Viet Pham Hanging In On Next Food Network Star

Viet Pham at his restaurant, Forage.

After two episodes, Viet Pham seems to be in the middle of the pack on "The Next Food Network Star." He hasn't made any major missteps, but he hasn't jumped to the top of the class yet.

From what I've seen of the competiton, and what I know of Viet personally, his cooking skills and his creativity are his biggest assets. He doesn't have a bold (or bizarre) personality as some of the other contestants — shoulder-shaking Damaris, "Glam it up" Lovely, or "The Pie Guy."  In some ways, that's a good thing, because over-played gimmicks can get annoying.

But it seems the judges want everyone to have a cooking "point of view" that can be summed up in a quick sound bite. Hence, the "Pie Guy," and the "Barbecue Guy," and Nikki's "Meat On the Side" vegetarian cooking.

But the mentor/judges also seem to have preconceived notions as to what that "point of view" should be. Alton Brown, Giada di Laurentiis and Bobby Flay all jumped onto the idea that Andres had lost a lot of weight through cooking; but he was reluctant to bill himself as the "calorie-cutting chef" that they had in mind. So when it came down to Danuschka or Andres, they sent him packing.  (And they might have also wanted Danuschka to keep around so viewers would have someone to cheer against!)

I'm wondering if the judges want to label Viet as a stereotypical "Asian chef?" That would be a mistake, because his cooking is so much more.  But it would be hard to sum it up in a sound bite; maybe I would go with something like "creative global cuisine," or the ability to create something amazing from basic ingredients. While "I beat Bobby Flay" is a great bragging right, it doesn't describe Viet's type of cooking or what he will teach us on his show.

Viet Pham was the runner-up on "Extreme Chef." 

I was also surprised that Viet seemed a little camera shy.  This is the guy who was cool and confident through every bizarre episode of "Extreme Chef!" And beating Bobby Flay on "Iron Chef" tested his culinary mettle.
But, perhaps Viet is used to letting his food do the talking, instead of making a sales pitch about himself.

Still, he's connecting with viewers, because when I checked tonight, he was the second place Fan Favorite, behind "The Pie Guy" Rodney Henry.

It's been a few years since I watched "The Next Food Network Star" through a whole season. And it seems that instead of finding "unknowns" out there, the producers are recruiting cooks who are camera-ready because they've been on other TV series. Stacey Poon-Kinney's restaurant was featured on "Restaurant: Impossible." Russell Jackson competed on "Iron Chef." Rodney Henry has been on "Chopped," "Down Home With The Neelys" and "Paula's Home Cooking."  Danuschka competed on "Chopped." Chris Hodgson was on "The Great Food Truck Race."  I guess it's to be expected now that there are so many other food competition and reality series out there.

At any rate, I'm getting a chuckle out of some of the judges' comments.  Giada complaining that Lovely is too slick and polished?  Um, what do they say about "pot calling the kettle black?"

Marie Callender's Pie Sale Through June 30

Marie Callender's just kicked off its Marie’s Whole Pie-To Go Sale, through June 30.

You can buy a whole pie for $7.99 plus the cost of the pie tin. The sale excludes cheesecakes, seasonal fresh fruit pies and promotional pies, but you still have a lot pies to choose from!  Visit www.mariecallenders.com for a complete listing!  

Blue Lemon Launches Breakfast Menu With Charity Event

Lemon Blueberry Ricotta Pancakes served at Blue Lemon restaurants.

 Blue Lemon restaurants are launching a new breakfast menu in June by hosting a week-long charity breakfast to benefit the Utah Adoption Exchange. 
Blue Lemon owners Aaron and Lychelle Day, who are adoptive parents themselves, will donate $1 to the non-profit for every breakfast entrée item bought next week, June 17 – 22. 

“We picked the Utah Adoption Exchange as a recipient of our charity breakfast event because we are personally very passionate about the need to find loving and supportive families for all children,” said Lychelle Day, co-owner of Blue Lemon.

In addition to being the mother of three daughters, Day and her husband have adopted two brothers, aged three and four. The Utah Adoption Exchange recruits families to adopt children ages eight to 18 years old.  According to Lindsay Kaeding of the Utah Adoption Exchange, 154 children are waiting to be adopted in Utah. The average child is an 11-year-old boy, and many children are victims of abuse and neglect. The Utah Adoption Exchange is the only adoption recruitment agency registered with the state of Utah. The organization contracts with the Utah Division Child and Family Services to match children who need a home with suitable parents.

Blue Lemon, with locations in Cottonwood Heights, City Creek and Highland,added six new entrees to the breakfast menu including: 

- Artisan breakfast sandwich with eggs, broiled tomatoes, fontina cheese, and a choice of black forest ham, grilled peppercorn turkey bacon or turkey sausage

 - Lemon Blueberry Ricotta Pancakes topped with homemade buttermilk syrup and fresh blueberries

 - Bananas Foster French Toast made with cinnamon walnut bread and topped with buttermilk syrup and fresh cream

 - Eggs Florentine with poached eggs, broiled tomatoes, fresh sautéed spinach, grilled ham on a freshly baked English muffin, topped with house made hollandaise sauce

 - Berry Orange Crepes filled with orange-zested sweet cram, topped with fresh berry orange compote and finished with mint coulis

  - Grilled Steak and Eggs. 

  Several entrees are accompanied with new rosemary grilled potatoes. 

Blue Lemon is open 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday - Thursday, and 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Breakfast is served from 7 to 11 a.m. at all three locations: at 55 W South Temple in Salt Lake City, in Highland at 11073 North Alpine Highway, and in Cottonwood Heights at 6910 South Highland Drive. For more information visit www.bluelemon.com, @blue_lemon on Twitter and on Facebook.

About Blue Lemon

Blue Lemon was founded in 2009 by Utahns, Lychelle and Aaron Day, with fresh, seasonally-driven food with a unique twist of flavors and textures at an affordable price. Its mantra is “Pure, clean food with a twist.” 

Blue Lemon uses organic foods and hormone-free meats in its menu, and eco-friendly tactics such as recycling, sourcing from local providers and using recycled materials. 

Saffron Valley Hosts Kebab & Wine Festival

Lamb dish from Saffron Valley.

Saffron Valley invites you to experience a traditionally distinctive menu of grilled kebabs complete with select wine pairings by Young’s Market Company during its 3rd Annual Kebab & Wine Carnival. The kick-off for the 2-week long Kebab & Wine Carnival will begin at its newer downtown location (26 E Street, Salt Lake City) from June 10-16 followed by theSouth Jordan location (1098 W South Jordan Pkwy.) from June 17- 23.

“The Kebab Carnival honors the age old traditional Tandoori style of cooking which is loved the world over by Indian food enthusiasts. What is so unique about Tandoori style of cooking is that it is absolutely flavorful, delicious and very healthy for you,” said Lavanya Mahate, owner of Saffron Valley, in a press release. “We are excited about the upcoming Kebab & Wine Carnival which will present over 25 different varieties of succulent kebabs and wines to go with them.”
Kebabs are chunks or morsels of meats or vegetables marinated in yogurt, fresh and dried herbs and spices and cooked in an open flame Tandoor oven which reaches temperatures over 750 degrees F. Kebabs can also be made with ground meats. Although the typical notion is that kebabs are grilled and served on skewers, they can be removed from the skewers prior to serving. All kebabs during the Carnival come with a generous helping of salad, rice and soup for a hearty dining experience.
In India Tandoori cooking and more specifically Kebabs were popularized during the Moghul era when cooking was taken very seriously and rivalries were common between chefs over recipes, ingredients and whims of kings, who wanted their meat cooked in particular ways. 

Saffron Valley is recreating the magic of the Tandoor to connect  modern day Salt Lake patrons with the ancient Tandoori cuisine through this dedicated Food Carnival.

"Walking Salt Lake City" Takes Fitness To The Streets

Last summer I bought a copy of "Walking Salt Lake City" by Lynn Arave and Ray Boren (Wilderness Press, $17.95). The fact that I used to work with both of them at the Deseret News was what first piqued my interest.  

I spent a lot of the winter reading the book's fascinating "back stories" and historical notes about the locations, thinking that once spring hit I might enjoy following some of the routes.  Alas, a torn meniscus sidelined my plans, and my post-surgery knee isn't quite ready to take it to the streets yet.  
But I've familiar with a quite a few of the 32 walks in th ebook, after working in Salt Lake City for ten years. And as a Davis County resident, the Farmington/Lagoon trail loop and Antelope Island walks brought back some family memories. When my kids were young, I would take them for a walk & picnic on the Lagoon trail, as my husband worked the graveyard shift and needed some quiet to sleep.   

 I did write about the book for my Standard-Examiner column this week.  The walking routes stretch from Dimple Dell in Sandy on the south, to Antelope Island on the north. They vary in distance from a quarter-mile around the Temple Quarry in Little Cottonwood Canyon to five miles in the Avenues.Each walk has a map, degree of difficulty, clear route directions, background about the location and points of interest to see along the way.

Walking gives you a chance to soak in all of the little tidbits and architecture that you miss when you drive through a neighborhood, Arave told me.

He once considered walking a second-rate workout. “But I discovered that as you age and injuries may prevent running or hiking, walking is the granddaddy of all exercises — for young or old, it is poetry in motion.”

 Through writing about hikes in the Grand Canyon, Arave became acquainted with outdoor author Greg Witt with Wilderness Press. When the company decided to add Salt Lake City to its series on urban walks, Witt recommended Arave, since he worked in Salt Lake City at the time.

Arave asked Boren, a retired Deseret News editor, to co-author it, “because we work well together, and Ray is a great photographer and lives in Salt Lake City.”

Boren and Arave first brainstormed, scouring the Internet and maps for ideas. They did 90 percent of the walks together, documenting them as they went.

“Parley’s Park and the Peace Gardens were unknown to me previously, and yet gems for walkers,” Arave said. “We both had no idea that the Miller Bird Park, a pocket of nature at 1500 E. 1050 South, existed. Even some locals near that area had never discovered it.”

Boren, a Salt Lake City native who has enjoyed walking its streets, said some of the routes they devised made him look at the locations in a different, more segmented way.

“South Temple and the Avenues will always be among my favorite routes, both for their history and their familiarity to me, for I lived on Salt Lake City’s F Street for more than a dozen years,” Boren said. “I also enjoyed rediscovering the International Peace Gardens at Jordan Park, which I had visited often as a child, and exploring more of the Jordan River Parkway.”

He noted that Antelope Island is more rural than most of the other walks.

“We specifically included it as a way of extending the reach of the book to the lake that gave Salt Lake City its name — and to introduce it to visitors and Utah residents alike,” Boren said.

Arave said the Temple Square “Mormon Mecca” chapter was the hardest to do, “as we could only scratch the surface on the detail we saw on our walk there. Mount Olivet Cemetery was such a fabulous place that we made it a separate walking route, as strange as that sounds.”

The “backstories” make it a fun read, even if you never take a step on any of the routes. For instance, there are details about the Gilgal Gardens, with its sphinx-like bust of Mormon prophet Joseph Smith and scriptures carved into sculptures.

“Ray and I had both learned a lot of history during our long newspaper careers and it came in very handy for this book,” said Arave. “For space reasons, not all our backstories made it into print, though.”

Another publishing limitation is that Boren’s photos are printed in black and white. To enjoy their beauty in color, you can check out the “Walking Salt Lake City” Facebook page.

The book is written for both tourists and locals. “We tried to write the book as if the reader knew nothing of Salt Lake,” said Arave.

Since Arave lives in Davis County, one would hope that his next book would feature more Top of Utah walks. But don’t hold your breath.

“I think the publisher is doing the larger cities first,” said Arave. “Ogden would be down the road a long ways.”

Allgood Provisions Utah Cherries — It's All Good

Allgood Provisions' Utah Cherries recently were named one of Clean Eating magazine's Clean Choice Award Winners in the snack category.  This is the magazine's second annual awards.
 I was recently forwarded a review sample of these dried organic red tart cherries, which come from a family farm south of Spanish Fork. They have a deep, tart-sweet flavor that makes them good for snacking or tossing into a salad. Cherries and a small amount of organic sunflower oil are the only ingredients. (It must be a pretty small amount, as a 1/4 cup serving contains about a half-gram of fat.  
That 1/4-cup serving also gives you 10 percent of the daily value for vitamin A, 2 percent of calcium, and 2 percent of iron.  

Allgood Provisions sent me a package of their dried blueberries that are bursting with strong berry flavor.  They look like tiny  raisins, and they're sweetened with a bit hint of cane sugar.  Knowing that blueberries are high in antioxidants and vitamins, I was perplexed when I read the Nutrition Facts on the back of the package and saw that a serving contains zero percent of the daily values for vitamins A and C, as well as calcium and iron. 

"Blueberries are high in vitamins, including Vitamin A and potassium," said Jake Boyd, company founder. "Because the FDA calculates nutrient value percentages on serving sizes of 100 grams and does not allow reporting fractional percentages, anything below 0.5 percent is reported as zero. Hence, the serving size of our Wild Blueberries is 30 grams and the Vitamin A is 0.35 percent per serving." 

Allgood Provisions, headquartered in Park City, Utay,  products offer only certified organic products free of harmful pesticides, growth hormones and synthetic fertilizers.

Standard-Examiner Cooking Show at WSU May 9

Presto Zuppa Toscana from my cookbook, "Soup's On!"

This Thursday, May 9, I'm going to be the "warm-up act" for the Relish Cooking Show at Weber State University. The show, sponsored by the Standard-Examiner, actually begins at 7 p.m., but the doors open at 4 p.m. so that people have plenty of time to check out the vendors and find themselves a seat. 

So I'll be cooking Preso Zuppa Toscana and Quick Chicken Tortilla Soup with Avocado from my cookbook, "Soup's On!"  And if you get there in time, you can slurp a soup sample while you shop!

In preparation for the show, I interviewed Relish magazine’s chef and cooking show director Brian Morris. He said that there's been a surge of interest in home cooking, but people often don't learn the basics.

“What we’ve found recently is that there are a lot of folks who really would have so much more fun in the kitchen if they were confident about a few key things,” Morris said.

In the Relish show, he teaches some of those basics — “like perfect roasted chicken, perfect stir-frying, perfect poaching. These are little things that make such a huge difference in so many recipes you do.”

Morris, who was trained at The French Culinary Institute in New York City, travels with Relish magazine’s show almost 12 months out of the year. He can also be found on the Relish Facebook page every Tuesday as the “Chef in Your Pocket.”

There, he answers all sorts of cooking questions, sometimes posting short, impromptu videos.

Morris worked at Le Cirque 2000 and Jacques Torres Chocolates and as a private cooking instructor with a client list that includes Derek Jeter, Ally Sheedy, Nicole Kidman, Keith Urban, Clint Black and Lisa Hartman.

“I’ve had a chance to work with a lot of really fun people, and each had a different thing they wanted to figure out,” he said of his celebrity clients. “One of them had never made Thanksgiving dinner for the family, and wanted to be able to do this wonderful dinner for them.

“Another wanted to know how to cook with a limited amount of time throughout the week. Another person wanted to learn about Asian cuisines. But it all went back to learning the basics.”

Morris said the cooking show talks technique in a fun, entertaining way.

“People leave with a lot of tools for their culinary tool belt, but they are also going to have their sides sore from laug

hing, because we have a lot of fun,” he said. “It makes a great date night or a family night.”  

Tickets to the show are $12 if bought in advance at events.standard.net, or $14 at the door.