Slow foods dinner at Six 89

Here are some pictures from kitchen along with the chicken coupe and herb garden that are located 20 feet from the restaurant door.I had fun meeting and plating with all of the chefs. The pictures have been loaded in reverse starting with the dessert course. The only picture I lack is my course. I was too busy running around making sure it went out perfect. Thanks to Mark Fischer and his amazing staff for treating us so well each and every time we see them

Sparkopolis

After 6 months of preparation and many sleepless nights we executed Sparkoplis. It took a lot of planning and help from my sisters Rachael and Kaylie and team of professional friends to pull it off. Here is a link to the article in the Denver Post about charity events this summer.

Passed appetizers

Colorado lamb meatball wrapped in angel hair and rosemary

Roasted sweet Colorado corn and apple shooters

Smoked Rainbow trout Bruschetta

Chef’s garden grown vegetable kabobs with sweet pea pesto

Long family pork belly sliders with asian slaw and hoison aioli

Rocky ford melon pipettes with serrano peppers and proisutto

Food Entertainment Stations

Cheese

Baked rolls and sesame crackers from City Bakery

Artisan cheese from Haystack Mountain Dairy

Goat cheese baked in olive oil and rosemary

Pickled watermelon and mint with feta

Creamy buttercup with Colorado peach chutney

Snowdrop with jalapeno caramel

Tamale

Hand rolled mini tamales with red chili or green chili and pork

Featuring Colorado cheeses,farm to table vegetables and unique sauces

Cotijo cheese, Asadero, western slope corn, hatch chili, chef grown tomatoes

yuzu avocado and black olive chipotle

Colorado poured bar

Featuring

Cottonwood cellars, Debuque canyon winery

Great divide and Breckenridge brewery

Stanahan’s whiskey, Colorado vodka and Montanya rum

Creation Stations

Bar

Stanahan’s whiskey caviar and cream

Montanya rum carbonated over vanilla ice cubes

Colorado vodka peach martini with strawberry pop rocks

Ice cream station

Strawberry mint ice cream, hot fudge ice cream and Madagascar vanilla sorbet made with liquid nitrogen. Topping bar includes:

Exploding banana whipped cream, chocolate bubbles, pineapple bubbles, frozen caramel rocks, coconut marshmallows, mint paper and carbonated cherries

Slow Foods Dinner at six89

Mark Fischer from Six89 is putting together a amazing dinner on September 13 and has asked the Inventing room to cook a course. He had all the chef's send in a few choices and he made the final menu from that. I am very excited to go up and cook with a few chefs I have been following for years. Here is the menu and the chefs

Sarah beckwith helsey- restaurant montagna at the little nell

anti pasta er marinated vegetable "salad" with home made goat feta

Bryan nelson- pacifica

hiramasa tartare, preserved palisade peaches, rooftop thai basil and chilies

Kelly liken- restaurant kelly liken

chilled sweet corn soup, roasted red pepper-tarragon relish

Bryce orblom- six89

braised north fork fork goat, foraged wild mushroom, house made chevre agnolotti

Ian kleinman- the inventing room

long family pork belly, isreali cous cous carbonara, poached egg, grilled spinach

Frank bananno- mizuna, luca d "italia, bones, osteria marco

roasted beet salad, home made burrata, aged sherry vinaigrette

rob zack-8k at the viceroy snowmass

cheesecake, avalanche chevre, blueberry fritter, salted pistachio brittle

Please check out six89 for details

What a Wednesday

We are still trying to catch up from Wednesday of last week. We debuted the Inventing room cart in the morning and had a catered event at the Governors mansion that night. We began the morning loading my car full of tables, water bottles, tents and whatever else I could fit into it. I drove to commissary and loaded all of my prepped purees, bases and creme brulee into my coolers. Chad, the chef from the Porker cart helped me get my product to the site along with towing our cart. We unpacked and waited to see what would walk up, not a lot but I was OK with that. It was our first time and I had to figure out what went where and if I put this over here it might make it easier. We packed up our cart and the Honda around 3:00 and drove the cart back to the garage. Exhausted, I now had to think about the buffet we needed to have set by 6:00. We made it to the mansion at 4:30 and began to set when we realized our bread had not been delivered. There was a mix up with our order and our menu featured a bread station. Jeff ran to Whole Foods, the bread company sent a emergency delivery and we did what we could until we got slammed around 6:30. It all ended up working out and it was a really fun event.

Our menu included:

Bread bar with hummus, olive tamponade and spinach artichoke dip

Grilled marinated vegetable kabobs from the chefs garden

Colorado sweet wine sorbet bar

Merlot space foam

Jennifer and Peter's wedding

We had a amazing time cooking Jennifer and Pete's menu that included beef tongue bruschetta, mint and chicken wrapped in phyllo and pork belly sliders. It was an honor being a part of such a colorful ceremony and meeting such wonderful people. Here was our vodka bar that included nitrogen frozen vodka lemonade, blackberry nitrogen shots and a peanut butter cup martini with a peanut butter pop rock rim

A kid in a candy factory

We took the kids to Hammond's in Denver for one last trip before school starts. They have a tour where you can watch the candy being cooked, pulled, folded and flavored into some amazing confections. The best thing they make is called a vanilla caramel. It is a whipped marshmallow encased chewy caramel. You can buy a bag of rejected marshmallow carmel that is block of goodness, we have been cutting off chunks since we got home. Here are some pictures of where I want to be buried

This is where they take different flavors and colors and pull them into the sugar. They make #50 batches that will be pulled into hard candies such as ribbon candy or candy canes. The brown block is wrapped in a layer of white

The white candy was then cut into sections and placed onto the green sheet

The green sugar was rolled around the white blocks

The sugar block is then placed in this machine that rotates the sugar on the canvas while a propane lid keeps the sugar pliable so they can pull it into any shape they want. The tour is free and they give out candy, do I have to twist your arm anymore?

Sparkopolis

We have a amazing event coming up on September 11. Sparkopolis is a fund raiser for front range libraries. The new Wright Farms location at 120th and Holly will be transformed into a interactive light and food show. We will have creation stations where you will be able to build your own dishes. Garnish your Colorado tamale with creative toppings, make whiskey caviar for a shot our build a banana split with pineapple bubbles, exploding whipped cream and carbonated cherries. We are even growing the produce for the event in our garden as we speak. Tickets are $75 a piece and we hope you come out and support this amazing concept

Carbondale Mountain Fair

We are making ice cream bases like crazy right now for the 38th annual mountain fair. It runs from Friday July 22 through Sunday July 25. Here is our menu, we will be located in the kids section of the park. We can't wait to get out of the city and mix some ice cream in the mountains. Come up, get out of the 100+ degree weather and make sure you stop in and get some of the cold stuff.

Our Slushy made American Libraries Magazine

This little girl is so cute Library opening

Anythink library opening

Please join us on July 10 for the Grand Opening of Anythink Wright Farms. We will cooking burgers and dogs with gourmet toppings on egg buns from Mike Bortz at City Bakery. Whats a BBQ without liquid nitrogen mango and strawberry slushies with sweetened condensed milk? We will be donating .50 cents of each sale back to the library's educational programs. The opening begins at 1:00 and there are different programs for the family throughout the day.

Ice cream drinks

We have a birthday coming up this weekend where a client has asked us to take some classic ice cream flavors and make drinks out of them. The menu includes:

Banana Split- banana liquor, compressed pineapple, chocolate exploding whip cream, glass rimmed with strawberry pop rocks

Smores- Marshmallow infused vodka, dark chocolate caviar and graham cracker bubbles

Peach melba- Carbonated peach schnapps with raspberry sorbet frozen with liquid nitrogen

Taste of Elegance Beer Competition, the results

Thanks to everyone who came and supported us at the event. It was great to see some old friends including David Harker, the executive chef at the Omni in Broomfield. I worked with Dave when I first came out of high school at the Westin tabor center. We also opened Babaloo burritos in the Fox theatre in Boulder a long time ago. Mike Long from Opus took Best Chef, Jean Luc from the Westin Tabor and the Inventing room tied for most creative and chef Harker won peoples choice.

Our ice cream turned out amazing. It was Honey vanilla roasted peanut ice cream with molasses popped liquid nitrogen popcorn and pretzel bubbles.

Genes and Cuisines that Reign Supreme Lecture

I will be participating in a lecture at the Museum of Nature and Science on Wednesday. I will be presenting with Dr. Tom Finger from the Rocky Mountain Taste and Smell Center and Nicole Garneau the curator of Human Health at the Museum. Nicole is going to talk about the genetics about taste. Tom's lab has genetically altered mice to have their receptors removed for bitter, sweet and unami. I always enjoy talking with different researchers about taste. It has helped me discover how different textures and presentations effect taste.

Taste of Elegance Beer Competition

I have done the wine side of this competition in the past and I am very excited to participate in the beer competition this year. The chefs are given 2 beers that are that they pair two dishes with.

My first dish this year will be based on 3 P's of beer- peanuts, pretzels and popcorn and my other dish involves a flipped street taco. Hope to see you there. It is at the Omni in Broomfield on Wednesday June 9 at 6:00 pm. You can get tickets at www.denverbeercomp.com and they have a 2-1 coupon if you use the code: rack

Project Pave at the Governors Mansion 2.0

We were lucky enough to be invited back this year to cook at the Mansion. We were joined this year by Lance from Strings restaurant. I have to say it was nice sitting back this year and watch Greg and Lance do their magic. I took the sorbet and dessert corse and helped plate the rest. Here is the menu and some photos of the evening

Passed apps

Smoked sea scallop ceviche with lemongrass syrup and upland cress

Duck rilette with cardamon tulle, baby bok choy and duck praline

Country pork pate with pickled chippolini/ olive tapanade and curry apple remoulade

Salad

Swordfish Tataki with watercress, pickled shallot, cucumber and watermelon radish

Seafood

Roasted sea bass with artichoke tortelinni, tomato coulis and parsley puree

Soup

Heirloom tomato soup with babylus vinegar, natural tomato

salad and textures of olive oil

Sorbet

White peach and apple sorbet with Stanahan whiskey paper

Meat

Local micro ranch Berkshire pork 3 ways with carrot hazelnut puree,

braised greens and ancho glaze

Dessert

45 second chocolate cake with white chocolate exploding whipped cream, molasses powder, dark coco bubbles, hot fudge ice cream, mint jel and berry salad

Limb Preservation Foundation Charity Event

We had a great time on Saturday night at the Crowne City Plaza at DIA to support the Limb Preservation Foundation. Thank you for inviting us to be part of such a great event.

Bacon dinner at Opus

Mike Long, owner of opus invited my wife and I to a bacon dinner. Mike asked me about a week ago to do a bacon ice cream for him. I agreed knowing that I could fill my small tank at a local welding store. On Friday I went down and filled my four liter tank. Joe the manager asked what I was driving. I pointed to my Honda in the parking lot. He informed me that I had to have a pickup truck for him to release the nitrogen. It turns out that some guy had a small dewar in his car that spilled all over him and caused third degree burns a few years back. With no pick-up and no one to help at 4 p.m. on a Friday, I parked my car 6 blocks away and told Joe I was going to walk it home. I had to do it, I promised Mike I would make it happen. I made the ice cream base and went to the dinner. We had a great dinner that included

Bacon wrapped scallop with pancetta risotto

Roasted ribeye stuffed with sous-vide pork belly

Peanut butter nougat and bacon chocolate bar with bacon ice cream

It was good to be back in the kitchen for a night. As far as the bacon ice cream, it turned out pretty good but I probably will never make it again

Taste of Elegance Competition

One of our favorite events is coming up next Thursday. It will be held at Mile High Station this year instead of D.U. I was given my wines yesterday to pair with my dishes. I received a Proseco and a Petite Sirah. I am going to make the graham cracker soft shell crab with tropical fruit, coconut mousse and soy dipping dots to go with the Proseco. I will match the Sirah with a blueberry allspice sorbet with frozen honey crystals. There are tickets still available for $100 a pop. There will be 18 chefs competing this year from all over the United States. http://www.denverwinefest.com/order.html#toe

Tailgating with liquid nitrogen

I do a lot of charity work for http://www.projectpave.org/, a local organization that helps at risk youth. Joe Hubbard (pictured here on the right) asked Greg from the Broadmore(pictured on the left) and myself to cook a tailgating party to help raise some money. I can honestly say we had one of the best spreads ever in that parking lot. Roasted tenderloin, seared scallops, lamb chops, smoked sausages and liquid nitrogen ice cream were just a few of the items we put out.

Musuem of Contemperary Art Mixed Taste Lexture

This past Friday I fortunate enough to be invited to mixed taste which is a 30 minute presentation given by 2 people on unrelated topics. At the end of the presentation the audience ask questions that try to connect the 2 subjects. The other presenter did Machiavelli, a 15 century political philosopher. We arrived around 5:00 and set up a station where people could grab some strawberry sorbet before sitting down. My presentation went fairly smooth. I started off with Herve talking about how the term molecular gastronomy is wrong. I moved on to talk about the presentation I went to in New York where Harold and Linda talked about taste. People were fascinated by the supertaster theory. I then talked about molecular products that people use everyday with out knowing it. We then moved onto to the additives where I included a lot of pictures from the blog. The zebra steak got the biggest roar. The question and answer session was fun fun. One of the questions was what would the menu look like at the Machiavelli cafe.

I ended off the night freezing a pickle and shattering it on the ground and sucking down some space foam. Mixed taste happen every Friday night at the MCA. It was a blast and I can't wait to be invited back