful career in the culinary arts.

An important part of culinary arts education includes the training or the apprenticeship element of such a course of education. Experts agree that hands-on experience is crucial to training a person appropriately in the culinary arts. Apprenticeship programs are used in significant numbers today. In fact nearly all culinary arts education programs require a student to participate in an apprenticeship type program for the purpose of obtaining a degree in the culinary arts.

Work experience.
About 80 of the 100 schools offering accredited culinary arts education programs offer apprenticeship programs as part of their courses of study today.

A culinary arts education can be rather expensive. However in a culinary arts school, obtaining an appropriate culinary arts education can be an excellent investment in a person’s future.

[Source]

Is culinary school really necessary? I always thought if you knew how to cook, you knew how to cook. It turns out I was wrong. If you want to go into culinary arts as a career, culinary school is just as necessary for you as law school is for a lawyer. I found that even if you are a great cook, there are simply skills and qualifications you will get from culinary school that you need when it comes time to enter the professional culinary arts world.

You, like many people, may believe that cooking is a talent that you are just born with. That is partially true, but many in the culinary arts industry recognize that it is indeed a talent, but it is also a skill. Though you may have an understanding of how to make food, in culinary school you will learn more about ingredients, foods, and how to combine them. By being well informed and educated, you will be able to take better advantage of your given talents.

You may also not realize that culinary school can prepare you for more than just becoming a “cook.” Most people think of chefs, caterers, and restaurateurs as the only people who attend culinary school, but that simple isn’t true. There are countless jobs available to graduates of culinary school. You can choose to be in restaurant management, work in retail food markets, or even become a food writer to name a few of the options. Culinary school is an education to prepare students for any career in food, not just becoming a cook.

The point is that if you really are serious about a career, any career, in culinary arts, then culinary school is necessary. Yes, like any education, it is expensive, but in the end wont it be worth it to be able to get a good job doing what you want at the restaurant or company with you want to do it? If you were to become a lawyer, you would have to go to law school and if you want to become a doctor, you need to go to medical school. So to have a successful culinary arts career, you have to go to culinary school.

When you go to select the culinary school you want to attend, you should look for one that is accredited and will get you the certificate or degree you need for the career you are after. A good culinary school will train you in the use of quality ingredients, proper presentation, and even balance for meals. The program will help you to understand everything about the food from the purchase of the ingredients to the presentation of the finished meal. With the overall culinary education you will get, you can then make full use of the talents you have.

If you love to cook and see yourself as a chef, restaurant manager, or even a food critic, you should consider culinary school. The knowledge and basic skills you will acquire there will allow you to pursue a long and successful career in the career you want.

If you would like the latest cooking secrets, or find more of my personal articles like the one you just read, visit my culinary site.

[Source]

Herbs have been with humans since the dawn of recorded time and before. They have been used in a wide variety of functions and new uses continue to be found for them in the present day. Depending on who you ask, there are anywhere from 40 to 60 herbs to choose from and most of them are very simple to grow and use.

The reason that herbs can be used in so many different functions is because they come in different varieties. For instance, there are aromatic herbs that are grown purely for the scent they give off. The oils from these herbs can be found in candles, perfumes, and many other cosmetic and skin care products.

By far the most popular of herbs is the culinary herb. In fact, most people are familiar with only this kind of herb. Many gardeners grow a few varieties of culinary herbs such as basil, dill and chives. The beauty of some of these herbs is that you don’t need plant them every year since some of them are annuals and will appear without needing to be replanted.

The ornamental herbs are planted only because they look beautiful and you can create exquisite fresh or dried arrangements with them. They are usually found in and amongst the flowers in a flower garden.

There are herbs that have medicinal value. They are used to treat a variety of ailments to this very day. Although the Western medical community has not yet accepted or practiced curing diseases with the help of herbs, it has been a popular way of treatment in the Eastern countries. And, scientists are showing an increasing interest in the potential of herbs to cure disorders.

Even in the harshest of economic times people manage to have culinary herbs even if that means growing them on their own. These herbs are important to some because the food would otherwise taste too bland and tasteless without them. They are used to prepare marinades that add subtle but marked flavor to food. This flavor enhances the taske of the dishes.

Growing herbs in your garden is a fairly simple and painless process. But before you start laying out your garden and planning where what gets planted where, be aware that herbs are available as annuals, perennials, and biennials. This means that the herbs will be coming up at different times in the year so you will have to keep track of where you plant what herb and what its growing cycle is.

Most of the culinary herbs do quite well in soil that has been well drained but still remains fairly fertile. You have nothing to worry about if space happens to be limited outdoors because herbs do great when grown indoors as well. No matter where you intend to plant your herbs, be sure not to plant them too deeply in the soil or they may not have a chance to grow. When harvesting herbs, try to do so in the mornings because this is when the precious oils in the herbs are at their concentration and precisely when you want to pick them.

[Source]

It all began in 165 B.C.E. The Syrian Greeks occupied the temple in Jerusalem and prevented the Jews from performing their rituals and observing their religious beliefs. Against impossible odds, a small group of Jews, led by Judah, rose up against their oppressors and threw the Greeks out of the temple. After they cleared the temple of Greek icons and idols, the Jews discovered they had only enough oil to light the lamp in the temple for one day. But lo and behold, God worked a miracle and the oil lasted for 8 days, long enough for the Jews to find a more plentiful source.Today, Hanukkah is an 8-day festival celebrated by Jews around the world with menorahs (an eight-branched candelabra), spinning dreidels (tops), geld (gold-wrapped chocolates shaped like coins) and delicious fried foods. This year Hanukkah begins at sundown on December 3 and continues through December 11.

Jews from different cultures eat different fried foods to commemorate the miracle of the oil. Many American Jews, from Russian and Eastern European descent, eat latkes, shredded potato pancakes, with sour cream and/or applesauce. The Sephardic Jews–from Spain, Portugal, Italy, North Africa, Iraq, Syria, Greece and Turkey–enjoy jelly-filled doughnuts, or sufganiyot.

Cheese blintzes, crepes filled with ricotta or pot cheese, are another food enjoyed during Hanukkah. This tradition springs out of another legend, the story of Judith, a Jewish widow who saved the Jewish town of Bethulia during the revolt against the Syrian-Greeks. She entered the enemy camp and prepared a feast for the general that was full of salty cheeses. The general developed a powerful thirst from the cheese and drank so much wine that he passed out. Judith then cut off his head with his own sword and the general’s troops retreated.

The most important ritual of Hanukkah is the kindling of the menorah lights each night–one candle the first night, two the second, and so forth, always lighting from right to left. Many families retell the story of Hanukkah, reminding their children to be proud of their Jewish heritage and to treasure religious freedom.

During the 8-day celebration, children receive presents and bags of chocolate coins called gelt. They also play a gambling-type game with the dreidel, a 4-sided top with the Hebrew letters nun, gimmel, heh and shin. The letters stand for the words which mean “A great miracle happened here.” The dreidel game is said to have develoepd as a way to get around a decree the Syrian-Greeks passed against learning the Torah, the Jewish holy book. Jews who met together to study would bring the tops, so passing patrols would be lulled into thinking they were playing a harmless game.

[Source]

Becoming a cook is a much trendier profession than it used to be. With more programs, schools, and vocational training regiments out there that are producing professional chefs, getting into the business looks very attractive to many. With the quality of cooking improving so much over the past decade, the awareness of what kinds of ingredients people want is also improving.

At a culinary arts institute, you can learn how to create foods to meet these diet programs. Many of these super effective diets have come and gone throughout the years with some working and some falling flat on their face. One thing is certain, though, as long as there is food, people will try to lose weight through fad diet plans.

Trendy diets might not be the healthiest thing for dieters. In a society that is steadily moving towards obesity, regular folks and health professionals alike recognize the need to buck this startling trend before it gets worse. Some of the diets work and some of them do not. It is really all dependent on the person and how their body reacts to the changes in nutrition. Cooks and chefs are learning quickly how to adapt their style to fit just about everybody.

Read Full Story

Echo Boomers—-or Generation Y—-is a savvy group with tremendous purchasing power and strong beliefs: An examination of buying patterns and preferences on college campuses is provided.

As the National Association of College & University Food Services (NACUFS) notes, the Echo Boomers (also known as Generation Y) comprise 24% of the U.S. population. This 70 million strong group of individuals between the ages of 10 and 28 represents $625 billion in annual buying power; it is the country’s most diverse generation in terms of preferences, culture and ethnic backgrounds. They are well-informed and avoid the notion of trial: if everyone else is doing it, they go straight to adoption. The group, as a whole, is described as individualistic, distrustful and cynical of overt marketing, because they have been branded since birth.

In terms of food spending, this generation may well be the foodservice industry’s best friend. Generation Y Americans eat out an average of 24 times a month, according to a Technomic survey, spending $1,152 yearly on restaurant food purchases. They select fast food restaurants more than 80% of the time; however, that is not to say that their purchases are necessarily unhealthy: their consumption of salads is on the increase.

More than 10% of the group goes to gourmet coffee shops three times a week or more, according to the Technomic survey. Averaging 4.6 cups per day, Generation Y is the fastest-growing specialty coffee consumer segment, largely helping to propel blended coffees into a $1 billion industry.

As Janet Paul Rice, associate director of dining services at Concordia College, finds, “College students are spending money now, developing habits. They are forming opinions, if they haven’t already, about brands and companies. Their concerns and questions are more prevalent now, and they are much better informed, be it from parents or through media or their learning process. They are better informed about nutrition and food ingredients. Things like allergies are much more known.”

Read Full Story

Butter’s bad for you, but the alternative–margarine–also can make your arteries a clogged mess. The solution? Switch your spread.

Instead of using either butter or margarine, try one of the new spreads that
contain cholesterol-lowering ingredients called plant stanol esters. You should
be able to find a few different brands of these bread spreads at your local grocery store. Research has shown that these new spreads can lower your cholesterol as much as 14% with regular use. To see an improvement that impressive, however, you’ll need to include the spread in your diet three times per day.

In general, it is recommended that you consume no more than 300 milligrams of cholesterol per day. However, for most people, consumption of fat influences levels of cholesterol in the blood far more than consumption of cholesterol itself. Only by measuring blood levels before and after restricting dietary cholesterol do you know your responsiveness to dietary restriction of cholesterol. People who show a particular sensitivity to dietary cholesterol should eat even less than 300 milligrams daily to retard or reverse arterial aging.

[Source]

If you are thinking about a career in culinary arts then studying in a culinary school is a must. You may be a great cook but you will never become expert learning culinary arts yourself. Farther taking up a job as a chef in a good restaurant demands a professional qualification, which comes only after attending a regular culinary school.

There are many myth surrounding culinary arts. For example people say culinary is an art and art cannot be taught. This is not true. First culinary is not just an art, its science too. You must know about the ingredients you are using while cooking. You should also have through knowledge of the contents of the ingredients or additives you use to cook food. It helps you to be an informed chef.

Another myth is that culinary education is very costly. You see, any education is costly. Culinary is not an exception. But if you compare, a Bachelor of Engineering Degree is much more costly then a diploma/degree in culinary.

One of the worst myths is that chefs live a great life - full of glamor and no work. This is not at all true. Most of a chef’s time is spent in kitchen with hot oils and burning temperatures.

If you love to cook - culinary school should be your destination. It is never too early for you to think about the opportunities that will come along after culinary training. America need good chef - you can be one of them.

Chef, caterer, pastry chef and restaurant cook are merely the most familiar four options, but there are hundreds of jobs in the food industry. You may want to consider preparing for positions in management as executive chef, or in sales as catering director or in administration in food and beverage management. Maybe you’ll want to explore developing specialty products - a line of sauces or dressings, for example - for retail or wholesale markets. Maybe you’ll want to become a restaurant consultant to entrepreneurs who want to start restaurants. There are also teaching opportunities in professional cooking schools. Still another option is food writing and editing for magazines and books devoted to food and cooking. The options are endless.

For any of these career directions, you’ll find the best preparation in an accredited school program - you’ll come out with a certificate or a degree. This training will provide you with a lifelong basis for understanding quality raw ingredients, creating balance and pleasure in combined flavors and presenting a beautiful plate to the diner. Yes, you keep learning on the job, but culinary school gives you a base of knowledge to test and compare to new trends, new ingredients and your own creativity.

[Source]

Might be better known to some as ‘Peking Duck,’ but ‘Beijing Roast Duck’ is the full translation of the Chinese name. Needless to say, it’s a bit of a specialty of the city, and Beijing Roast Duck restaurants abound.

I usually use ‘breaking culinary news’ to announce something upsetting or unusual, so this time I thought I’d give equal billing to what was an excellent meal.

Last week I mentioned to some friends that I hadn’t yet had the dish, which is practically a crime for anyone who has spent more then 12 hours in the city. Neither of them had either, so we made plans with a couple of longer-term Beijing residents to go out for dinner tonight.

The restaurant itself, Li Qun, seems fairly authentic. It’s an old, old courtyard house in a pretty battered looking hutong that must be a couple hundred years of age. From the piles of new bricks, the neighborhood looks like it may be in line for a renovation, but it certainly is REAL Beijing, from the tall grasses growing out of the roofs of the houses down to the kids playing in the street and the residents gathered in small clusters sitting on the sidewalks.

On the other hand, the restaurant is probably only 4-5 blocks southeast of Tienanmen Square, and I think it’s become one of those ‘authentic’ places that gets ‘discovered’ and then fills up with ‘tourists’ as the ‘prices’ go through the ‘roof.’ This impression was borne out by the review my coworkers were reading during the hour cab ride to get there through rush hour - the phrase
I recognized was ‘laowai hen dwah hen dwah’ - many, many white people.

Read Full Story