Season four was the first Top Chef season I ever watched. Introduced to a dozen great chefs from around the country, it was the first time I learned who Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons were, and the first time I was introduced to chef Stephanie Izard.
With fans across the country, I cheered for Izard, and her many now-familiar competitors, throughout the season and watched the final episode as she secured the Top Chef win from competitor Richard Blais. I almost immediately scoured the web for contact information for the winning …

By the time Sunday began, I was ready for a little leisurely imbibing. With the weekend coinciding with the Great American Distillers Festival, I dropped in to Portland’s Leftbank Annex to check out the selection of distillers and distributors bringing the best spirits to Stumptown. My plans, however, were a bit thwarted when Oregon Bartenders Guild president David Shenaut asked me to step in to judge the final round of the GADF cocktail competition. Joining fellow judges Ali Tahsini, who took home first prize in last year’s competition, and Paul …

As an observer, it has been a fascinating experience to mix and mingle with bartenders from around the country at various spirits events. While I can comprehend the thinking and planning of chefs and their dishes, drink mixing still remains a bit out of my grasp. Much like traditional cooking, there are a multitude of ingredients – bitter, sweet, spicy – as well as particular techniques to pouring libations…and I’m still trying to get the hang of it.
In an effort to better understand the moving and shaking of a bar …

Is there anything better than a train car full of bartenders? Arriving to the Portland Amtrak station on Thursday night to kick off the start of 2011 Portland Cocktail Week, a bevy of guests were met with a grand Pernod Ricard gala at the adjacent Wilf’s restaurant. Complete with drink master Dale DeGroff slinging Negronis from a push cart (and crooning a few jazz tunes!) the opening event offered a warm welcome, with mixologists, writers, and cocktail aficionados starting the weekend with a little classic imbibery.
Not so very early the …

A longtime supporter of Share Our Strength and its many outstanding initiatives, including Taste of the Nation, the Great American Bake Sale, and National Dine Out, I was thrilled to see that Portland’s own Sarah Schafer would be hosting a “No Kid Hungry” dinner here in Stumptown this fall featuring an all-star lineup of accomplished female chefs.
“People in Portland love everything local, so I thought the best thing to do for the first year was to only have local chefs. I remember talking to someone who said it was difficult …

Every time I venture into Oregon Wine Country, I always get lost. Regardless if I’m going somewhere I’ve been before (rare) or headed to a destination unknown (likely), I somehow lose my way, passing my planned turns, embarking down random dirt paths, discombobulated over north or south, east or west. The butterflies usually begin a few minutes before my departure, and they cease to rest, particularly if I’m required to arrive in a timely manner, until I am present and accounted for.
I can’t tell you what it is. I become …

The carousel winds down and another Tales of the Cocktail heads into the books.  It’s been a week of great times, bleary mornings, late nights, and wonderful people.  There have been lavish parties and dinners, impromptu gatherings at watering holes, and disputes over the fastest and most ridiculous way to deliver drinks down your throat (the answer is Negroni cannon).  I had a few drinks, saw a lot of new and old friends, and missed seeing a ton of people as the swirl keeps kept me from catching everyone.
Tales is …

All week long, Tales of the Cocktail is an unending parade of events, seminars, tasting rooms, and competitions.  What does it take to pull it all off?  A small army of volunteers, TOTC Cocktail Apprentices, bartenders, brand reps, and ambassadors put in the hard work to get scheduled coordinated, drinks slung, and the messy aftermath cleaned up.  Every year as part of the wrap up, an impressive list of stats is published, detailing the hundreds of thousands of drinks served, tons of fruit juiced, and gross upon gross of eggs …

Party time at Tales of the Cocktail begins with a bang. Were you to let yourself, you could just keep rolling from party to party all day and all night at Tales – here’s no real stop time to anything.  It just all keeps going and going and going.  If you wanted, you could go all week without actually sleeping, going to a class, or even a shower – and I’ve seen it. Most are official events, some are impromptu affairs put together at the last moment, and some just …

The best day of Tales of the Cocktail is often the day before it officially begins.  People start arriving and you begin reconnecting with friends you haven’t seen in a year.  Sitting in the Carousel Bar at the Hotel Monteleone, spinning around and around, with a drink or twelve every few minutes bringing a new face to greet.  It’s a wonderful time.  It makes you realize what a wonderful group of people inhabit this industry as people shout greetings to each other across the room.
Tales is a marathon.  The competitive …

Take a few thousand spirits professionals, a bunch of hardcore cocktail enthusiasts, and a couple hundred bloggers, journalists, and reporters – and drop them all in the French Quarter for one hot and sticky week in July – and you have Tales of the Cocktail.  I’m sitting on my plane headed down to New Orleans via San Francisco and Atlanta – look, the ticket was cheap and one means one more city to get a drink in, preparing for the madness. This is my fourth time headed down for this …

I have to say I was quite sad by the time I reached my last day at Kapalua. The sun shone across the gorgeous seaside hills Sunday morning as I made my way to the last wine tasting session of the weekend, titled “You say Shiraz, I say Syrah.” Another stellar lineup of wines were featured, including an Amavi Cellars Syrah, Scherrer’s “Sasha” Syrah, Waters’ “Loess” Syrah, and Penfolds’ St. Henri Shiraz, with panelists like Jamie Brown of Waters Winery, Pax Mahle of Wind Gap Wines, and Fred Scherrer of …

After a morning rainstorm – a regular occurrence on that side of the island, I’m told – I began my Saturday morning with a bit of snorkeling as part of the Jean-Michel Cousteau Ambassadors of the Environment program. After a few hours of floating along with the sea turtles in the blue waters off the coast of the Lahaina, I returned to the Ritz for the afternoon’s wine tasting session, A Drive up Highway 101. Featuring a handful of some of California’s best wines, panelists like Ted Lemon of Littorai …

An avid traveler, I’ve been around the world, from the sandy beaches of the Caribbean to high humidity of Kuala Lumpur, the icy glaciers of Alaska to the blue waters of Australia. But Hawaii is clearly something special.
Landing in Maui on Thursday afternoon for my first trip to the islands, I was a bit wary for my Hawaiian adventure, personal trials and tribulations weighing heavy on my mind. But that first step off the plane, with breezy palm trees blowing in the wind surrounded by green rolling hills and plenty …

This past Saturday, Portlanders gathered at the Portland Art Museum for the 2011 Portland Iron Chef competition raising money and awareness for the Children’s Relief Nursery, a fantastic charity that commits to helping children and families in need in the Portland area.
The evening started with a silent auction complete with a food competition. Three rising star chefs -  Ryan Bleibtrey from The Original, Adam Higgs from Acadia, and Anthony Cafiero from Tabla – battled it out for the People’s Choice hors d’oeuvres. Guests were asked to judge by secret ballot, …