CIC Alum Jamie Simpson Takes The Chef's Garden to Ireland

Left column: Fermentation workshop, collecting pepper dulse, and harvesting kombu.
Middle column: roasting The Chef's Garden carrots for the pop-up dinner,
working on details of the dinner with Chef Enda McEvoy
Right column: Yuzu curd with cucumber blooms and baby cucumbers from The Chef's Garden,
preserved white asparagus, creme fraiche, trout caviar from the Burren Smokehouse

CIC alum Jamie Simpson is the Executive Chef Liaison for The Culinary Vegetable Institute, part of The Chef's Garden in Huron, Ohio. Following an appearance at the Charleston Wine + Food Festival, he left for Ireland to share some of their vegetables and knowledge.

Jamie toured Ireland with chef and author Jody Eddy and ChefJustin Wolfe. In Lisdoonvarnahey, they prepared a pop-up dinner for 60 with Chef's Garden ingredients and techniques, accompanied by Irish Chefs Enda McEvoy from restaurant Loam and Kevin Thornton of restaurant Thornton's. The guest list included some of the top food advocates in Ireland.

He studied seaweed on the coast and headed a workshop in fermentation at the home of Hans and Gaby Wieland, the Neantóg Kitchen Garden School. One of the attendees had high praise: "This was not only awesome, inspiring and a taste sensation, we have now inherited more than 24 jars with the most delicious, simple and at the same time sophisticated ferments from Jamie. We are kind of speechless about this generous and totally unexpected gift and we will look after them and put them to good use to further the cause of fermented foods."

The three chefs participated in the 20th annual Potato Day at The Organic Centre. Jamie spoke about The Chef's Garden's potato trials, highlighting the flavor profiles of the potatoes they grow. “This last weekend marked our 91st new potato variety tasted at the institute since I arrived,” he said. 

The visit was organised by our Board member and seaweed expert Dr. Prannie Rhatigan, who spoke at their Roots Conference in Ohio in 2015. This will be a unique opportunity to hear about the importance of potatoes as part of a healthy diet.
Jamie Simpson is the Executive Chef Liaison at The Culinary Vegetable Institute in Ohio. He is passionate about exploring different cultures and designs dishes around what is available on the farm that day. His commitment to micro seasonal cooking opens the door for him to be more creative while respecting the plants. His dishes look astonishing, always play tricks on the senses and are constantly evolving. http://www.culinaryvegetableinstitute.com

The visit was organised by our Board member and seaweed expert Dr. Prannie Rhatigan, who spoke at their Roots Conference in Ohio in 2015. This will be a unique opportunity to hear about the importance of potatoes as part of a healthy diet.
Jamie Simpson is the Executive Chef Liaison at The Culinary Vegetable Institute in Ohio. He is passionate about exploring different cultures and designs dishes around what is available on the farm that day. His commitment to micro seasonal cooking opens the door for him to be more creative while respecting the plants. His dishes look astonishing, always play tricks on the senses and are constantly evolving. http://www.culinaryvegetableinstitute.com

The visit was organised by our Board member and seaweed expert Dr. Prannie Rhatigan, who spoke at their Roots Conference in Ohio in 2015. This will be a unique opportunity to hear about the importance of potatoes as part of a healthy diet.
Jamie Simpson is the Executive Chef Liaison at The Culinary Vegetable Institute in Ohio. He is passionate about exploring different cultures and designs dishes around what is available on the farm that day. His commitment to micro seasonal cooking opens the door for him to be more creative while respecting the plants. His dishes look astonishing, always play tricks on the senses and are constantly evolving. http://www.culinaryvegetableinstitute.com

CIC Alumni Successes

CIC is very proud of the contributions that our alumni are making to the hospitality industry in Charleston. Here's the latest CIC ad, which was placed on the back outside cover of the City Paper's popular DISH magazine. It features Blythe Hill, Director of Sales and Hospitality for King Street Hospitality Group; Micah Garrison, Food and Beverage Director for Middleton Place; and Josh Shea, Food and Beverage Director for the Charleston Riverdogs.

CIC/MUSC Culinary Health Classes Featured in The Post and Courier

In today's Post and Courier, Food Editor Hanna Raskin reported on CIC's partnership with MUSC to offer Culinary Health classes, "a new elective course for health college students that melds cooking instruction with dietary science." 

Held in CIC kitchens on the Palmer Campus, the class is taught by CIC Chef Instructors Miles Huff, Ward Morgan, and Kevin Mitchell in conjunction with Debbie Petitpain, the Sodexo Wellness Dietitian at MUSC and MUSC health promotion director Susan Johnson. Johnson says that there's already a waiting list for the next section to run. 

Read the complete Post and Courier story here.

UPDATE: From February 25th to 28th, Johnson, Petitpain, and Huff attended the "Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives" conference and workshop hosted by The Culinary Institute of America on its Napa Valley campus. 

Huff writes: "The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Department of Nutrition sponsored the conference. There were approximately 400 attendees with more than two-thirds being health care professionals. The workshop provided demonstrations of healthy cooking, recipes, healthy cuisines, and information on using local healthy foods.  Many of the general sessions shared information about fad diets, food labeling, child nutrition, benefits of plant-based diets, and statistics about the state of our nation's health. 

"Much of the information gathered will be shared and help promote CIC's Sports and Health Nutrition program, our continued training of the school cafeteria workers in our state, as well as our new initiative, the Culinary Health classes."  

Success at the Chef's Feast 2016

The Chef's Feast is always a big success because it benefits the Lowcountry Food Bank. Chef Kelly Wilson represented the CIC with Vanilla Bean Panna Cotta, passion fruit cremeux, fresh passion fruit, hibiscus gel, and dried meringue drops. Chef David Vagasky was there, too, with the divine chocolates that he and Mark Gray make for their company, Cacao's Artisan Chocolate.

Chef Huff Takes on Salmon for SEWE

 

Chef Miles Huff represented CIC in the cooking demonstrations at the 

Southeastern Wildlife Exposition

this weekend. Here's the recipe for his Pan-Seared Wild Alaskan Sockeye Salmon Filet Served over a Pearl Couscous Salad with Arugula and Topped with a Peach Mint Jam seen in the photo: http://bit.ly/1U3Hl30

CIC Partners with MUSC

Chefs Miles Huff and Kevin Mitchell, representing CIC, Debbie Petitpain, MS, RDN, representing MUSC, are teaching Culinary Health class, IP 770, an elective course in MUSC's inter-professionals program, at Palmer Campus on Monday nights in February.

Recipes were selected to highlight the macronutrient focused on that week in order to highlight the role it plays in foods and what happens when you change or replace it. Each recipe was entered into Nutritionist Pro nutrition software. Reading nutrition science will be done as homework. For each week, the focus is on a food pattern (not a particular nutrient) that promotes health and that food pattern is connected to the prevention of one of the most prevalent chronic diseases and a macronutrient. 
- Week 1: Overview: kitchen safety and food safety including HACCP and cross contamination and will touch on the top 8 food allergens
- Week 2: DASH diet, cardiovascular health, fat
- Week 3: Plant based diets, cancer prevention, protein
- Week 4: Mediterranean Diet, prevention of diabetes, carbohydrates
- Week 5: Volumetrics, obesity prevention, calories 

CIC Student Daven Coad Brings Home a Win!

 

Congratulations to CIC student Daven Coad for winning the San Pellegrino Almost Famous Chef 2016 Southeast Regional Competition. Daven competed against students from nine other schools to win the right to go to Napa for the national competition. His dish was a Sweet Tea Bourbon-braised Short Rib with Pickled Collards, Herbed Sweet Potato Puree, and Candied Bacon. 
http://www.almostfamouschef.com/

Anson Mills Brings Soba Expert Sonoko Sakai to Teach a Class

Many thanks to CIC friend Glenn Roberts and his company, Anson Mills, for bringing Sonoko Sakai to teach a class in soba noodle making at CIC. Attended by an enthusiastic group of chef instructors and students, the class was astounding. Ms. Sakai is a food writer, cookbook author, cooking teacher, noodle maker, and producer based in Los Angeles. She has been published in the LA Times, NY Times, Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Lucky Peach, and Saveur, among others. She is the founder of Common Grains, a project to grow heirloom grains and create a sustainable agricultural grain hub in Southern California with a seed grant from Anson Mills. 

The Farm to Plate class had a great term. Chef Forrest Parker of the Old Village Post House Inn and Chef Jacques Larson of The Obstinate Daughter and Wild Olive were terrific guest instructors. The class took fantastic field trips to Keegan-Filion Farm in Walterboro, Bulls Bay Saltworks in McClellanville, the MUSC Urban Farm, GrowFood Carolina, the US Vegetable Lab, and Middleton Place, where they foraged for mushrooms and were served a special lunch that included South Carolina grown Manchester Farms Quail and Carolina Gold Rice from Anson Mills. A big thank you to all of our partners who welcomed CIC students eager to advance their learning about the Lowcountry.

Christmas arrived at the Relish Bakery Cafe last week. There were chocolate Santas, white chocolate Santas (red and green), chocolate angels, and white chocolate angels (red and green) - all made by the students in Advanced Chocolate and Sugar. All eighty were sold!

CIC Hosts Limehouse Produce Fall Cornucopia Cooking Competition

CIC was honored to host the Limehouse Produce Fall Cornucopia Cooking Competition for high school culinary students. Judges were CIC Culinary Department Chair Michael Carmel, Post & Courier Food Editor Hanna Raskin, Charleston Grill Executive Chef Michelle Weaver, and Limehouse Produce Buyer Jamie Vaughn. Finalists were Wando High's Chloe Seay, West Ashley High's Michelle Hammock, and Fort Dorchester High's Ethan Tordoff, who won the competition.

Top l-r: Chef Carmel, West Ashley High's Michelle Hammock, Limehouse Produce buyer Jamie Vaughn, Fort Dorchester High's Ethan Tordoff, Limehouse Produce vice president Andrea Limehouse, Wando High's Chloe Seay, and Limehouse Produce lead buyer Weston Fennell.

Bottom left l-r: Fort Dorchester High School Culinary Department Head Evelyn Zale-Brown, Wando High School Culinary Department Head Chef Bill Twaler, West Ashley High School Culinary Department Head Jason Wheless, Andrea Limehouse, and CIC Dean Michael Saboe.

For information on the competition and the dishes

For the Post and Courier coverage

For the video made by the Charleston School District

For information on Limehouse Produce

CIC Alum Anna Abram Featured in Skirt Magazine Food Issue

We loved this big smile from CIC alum and former chef instructor, Anna Abram, who is now the executive pastry chef for the Indigo Road Group. This is a photo of her page in the Skirt magazine food issue. Congrats, Anna! http://www.skirt.com/

CIC Students Create Pumpkin Recipes for Post & Courier Newspaper

Daven Coad slices his stuffed pumpkin.

For the month of October, CIC students Alex Ward, Rachel Allen, Jordan Fagan, and Daven Coad worked on a project to create recipes using fresh pumpkins for The Post & Courier Thanksgiving Food Section. Chef Randy Williams donated his time and Limehouse Produce generously donated pumpkins to experiment with. Today, they made the front page of the food section + two interior pages. 
Read about it here. and find the recipes here. 

L-R Alex Ward, Chef Williams, Rachel Allen, Daven Coad, and Jordan Fagan
Photo credits: Wade Spees

Hotel Management Class Tours Charleston's New Hyatt Complex

Mr. Nathan Rex, CIC Hospitality Department Chair, took his Hotel Management class to the new downtown Charleston Hyatt House and Hyatt Place, where Mr. Pedro Perez, the General Manager, and Linda Hall, Executive Housekeeper, gave them a fantastic tour of the entire property, front and back of the house. They were introduced to the food and beverage areas, four different guest rooms/suites, fitness center, pool, and beautiful Sterling Hall, the conference/banquet center. Throughout the tour, Mr. Perez and Ms. Hall provided some great industry-specific information, discussed careers in the industry, and shared some best practices in what providing true hospitality was all about. 

Southern Living Taste of Charleston Iron Chef

The street fair of healthy food!

This year the Charleston Restaurant Association partnered with the SC Hospital Association for the Southern Living Taste of Charleston Iron Chef. CIC provided the venue and food. The emphasis was on healthy cooking.

The Iron Chef featured Katie Lorenzen-Smith of Tavern & Table and Fred Bennett of Trident Hospital/Sodexho taking on Ted Jackson of The Westendorff and Mark Hamell of Roper St. Francis Healthcare/Morrison.

Southern Living editor Sid Evans; Coastal Living editor Steel Marcoux and Food Network's The Kitchen’s Katie Lee served as judges.