Please take your seats. Tonight's event is ready to begin. As a courtesy to those around you, please
turn off your personal electronic communication devices. Welcome to the 2010 Community Kitchens Chef's
Challenge.
fourth annual Bloomington Chef's Challenge. You have to excuse me. I'm your lovable and affable host.
My name is Brad Wilhelm. I'm with you. I got to get this on here just right because I'm also running
the drive-through at Raleigh, so just hang on one second here. I run a nonprofit. I need to pick up
whatever money I can. All right. Everyone in a good mood? All right.
You know that you're here to see three of the best chefs in the country compete for the coveted Golden
Spatula Award. That's right. And not only are they're going to get that golden spatula, they're going
to get bragging rights for their restaurant, but most importantly, you
And they, and everyone who's watching this at home, are here to support the Community Kitchen of Monroe
County. So let me introduce our announced partners. First up, the guy who's going to run up top, he
needs no introduction, so I'm not sure why I'm actually doing this. You know him as the guy behind the
bar there at Nick's. Rags.
already broken stuff. All right. And our color man going up and going to tell us all about what's going
on from Blooming Foods, Mr. David Koontz.
So you all know that what this is, if you've seen the television show Iron Chef, that's basically what
we're going to be doing here. You're going to have three chefs. They're going to come out. They're going
to be cooking. We had a panel of judges. They're going to be able to judge what they're doing and to
get our golden winner. But you know what? Those of you who are out there sitting here, you're like,
what are these people doing down front at these nice tables? They've got plates and silverware? What
does that mean? It means they're going to get to eat the creations along with the judges that are coming down.
I hope that those of you down here are ready for an incredible experience this evening. And I hope the
rest of you who are out there tonight realize that if you just ponied up a little more dough, you could
be down there right now, too. All right. Dave, my friend Dave Koontz, he's going to let us know about
some of our sponsors tonight that's made this possible. All right, hold on a second here. Let me get
my sheet ready here. We've got plenty of sponsors, and we should wait till the end to give all these
people a really good big hand, because they've all donated lots of money
and food, not just for the pantry here and for the chefs, but also to the kitchen and its allied causes.
So anyway, let me tell you about some of our sponsors. We've got Cisco Foods, Blooming Foods, United
States Food Service, Fine Print, Gouldy and Sons, Relish, Green and Schultz, Attorneys at Law, WFIU,
Oliver Winery,
The Herald Times, Goods for Cooks, The Inner Chef, and of course, all the staff and volunteers here
at the Buskirk Cremley Theater. And of course, most importantly, all of you guys. So give a round of
applause. Thank you, Dave. And now, Rags is going to introduce our panel of esteemed judges for us.
Well, thank you, Bradley, first and foremost.
I'd like to thank everybody for being here for another great event. I think we sold more tickets than
ever this year. We appreciate all your support. Okay, and next thing I want to do is these people here
are taking out some of their time to be judges here at this elite competition. First of all, Jeff Meese,
founder and CEO of One World Enterprises.
His restaurants include Lenny's, Pizza Express, which has taken delivering pizza to a whole new level,
and Bloomington Brewery Company, as we lovingly call BBC here in town, some wonderful beers. Jeff is
a proponent of very much local foods.
He's a farmer. He raises pot-bellied pigs in Water Buffalo, which pretty soon you're coming out with
some Water Buffalo mozzarella, which we're really looking forward to. And Jeff's company's most, first
and foremost, I know he's very proud of this, has a very, is focused on being very environmentally sound,
which he's a leader in the community for that. We really appreciate that. All the other restaurants
try to emulate him in that sense. The next judge we all know and love, Charlotte Zitlow,
Monroe County icon. And I've been told to say semi-legend, but I like to say a legend. She's founded
Goods Incorporated, which is on the west side of the square, in 1973 with Marilyn Schultz. It's now
Goods for Cooks, owned by Andrew Apple, who I know is in attendance here. A fantastic store. She created
and administers food works with the Middleweight House, which helps women in need with their talents.
teaching them culinary skills and trying to make a better life for themselves. And at Nick's English,
we're kind of getting ready to work with that with FoodWorks also. Thank you very much for that, Charlotte.
She helped usher in and shaped the Bloomington culinary world.
Years ago, you couldn't find things like we have here in this town now. The diversity in restaurants
is very far and few between, and she is one of the pioneers. And so we can thank her for the beautiful
food and wonderful chefs we have here tonight, because she indirectly or directly has had a lot to do
with that. She's been active in Monroe County politics for more than 40 years, serving as Bloomington
City Council President, as well as a member of the Monroe County Commissioners. And she's served as
Executive Director of Monroe County United Way. Thank you, Charlotte.
And our final judge is Lynn Schwartzberg. I'm sure you've read much of her work in the Herald Times.
Food commas extraordinaire. She's also a gourmet cook. You can see her sometimes at the farmer's market,
bringing down little packages of baked goods. Very wonderful stuff. She has been a manufacturer's
representative for several houseware companies, and she's worked in the coffee and food industry since
1978. That's about when I started NYX.
Stints includes Stints at Goods Incorporated with Charlotte, and the 2-Bit Rush, which was an espresso
bar, the first espresso bar back in the day here in Bloomington. Now there's espresso places everywhere,
and it was the first, especially independent one, that we had here in Bloomington. She's in charge of
cooking, she has been in charge of cooking classes at Goods for a number of years, and has had an opportunity
to learn at the side of many creative chefs. I'm sure you've read her every week, but that's
Lynn Schwartzberg right there. These are our panel judges for tonight.
Thank you, Rags. It's now our pleasure to introduce to you the 2009 Golden Spatula winner, the winner
of the Bloomington Chef's Challenge. He'll be defending his talent, no, he'll be defending his talent,
and he'll be defending his crown tonight, Mr. Dave Talent. Dave, go ahead and take a bow, and you can
go ahead and go on back.
The tension's pretty thick, isn't it, right now. Can you feel it? Do you feel it? I'm very excited.
Because right now, once again, you may know there is a secret ingredient. That's right. If you've seen
the show Iron Chef, if you haven't, if you've never been to one of these before, your three chefs are
going to have to cook with the same secret ingredient. They're going to have to work with this array
of foods that have all been donated that are going to be right here behind you. And they're going to
have to create their masterpiece. They're going to have only one hour to do it. We'll tell you about
the exact specifics in a minute.
I think it's time to announce the secret ingredient. Won't you please welcome the head honcho for this
whole event from the Community Kitchen, Mr. Tim Clower.
Who would have saw that coming, huh? That's right out of left field. Oh, beautiful, beautiful succulent
cheese. Look at that. All right. So basically, what is going to happen? Yeah, exactly. So what's going
to happen? You guys can't hear, but the folks at rallies are really funny right now. Someone won a big
Buford with double cheese. I was like, you don't know what just happened here. It was very funny.
No. We're going to take that cheese out there right now. Oh. Is that, Dave, is that real cheese? Dave,
can you hear me? Is that real cheese? That is real cheese, and it is real heavy. I'm going to be out
in my car for a few minutes. All right, you enjoy that. And if he goes out in his car with that, you
can be sure that he's not going to be in the bathroom for quite a while. All right. This has taken a
strange turn, and we're going to get it right back on track here.
So your chefs are going to have one hour. We're going to introduce them. Your chefs are going to come
out. They're going to have one hour to make their creation. After it's done, what we politely
and respectfully say is the voice of God is going to let us know our countdown. When things are ready
to start, you're going to hear it too. And then we're going to go through here. They're going to get
one hour with the secret ingredient and their sous chef when they come up. And then they're going to
be able to plate to the judges. They'll have five minutes to do that. And then they'll plate down here
to the bistro seats. All right.
Ladies and gentlemen, it is time to introduce your first contestant this evening. It is Jake Brinchley
from the Scholars Inn with his sous chef, Josh Miller. His prep time is starting now. And Rags? Rags,
you want to give us some background here?
Stranger to this competition at all. He was the winner of the very first chef challenge in 2007 Jake
has also garnered Jake started the most votes this year
As a two-time competitor, expects his knowledge of the competition's format will keep him calm and focused
on his cooking. This guy's a gamer. He's like a starting pitcher, like a Bob Gibson, okay? This guy's
tough. He really can't, his concentration level's really high. He also shows off his talent here since
this is a community event and is rivaling any large foodie city anywhere. He's really proud of Bloomington
and the food culture that we have here.
His sous chef is Josh Miller, who's been with him quite a few years. These guys cook together quite
a bit. So you guys realize last year we had a competition in which we had different chefs, sous chef
for other chefs. These guys got to pick their own sous chefs this year. Interviewed lately with the
Herald Times, when cooking for a great cause, Jake said, my food tends to be even better. So we love
a guy like this.
The scholars in Bake House are 11th in college. I'm sure many of you have been there. And if you haven't,
you really need to make a trip over there. Correct. Scholars in Gourmet Wine Bar and Cafe. There you
go. OK. That's the scholars in Gourmet Wine Bar and Cafe. Correct. OK, Bradley.
minutes before we're going to get started there. Let's see what we can do here. So, Dave, can you let
us know what Jake and his sous chef are going to be working on right now? How are they going to get
started with this here? I'm sorry? How do you think they're going to get started? Well, you know...
You're messing with me now, aren't you, Dave? You know, I would say that he's going to be working on
some longer things to cook, maybe boiling some water for some kind of maybe pasta or something that
takes a long time to cook, like, you know, something
You know, like rice or risotto. I'm not sure what question you're asking. Something like rice. Something
similar to rice. While we have a couple of minutes, can I tell you a little bit about some of the cheeses
that we've got? Absolutely, yeah. We've got some local cheeses. We've got some cheese from Capriol Goat
Cheese Farms. They're down in Greenville, Indiana.
Their world-famous goat cheese is made by Judy Shad. They've been making cheese since the late 80s,
so over 20 years, and they've won numerous awards all over the world. We've also got some Swiss Connection
cheese. That's grass-fed cheeses made in Clay City, Indiana, and they've been making cheese since 2000.
We've got cheese from the Dutch Cheese House, which is in Middlebury, Indiana, north of Indianapolis.
And they've been making cheese since 1979, and they've got a variety of mostly harder cheeses.
And then we've got some cheese from Switzerland in Bern, Indiana, which is about 100 miles northeast
of here, and they've been making cheese for 2,000. So almost all these cheeses are grass-fed. They're
from cows, goats, and they're all basically from Indiana, and they've all been making cheese for more
than a decade. So that's something that I think we can be really proud of, that we've got these great
producers that are more or less local and making really great stuff.
Okay, we've got one minute until we start, one minute until we start. So, we got any guesses about what
we, you think there might be, sir, any guesses? No. All right, thanks for playing, appreciate that.
We've got some, speaking of playing, we've got some fabulous prizes coming up with some silent auction
items and we'll get your thinking caps on. We have a quiz, a quiz coming up where you can also earn
things like a,
a gift certificate to Pizza X, Yonko's little Zagreb, Crazy Horse, Scholar's Inn, on and on,
all this stuff, and probably the most prized is a Yonko's t-shirt. We're also gonna be giving away his,
who is right? That's right.
Remember, once again, the reason we're doing this, the reason the chefs are here, the reason we're all
here, is to support the Community Kitchen of Monroe County. You'll be hearing more about the Community
Kitchen soon, but the Community Kitchen is a United Way agency. United Way agency of Monroe County,
which is getting ready to kick off its fall fun drive here soon. The United Way serves 26 different
agencies. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, begin. And he's off!
As I was saying about the United Way, the campaign's getting ready to kick off. 26 agencies serving
everything from food like the Community Kitchen, the Hoosier Hills Food Bank, Monroe County
United Ministries, to the Red Cross, to Stone Belt, to Middle Way House, and even youth serving agencies
like Girls Inc, and the Boys and Girls Club, and Big Brothers, Big Sisters.
and even Rhino's Youth Center, United Way agencies. So your donation to the United Way goes a long way
to helping this community. So the Community Kitchen, once again, a member of the Mirror Cutting United
Way, when they come to your workplace, please give generously. All right, we're going to go to a video
right now. So let's take a look at the big screen.
I'm here with Chef Jake Brinchley at the Scholars Inn Gourmet Cafe and Wine Bar. Hi, Jake. Hi, Lynn.
So, coming back to the Chef's Challenge, how does it feel? How do you prepare when you've been the champ
and you're coming up and you're a challenger this time? Well, Dave's going to be a great competitor.
Oh, they're both going to be great competitors. I'm just looking forward to just being up there cooking.
I loved it. I had a great time. The hour goes by much quicker than you actually think it does.
But I really can't wait. I think it's really fun working with local products. And that's what I really
appreciated last time. We go to the farmers market quite a bit, and now we're getting the opportunity
to cook in front of all these people with the same products. So I feel good about it. I'm comfortable.
Well, what about the secret ingredient? How do you plan for something that you don't know what it is?
What we've been doing for the past couple years here at Scholars is we've been trying to work with so
many different ingredients and understanding how they work with different flavor combinations. So I'm
hoping that
secret ingredient will fit in somewhere with some of the experience that I've had with some of these
flavors and you know building on things. Bloomington's restaurant scene has completely exploded or at
least from where I'm sitting. How do you feel all the new restaurants have added to the education of
your customers? Do you think your customers are braver? They'll eat new
New ingredients take a little bit more chance on the menu items. This menu, what we've really tried
to focus on is making the ordinary extraordinary. So we're changing different favorites that people
have had, things like meatloaf and fried chicken, different things like that. We've put our own classic
fun spin on things to kind of educate them in a way that they haven't really seen before. So instead
of introducing a dish that's just brand new and a little bit different to them, we're introducing kind
of similar flavors with our own fun
adaptation of it. And I think people are really responding to that. It's kind of helping them ease their
way into more of this upscale dining, even though we're trying to keep it really nice and casual and
fun. So I bet a lot of people think when they come to Scholars Inn it has to be a big birthday or their
anniversary or graduation.
How do you feel about the restaurant? This is an everyday place. You want people to lay back, relax.
We've got a great martini list. We're running specials pretty much every night of the week,
whether it's wine, half off appetizers, a lot of different things. Yeah, we have a lot of new specialty
beers that we're doing. So again, it's a fun place. You can just come and sit. Not to mention,
every Friday, Saturday, we have live music up on our upper deck. That's right. That's right. So again,
it's just a place to have a good time. Summer was really a good time because you can come and have a cocktail.
one of our gourmet flatbreads and just kind of take it easy. Thanks so much. Good luck in the competition.
Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Jake Brinchley, everybody. Okay. Absolutely. Dave, we're going
to move over here and take a look at what Chef Brinchley's doing right now. Dave, can you tell us what
he's doing in his early preparation? Well, he's got a plethora of ingredients out on his station. He's
got I see fennel, leeks, peppers, peaches, apples. He's got pork loin, bacon, rice vinegar, olive oil,
white wine vinegar.
what I will and he's got some of that Dutch cheese house farmers cheese and Jake has trimmed a pork
loin and he's got it searing in this pan already he's got a pan of boiling water and his sous chef Josh
has already sliced up some pears and some app and some apples and it looks like we've also got peaches
on the station we have corn on the station my first guess just looking at what we've got right now is
he's probably gonna make some kind of a pear and cheese sauce for this pork loin since pear is such a natural
accompaniment to pork, I think, and most people would think. But at this point, with so many ingredients,
it could go anywhere. It could go to any point in the culinary world, which is what's really exciting
about having so much great food up here and so much great food from all these great farmers. Thank you,
David. For those of you who are right now, you're going to start?
smelling that Pokemon here in just a second. All right, ladies and gentlemen, we're staggering, so get
ready to bring out the next contestant right now. So I want you to please welcome Mr. Tom Dempsey and
his sous chef, Jackie Buck. All right, Rags, what can you tell us about the chef?
So we have Thomas Dempsey from the Scenic View restaurant, and the sous chef tonight, which is Jamie
Buck. They have a role reversal going on here, because usually Jamie is the chef out there, executive
chef, and he's the sous chef. But tonight, it's going to be very interesting to see how they work. A
little bit of reverse roles, but I think they'll be OK. The Scenic View restaurant, as you know, is
located on Scenic 446, just by Lake Monroe, sometimes called The View, of course. And it's one of the
newest restaurants in town. The focus of the menu at the Scenic View
one of the newest chefs in town. The focus of the menu at the Scenic View is a casual fare with creative
ingredients such as smoked salmon, mac and cheese, green eggs and ham, and a few other specialties over
there. They run daily specials. They have a fantastic beer list also for you who wish to buy. For the
secret ingredient, Chef Dempsey is practiced every day by having his staff throw out a secret ingredient
and then he has to create a dish from that. This has worked pretty well. I talked to him earlier here,
and he feels really good about the competition. He's fairly new to town, but I think they have a good
combination going on here, and be creative to see what type of things that they have going on here.
So back to you, Bradley. All right, thank you, Regs. All right. I think we would like to do one quick
quiz question. What do you guys think? You ready for it? Win something? All right.
Samantha, this is my daughter Samantha. I want you to be able to stand up. Yeah, that's right. You give
her a round of applause. All right, Sam. Sam, since I can't see, you tell me who gets their hand up
first to answer this question, okay? Each year, the National Restaurant Association awards one restaurant
in each state its Restaurant Neighbor Award. This year's award for Indiana went to a Bloomington restaurant
and a B-I-R-A member. Name that restaurant.
Right here. Thanks, Sam. I guess I didn't need you, Sam. All right, there we go. What? No, that is incorrect.
Lenny's is the correct answer. And B-I-R-A is, of course, the Bloomington Independent Restaurant Association.
Mr. Paul Busby is here, and he's at the back of the stadium. Where are you, Paul? Where are you? Straight
ahead. Stand up and take a bow.
There you go, right back there. Samantha, can you deliver this gift certificate to the crazy horse to
our winner? Ha, see, if you want to eat the food, you've got to work for it, little girl. There you
go. All right. OK, we've got two minutes before we're going to start cooking. Do we have time for one
more quiz question, do you think? All right. Locally owned Pizza X, which is formerly Pizza Express,
put X on the express area.
operates one of the busiest pizza delivery stores in the country. Founder Jeff Mee started the company
at the tender age of 20. Who was his neighbor at Colonial Crest Apartments during that time? No,
I'm sorry. That's not the correct answer. Jeff, do you have that answer? Brad Wilhelm is the correct
answer. Yes. Yeah.
What year did I live in Colonial Crest Apartments? That is your quiz question. Anyone know the answer?
What year did Pizza Express say? What? 2010. I'm not even going to dignify that with a response. 1982
is the correct answer young lady. And you win.
You win a $10 gift certificate to Pizza X. Chef Dempsey, you have 45 seconds. 45 seconds. Oh, this is
exciting. OK, when you folks see 50-50, we're going to start the 10-second countdown. So you can see
the clocks and I can't. So you have something on me that I don't have. 10.
Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, begin. All right, there we go. All right, and
now let's see a video about Chef Dempsey.
I'm here at the Scenic View with Chef Thomas Dempsey. It's also called The View. Good to meet you. Nice
to meet you, too. So tell me, you're going up against two seasoned chefs. Jake won the first year we
had the Chef's Challenge. Dave Talents, our defending champion. How are you preparing for this? Well,
really, it all depends on the ingredient. I can just do as good as I can. Kind of going back and forth
on guessing what it could be.
trying to play as many recipes off of that that I can. So how are you preparing for the secret ingredient?
It could be anything. What are you doing about that? Well we started doing these little mini quick fires
in the kitchen where I'll come in in the morning and someone will shout out an ingredient and then I
have to theme the special of the day off of that. Fun, that's really awesome. So you're actually serving
that dish that day? Oh that's totally awesome.
So you're not the typical lakeside restaurant. I assume you've experienced people coming either from
town or from boating on the lake, popping in and finding this menu filled with things they may not have
expected. We do. I mean, we feel that we still draw from the Bloomington Square crowd. But a lot of
our business comes actually from the lakeside. People coming out from the lake get off the boat. They're
tired. They're on the way back to town. They see the view. They come in and have just classy food
what you'd normally expect from a diner. We call it gourmet with a twist. Our straight menu is pretty,
it's large, but it sticks for the kind of homestyle food. And then with our specials, we push the envelope
and we go for the exciting and wow factor. Well, good luck in the challenge. We hope you have a great
time with our secret ingredient. Thank you very much. All right, thank you.
And by the way, all this wonderful video and stuff you're doing, Blue Ace Media, and the folks at CATS,
and the folks here at the Buskirk Show, I mean, they're tech people, are doing a fantastic job. So can
you all give them a round of applause? And hopefully all of you all know that this is also Local First
Week. And this weekend has started off Local First Week. Una Winterman is here from Local First. Una,
where? Una Winterman is here. Where are you, Una? All the way in the back.
I've butchered your name, and I apologize, and I will forever be in your service. Another name I've
butchered so far is Chef Dempsey Sous Chef. It is Jamie Buck, not Jackie Buck. So whoever told me the
name Jackie, I'm coming for you with pain. All right. Dave, what are we doing? Well, over here. Let's
go in the middle here. All right. Over here on Tom and Jamie's station, we've got some mushroom stock
boiling in a saucepan over here.
We've got some finely minced red onion, shallot, and white onion over here. And Tom is peeling apples.
He's got pork loin out and bacon out as well. He's got eggs. I'm not sure what kind of cheese yet he's
got going on. Looks like, okay, we'll say we got some Capriol fresh goat cheese and some, yeah, some
Swiss connection cheese feta over there. And then he's also got some quinoa out, which is a
pretty interesting ingredient. It's a very high protein grain that it's
considered an ancient grain, been used for thousands of years. What's the name of that again, Dave?
It's called quinoa. Quinoa. Q-U-I-N-O-A. And over here on Jake's station, he's got his pork searing
with salt and pepper in this pan. He's also got some bacon that he's diced down, and he's rendering
that out right now. Jake has finely minced some hot peppers, it looks like, and then over here on Josh's
station, he's got some finely diced peaches, apples, and pears, and he's also mincing up
a red onion right now. So all kinds of exciting things going on here. Still not quite sure where anything's
heading, but we've got all kinds of great ingredients out here. One of the more interesting ingredients
I see over on Tom's station is he's got a bag of coffee. So I'm really curious as to where that's going
to go. The heck you say, coffee? Unless he actually just needs a caffeine buzz. All right, well it can
be. No coffee makers here, but anyway. So right now we're just watching and seeing what happens.
Okay, and once again, the smells are starting to waft back through the thing. Who's hungry now?
All right. All right, ladies and gentlemen, it's time to bring out your final competitor and our reigning
champion of the fourth annual Bloomington Chef's Challenge, Mr. Dave Talent.
Dave does has a sous chef with him, Tony Cooper. Tony Cooper is the sous chef. All right. Rags, let
us know about Mr. Talent. Old David Talent, chef and owner of Restaurant Talent.
at 208 North Walnut, right here in downtown Bloomington, just down the street. He's defending champion,
and he's very much involved in local foods and slow foods. A lot of the, especially this time of year,
he gets a lot of local produce, a lot of local meats, local cheeses, so I'm sure a lot of the ingredients
he's gonna use tonight are fairly familiar to him. He hopes to stay relaxed during competition. He said
key to winning is to keep his cooking simple and staying true to his personal style. He's also James Beard,
awards semifinalist. His one quote is, once the cooking begins, I will be fine. And knowing David, I'm
sure he will be OK. He's cool as a cucumber, so to speak. He's looking forward to cooking with all the
local ingredients we have, except for maybe perhaps green peppers. He loathes green peppers. If you've
ever been to his restaurant, you will never find a green pepper anywhere in the kitchen or in your food.
So he's a man of convictions, as we see. Last year, I don't know if you remembered, last year he partnered
with Jeff Finch, owner and chef at Finch's, which is down the street on Kirkwood. And he's service about
maybe doing something a little bit different this year. But he's got Tony Cooper, a long time assistant
that has been at Restaurant Talent with him. And Tony and David have worked together on quite a few
occasions, as far as at the restaurant and catering also. With Kristen,
his wife and chef also there at Restaurant Talent. She's the pastry chef, so if you ever would really
like a really nice dessert, go out there and have a fantastic dessert at Restaurant Talent. No, no,
and there's another trivia question. I don't want to be thrown out. What did Restaurant Talent used
to be at that location? I think I know. Can I say? I don't know. It was less than... Over here.
You get a free lunch at Nick's for this one. Come on, what's the name of it? There you go. Give that
man, we'll get him a gift certificate, his name and phone number, and I'll take care of that, okay?
Hey, great, fantastic. Rags, I carry Nick's gift cards at all times, so here you go. I was wondering
where they went. Oh, Brad, you love me. I do love you, Rags, and if ever you need free food at Nick's
and don't want to pay for it, just come to me, I got it right here, here you go. You have food, food,
and a little bit of beer too. Yeah, yeah.
OK. All right. Sorry about that, Brad. I didn't mean the harsher gig there, but I just had to throw
that out there. You know what? If it weren't for Nick's, I would have never not graduated college.
All right. Thank you. Why are you applauding for that? All right, ladies and gentlemen, let's get another
quick quiz question here. Sam, are you ready? All right. That's too easy. Let's go to the next one.
Bloomington is blessed with two of the best craft breweries in the state of Indiana. Absolutely.
Can you name the first commercially beer, the commercially beer brewed in Bloomington going back to
1995, the first beer, the company and the beer itself? No. Well, there's one in the back, all the way
in the back. Yes. Well, there is another hand right here. Well, gentlemen, what did you say, sir?
Right back here in the back. No, everyone keeps saying up. It is not upland wheat. OK, next to the camera
guy here in the back to the right. That is the correct answer, sir. And you win a two pizza X coupons.
Ladies and gentlemen, there you go. Hold up your hand so that the beautiful and talented young lady
with the good genes can get to you there. All right. Counting down here. Once again, everyone enjoying
themselves correctly, right? 30 seconds there, Dave. Chef Talent, 20 seconds. Can you guys see that
time? Because I can't see it. All right, 14. 10.
Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Begin. And now, ladies and gentlemen, all three
of our contestants are cooking. It's delicious. Well, since you may know what's coming next, it is a
video about Dave Tallent.
I'm here at Restaurant Talent with chef and owner Dave Talent. Dave, what do you think about the changing
restaurants seen in Bloomington? Or has it changed since you've been opened? I think people are definitely
a little more adventurous. The fact that we have so many different ethnic restaurants and in Bloomington,
I think kind of is a testament to that. And you know, sometimes the things that we might offer on our
menu, people might be, you know, people are not as turned off by them as I would.
sometimes expect. So what's your approach to the secret ingredient going to be this year? Do you have
a plan? Are you anticipating something in particular, getting your menus conceived? Probably treat it
a lot the same way. I think I'll probably be a little more relaxed this year because having done it,
I get the feel of what it's like and how fast the time is going to go. So I think I'll be able to manage
my time a little better and hopefully be able to produce
you know, even better tasting food than we did last year. So an hour's plenty of time. Yeah. Yeah. I
think an hour's plenty of time to, you know, if not get one good quality salad dish, you know,
two or three. Wow. What do you think about the perception of your restaurant in Bloomington? I know
some people think it's terribly expensive. They only want to come there on their 50th anniversary or
some very, very momentous occasion. What would you say to that? Well, I think that, you know, one of
the main misperceptions is that
We're the most expensive and the fanciest in that it's only special occasion type restaurant. In reality,
we're no more expensive than a lot of the other restaurants. It's not just a special occasion type of
place. Over the last couple of years, we've taken our menu and added in more
You know, not simpler, but just a little more casual type things. That's Chef Talent from Talents Restaurant.
Just very quickly, an important point I think was just made is that fine dining is not necessarily expensive
dining. We have amazing restaurants in this town, amazing restaurants in this town that don't belong
to a corporate chain that make delicious food that is not that expensive. So when you're going out,
there's no reason
There's no reason to go someplace that's going to give you a free appetizer they've just dumped out
of a freezer and a margarita with the beads on there. You can actually come out and get good food prepared
here locally at a number of restaurants for the same amount or even less and you're going to pay at
some of those corporate chains that make our heart hurt. Let's take us to the middle table here, Dave,
and tell us what's going on with Chef Dempsey. This mushroom stock is still boiling. It looks like they've
added, is that mustard seeds?
Quinoa has actually been added to this mushroom stock. The ancient man I was talking about earlier,
he's got some butter down with some, it looks like he just added sugar and some garlic to that. Apples,
sorry. He's also got that coffee that I was talking about earlier in a bowl, which makes me think he
might be using it maybe as a dry rub for the pork perhaps. He's got some corn, looks like maybe he's
gonna be grilling that in the husk on his flat top grill over here. And then his sous chef over here
is shredding apples on a box grater.
And so it looks like we've got several components of a dish here. We've got some quinoa cooking in broth.
We've got some sauce with apples and butter. And then we've got some more apples being shredded. And
we've got a dry rub going on over here. All right. And over here on Jake's station, he's got that pork
that he was searing in that pan. He's got some onions. He's got some mushroom broth in there. He's got
some bay leaves. He's got some celery.
He still has some bacon rendering in his other saucepan over here. And then, his sushi over here, it
looks like he's making some kind of a pesto. He's got the mortar and pestle out, and is that basil in
there? Okay, yeah, it's like a pesto. It is a pesto. And then, we've also still got... we've also got
the pork that's been moved over to the flat top over here. And we still have the fruit that's been diced
up in a bowl over there.
So yeah, there's all kinds of a flurry of activity and I'm actually going to get out of the way because
I've been in the way all this last few moments here. Dave, if it's okay with you, I think we, let's
talk a little bit about the secret ingredient, maybe there might even be a video involved.
of goats and sheep. About 12,000 years ago, cheesemaking has been documented. Now in Indiana, in the
late 1700s, we know that people were making cheese. Currently, there are several artisan cheesemakers
in Indiana, including Capriol, Swiss Connection, Fair Oaks Farm. There's loads and loads of them. Traders
Point. Now in Indiana, you can get local cheeses made from goat's milk, sheep's milk, and cow's milk,
ripened cheeses, aged cheeses,
fresh cheeses all from Indiana by artisan producers. Cheese is the secret ingredient in tonight's Chef's
Challenge. Let's see what the chefs do with it. All right. Cheese. Is there anything it can't do? Cheese.
I mentioned before at the start that we've got some exciting auction items for you here. Normally you
go to one of these things and there's a silent auction. We decided we're going to dispense with the
silent auction. We're going to do a live auction. I'm sure that there's somebody out here right now
that would like to sit at one of these seats and eat this delicious food. Am I right? No? I'm not right?
Is there someone who would like to come down here and sit and eat this delicious food?
going to start the bidding right now. Only two seats are available and we're going to start the bidding
at $200. That's how much two seats cost, $200. Who's got $200 that would like to sit and eat this food
right now? Where are we?
Or we can do it separately at 100 each. Say you're with a date and you don't really like him that much,
but you would still like to come down here. One seat, $100. Ma'am, I can tell your body language. You
might want to get $100. You want a pony up to come sit down here? No, all right. $100. She's got $100.
$100. And yeah, remember, all this money goes to the community kitchen.
I know you think that we're all getting paid a whole bunch of this, but we're not. All this goes to
the community kitchen room. All right, let's start at $50 then. $50 to come eat the food. I got $50
right here. Is that $50 for one seat, sir? $50 for one seat. Who can do better than $50? $60. $60. $60
for a seat here. $60. $50 for one seat. We got to get $60 more than this. Come on, folks.
Last year, I was able to auction off my plate of food. $60 right there. $70. $70 right there. Open the
balcony. I forgot there was a balcony. What do we got here? You guys have been so quiet and sedate.
Yell out. What do you got? $75. $80? $80.
All right, going once. What, what? $100. Where were you when I started this thing? Yes, $100. Exactly.
Who's going better? Two, where's that? $100 for both. Okay, we got $200 for both seats.
$200 for both seats. Everyone can beat that. $200 for both seats. Going once. Going twice. $200. Folks,
come on down. Come on down. But bring the money, too. Yeah. I mean, come on down and bring the money.
Now, the next thing is we've got a seat at the judges' table. Oh, yeah. We've got a seat at the judges'
table. You don't only get, there is wine at the judges' table. You get to sit with Jeff Meese and Bloomington
icon Charlotte Zittlow, and you get to sit right next to Lynn Schwartzberg. So, it's right, I mean,
this is a, it's a $100 value, they say. I just think sitting next to Lynn Schwartzberg is $150.
So that would be me. So here's our lovely seat. Who is going to start at $100, $100 to join the judges?
$100 right here. $125. Right here, $125. $150. $150. $150 right here. $175. And you know what, the great
thing about this, $175, $200. Who wants $200?
$200 right there! Not only that, but you know this is going to be on the television and it's going to
run over and over and over and over. I cannot tell you, I mean people are like, I saw you on CASA, do
you weigh 300 pounds? Yes, I weigh 300 pounds. You're going to see it every time. What have we got?
$250? $300?
Okay, the last I heard was $500 from this lady right here. $500 from this lady right here. No, $200?
$200, ma'am? Yes? $200. Now she's hiding. $200. $225. Going to the community kitchen. $225. $225 right
down front. $250.
Don't get excited in front of me. 225. 250. Where we got 250? All right. All right. 225 going once.
Going twice. 225 right down front here. To join them. What's your name, sir?
Oh, are you going to let your date do this? That's awesome. Oh, your other wife. OK, yeah, I wasn't
trying to blow anything there. I was trying to be polite. No, I'm not dating his wife. Look at that.
What's your name, ma'am? Doris. Doris. And your charming husband? Arlen. Arlen is about to see. Harlen.
All right, like Harlen. Harlen, thank you very much. Come on up and join our judges. That's a big applause
for Harlen right here.
stepping up. Now, guess what just happened? Harlan doesn't know this, but he's about to be hooked up
with a new date because now we have an empty bistro seat. So we might as well auction this off now.
Ma'am, are you ready to bid for this right here? Where was my 200 bid? Right here?
Let's start at 100 for this seat. $100. $100. All proceeds go to the community kitchen. Right here,
$100 right here. Anyone want 125? 125. I'm not going to forget the balcony now, I promise you that.
125. $100 going once.
Going twice. Come on down. You get a bistro seat. This may have been Harlan's plan all along. I'm not sure.
I think she's fine sitting up here. I don't think she even cares. Doris doesn't even care.
Doris is like, fine. He's paying me either way. I don't care. All right. There you go. All right. Well,
that was exciting. We've got some more auction items here. This is some spatulas and spoons, a dish rag.
This is stuff from the Inner Chef, which is a fantastic place, and a beautiful colander. I know what
this is called. It's called a colander. That's pretty cool. Isn't this nice? All this is from the Inner
Chef. Yeah, this is a $50. This is a $50 value. So let's entertain some bids, shall we? How much do
we get for this package here from the Inner Chef? We get $25 for this package. $25? $25 right there.
How about $30? $30. $30. How about $35? $35, not a penny more. Well, who wants to make this guy seem
cheap? $35, not a penny more. How about $35.01? Who's $35.01? Right here? $40. OK, $45. What are you
bidding? That's a very good question. Thanks for paying attention.
This is a gift package from the inner chef. It's an enameled five-quart colander. It looks like squirt.
That would have been a funny word. A five-quart colander. A blue Q dish towel. Cooking is not my forte,
is what it says on the towel. And a three roasty maple. Roasty maple? 45. Thank you, sir. $45. These
spatulas may or may not have come from Spatula City.
Who got that reference? All right. It's a weird-out Yankovic reference. Okay. $45. Who gives me $50?
It's a $50 value. $50. $50. All right. You had done $45, but $50 again is good. That's great. $55. $50.
Going once. Going twice. $50 to the big round of applause. Thank you, sir.
He doesn't get that until he ponies up that 50. He was saying not one penny more, so I want to see that
penny coming out of his money right there. All right, next up. Oh, this is very nice. This is The Farm
Food, an autographed copy of Chef Daniel Orr's book. This book inspires food lovers to support local
farmers and craftsmen and is full of great recipes. This is a fantastic book. I happen to have never
read it. This is fantastic. You're going to love this because I cannot cook.
And it has been autographed right here. $30 value. Who will give me $25 to this book? $25. $25. $30.
$30 right here. $30. $35. $35. $30. Going once. Going twice. Ma'am, you've just won this families cookbook.
$30. Thank you very much.
I'm going to send over my lovely assistant. She needs your money. All right. And finally, and folks,
this. I don't know if I can even do this coffee maker justice, but I'm going to try to. This is coming
from Goods for Cooks. This is the Capresso coffee tea machine. This is the only combination thermal
carafe and conical burr grinder.
Now, I didn't know what the heck that meant, but this coffee maker can be programmed to not
only automatically make the coffee, which any standard run-of-the-mill coffee maker is going to do,
but it also grinds the beans first. You set the timer, you put the beans in,
When it goes off, it starts grinding, and you get the freshest possible coffee imaginable. This is a
$300 value. And I'm going to start the bidding at $200. $200 for this fantastic. And Andrew Apple is
here, the man who owns Goods for Cooks. Andrew, you can tell me this is worth it, right? Where are you,
Andrew? He's nodding.
Who will give me $200, this fantastic coffee maker? Up there, $200. Where are you? Okay, I'm just going
to pretend I can see you. $200. $250. $250. This is a pretty serious coffee maker. I'm sure if you talk
to it long enough, it will start your car for you, too. $200. Going once.
How about 225? Who wants to come in for 225? 225 right there. 225. 250. 250. Where was that at? I should
have guessed. All right. 250. This guy right here. All right. From Charlie Rich, the silver fox right
down front. OK. Four people are going to get that reference. All right. There you go. 250. 275.
275. 275. Do I hear $300? The value of the machine, $300. 300. Once again, all this money goes right
to the community kitchen. This machine has been donated. $300. Come on. It's worth it. Harlan, you want
to make up? $300. Here you go.
All right, $275. Going once, going twice. Jerry, you just won yourself a serious coffee maker for $275.
Yeah, we'll just go ahead and leave that right there. When Jerry comes up, you can pick it up right
here. All right. And now, ladies and gentlemen, I know you've missed him. He hasn't talked for a while,
so let's go back to Rags. And Rags is going to talk to our judges so we can get a load on what's going on.
Well, thanks, Brad. First of all, Jeff's over there concentrating on watching the chefs over here.
But Jeff, I'd like to ask you a couple questions, if you could. Beer, pizza, an iconic community, concerned
about the environment, pot-bellied pigs, water buffalo. I mean, where do you get this inspiration? You're
like a Renaissance man, so to speak. I read the local paper.
I got the water buffalo idea from a story in the Herald Times. Really? I really did. You'd be amazed
with our little local paper. What's in that? So maybe people aren't really familiar with actually real
mozzarella cheese?
And that's exactly because you went, actually you went to Italy, you spent some time there studying.
I did. I read the story several years ago in the Herald Times about water buffalo. I'd recently bought
a farm and I was looking for some interesting, unusual livestock angle. That's different. That we could
grow into. You know, this stuff does not happen fast. I read about
that the original mozzarella cheese was made from water buffalo in Italy 1,000 years ago. I'd never
known that before. I'd heard of mozzarella di bufala, but I never knew the story behind it. So I read
that on like a Saturday morning, and I said to Marie, that's it. That's it. And they're actually, the
pigs are not pot belly pigs, although they are fat. They're English large black. I'm sorry. No problem.
Great. But they grew up to about,
In a couple of years, in a year, they'll get to 600 pounds. So they are a big pig. They were a bacon
pig in Britain, but it's a breed that's largely fallen out of favor because it's a very fat pig, not
a lean pig. But those of us who really like pork realize the fat's where it's at. Oh yeah, for sure.
Thanks, Jeff. You can talk about pigs all night, for sure. Charlotte.
You've done a lot of things in the community. I've already gone over that between inspiring people to
cook better and live a better life and also improve their living conditions in Bloomington. What's your
most fulfilling aspect of your community service? What really makes you feel good? You've done so many
things. Where's the one that really gets you? I'll tell you. I was elected to the City Council in 1971.
and we were all involved in trying to get more community participation in local government. And we've
done that, and I feel really good about that. Amen. Thank you, Charlotte. Thank you. She's done a lot
for this community, that's for sure. Okay, Lynn, you've seen a lot of things come and go in Bloomington
as far as the restaurant business, food, what's available at local markets.
We've got Blooming Foods, can serve all kinds of gourmet things. You can just pick up from the grocery
store there. All the great chefs. The difference, the diversity of cuisine. Bloomington's a very unique
community, but why Bloomington? I mean, you've covered the food scene here in Bloomington for quite
a while. I mean, what makes Bloomington so special as far as diversification and quality of food?
This kind of hit a maturity point. I've traveled to a lot of towns the size of Bloomington around the
country and they hit kind of the tipping point as there's a lot of discussion of that and then all of
a sudden it seems like the floodgates open and everybody wants everything. We all travel more, we all
read more online and we want it all here and it's being given to us. We're very lucky. I'm sorry. Ah, yes.
Maybe just a little bit more there. I don't know how much they heard out there. Bloomington kind of
hit a tipping point, like many other towns of this size across the country. And we read more. We read
magazines. We watch TV shows. We want everything, and we want it here. And we're getting it.
And it's great. Makes total sense. Charlotte? I think that the way we've entered into the appreciation of food
and the appreciation of a number of other things, the outdoor activities, all the things that have changed
over the last 40 years, all have to do with the community growing and people coming into it and bringing
new ideas and having traveled, as Lynn said. I think this is all part of the same thing. It's a wonderful
community, and it's because of the people who've been here. Thank you, Charlotte. That's for sure. If
you're gonna live in Indiana, I always say you gotta live in Bloomington.
You know, with all the smells that we're getting away from the fantastic food that's right here.
So Dave, can you tell us what's going on here on the floor? We'll start over here with Chef Talent and
explain to us what's going on down here. Okay, over here on Chef Talent station, we've got a ton of
stuff going on. He has deboned an entire chicken. He's got that on this flat top grill just with some
salt and pepper and he's pressing it with a sheet pan with a bunch of other pans on top of it. So he's
got a chicken over here. He's already made some quick grits here in the middle.
And over here, to the right of the grits, we've got some charred, looks like some red onions and peaches
in this grill pan. He's also got what looks like it might be a soup going on over here. We've got tomatoes,
we've got basil, we've got onions and oil, and some kind of, looks like maybe some kind of stock in
there. And his sous chef, Tony, over here is slicing some bread into kind of thick squares. That's,
of course, local bakehouse bread. That's the farm bread.
I see a pressure cooker out, but I haven't seen anything go into it. And I'm guessing at this point,
if there's nothing in there yet, we're probably not going to be using that. I haven't seen the cheese
go down yet on Dave's station, but he's got about five different kinds of cheeses out there. So at some
point, I'm sure that's going to make a disappearance, although I'm assuming there's some in the grits,
right, Chef? Not yet. So it looks like we've got at least several different dishes or one extremely
complicated dish going on over here on Chef Tal's side.
Over here in the middle, with Tom and Jamie, we've got, the quinoa has got some corn in it, some onions,
I saw some peppers, I'm sorry, some leeks, and then right next to that, what we've got is,
it looks like a, it's like a creamy apple sweet sauce. Apple and goat bechamel, and a bechamel is kind
of a thickened cream sauce, you know, and with goat cheese, you know that's gonna be really,
really good, just on its own. That could be just fondue. Actually, I could just bathe in that.
He has also taken that pork loin from Fisher Farms and he sliced it thinly and dry rubbed it with that
coffee, salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. And he grilled that pork on that flat top grill. And it's
set aside in a pan over there. And now he's got bacon rendering out on that same grill that he cooked
the pork on. His sous chef, Jamie, right now is slicing peaches.
She's got some of that local feta on her station as well. So we're seeing goat cheese and feta over
here in the middle. And so we've got a lot of really nice flavors here going on. Some nice coffee. We've
got some sweetness with the bechamel. We've got some of this nice quinoa pilaf. So it's going to be
really nice. And then over here on Jake's station, he's seared that pork in this pan. He pulled it out.
deglazed the pan and made kind of a quick stock with the pork drippings and some onions and bay leaves
and some other aromatics. His sous chef has two pans on this flat top over here. One of them is that
diced fruit mixture. And then what's in the other pan there on the right? Well, I didn't see it go down,
sorry. There's a lot of stuff going on here. He's got some of that
looks like some local, looks like some mustard cheese over there. And then he's also got a pesto that
he made in this mortar and pestle over here. And he's got bacon that he's rendered out. And again, there's
all kinds of really, really great flavors. I wish you guys could be up here to smell this, because it's
really, really wonderful. So anyway, we're seeing some really, really interesting, impressive stuff
down here, especially for the kind of equipment they have to work with and the kind of time constraints.
I think we should give all these chefs a hand so far, because this is a lot of work. And it's a lot
of really good work going on. Rags, I'd be interested, I'm sure everyone else here is interested too,
in exactly what the judges think about what's going on. Maybe they might have some questions for our
chefs. Yep. Lynn, feel free, if you have time, take the microphone. I'm watching Jake finish up a dish.
I have absolutely no idea what he's making.
Jake, you want to film me in? Here. He needs a mic. He needs a mic. We are struggling with these burners,
so we're trying to make a pseudo cheese sauce towards here at the end. Our quick polenta is not going
firm up in time, so we are trying to make
I have to mention, we are giving these guys such a rudimentary kitchen, you will be amazed at the stunning
food that they produce from these kitchens. It's astounding. If you heard Jake's response, it translates
as, please leave me alone, I'm cooking. All right. All right. Charlotte? Thomas, what are you doing
right now?
Right now I have a quinoa that I've mixed with corn, leeks, a little bit of garlic, salt and pepper.
I've reduced it in a mushroom stock and I'm going to try and make that into sort of quinoa risotto by
adding cream and goat cheese. You've got a lot of something going on in the grill here and something
else that you took off the grill. Yes, I have a coffee infused pork loin that I'm going to be putting
on top of the bed of the quinoa.
And then I will drizzle my goat bechamel on top of that. And this is going to be for a dessert that
I don't want to talk about yet. OK, you don't have to talk about it. Thank you very much. I suspect
peaches will play a role. Thank you, Charlotte. OK, Jeff, I think Dave probably have a second or two
for you there. You know him pretty well, so watch out for those knives, baby. Let's start with Tony
here. Tony, I see you've got some, you've
Got some, is it cream cheese? Could you tell us about this? Just some goat cheese, herbs, salt and pepper.
We're actually gonna make a grilled cheese for our soup. Nice. Chef, you got a minute? You're using
a lot of weight there on the chicken. Could you tell us what that's doing for us? Yeah, this is kind
of a classic Italian thing they do called chicken under a brick. We don't have a brick, so.
I'm making do with what I got here, so. We're gonna do that chicken with the, we're gonna make some
cheese grits. And yeah, that's where we're going. Chicken under six pot, like a Chinese thing. Okay.
Thank you, Jeff. All right. Thank you, judges. Thank you very much. Thank you, regs. Folks, I sense,
you see that I have a handful of coupons, there's a t-shirt, and you're like, when's the quiz coming again?
The answer is exactly right now. So ladies and gentlemen, here's your next quiz question. And this is
going to be for a $35 Yonko's Little Zagreb gift certificate and a Yonko's t-shirt you can wear in there
so they don't think you didn't just steal the gift certificate and make it up yourself. You actually
have a t-shirt, so you're legitimate. Your question is, several years ago, Oliver Winery installed a
new high-tech bottling line.
The line can be operated by six people. It fills corks, boxes, and even stacks the finished cases on
a pallet for shipment. How long does it take for this machine to fully package 75 cases, which is one
pallet, of locally made wine? How long does it take? Who said 20 minutes? Wrong. All right. Who said
one minute?
Superman's winery. Two hours? No. Yes. One hour? No. Who said nine minutes? The correct answer is nine
minutes. Right over there, nine minutes. Nine minutes to get 75 cases of wine bottled, corked,
stamped and packed on a palette. Nine minutes, that is unbelievable. Folks, we are getting ready to
hear the voice once again that means one of our chefs is about ready to quit cooking and plate their
meal. And that shake would be... Jake Brinchley, you have five minutes. Five minutes for Jake Brinchley,
ladies and gentlemen. That is the five minute warning.
Let's do one more quick, since we got a lot of these gift certificates giveaways, give another quick
one out here. What iconic Bloomington restaurateur is credited with bringing Bloomington its first pizza
shop not long after World War II? Yes, right there. But who was it? Who was the person who did it? Cafe
Pizzeria? Dick Barnes is the correct answer. Where did that come from?
Who said Dick Barnes? Right back there, you win $20 in Nick's English Hut coupons. That may have been,
yeah, there you go. All right, once again, you're here tonight for the Community Kitchen. And it would
behoove me to mention the stats about the Community Kitchen once again. In January,
of this year, the community kitchen purchased the facility at 1515 South Roger Street. It's gonna be
renovated and it's gonna be the new home of the community kitchen. This purchase was a culmination of
years of planning, organizing, saving, and making do with limited space. If you've ever been to the
kitchen now, you know that that place is just jam-packed and you can't move in here. This new facility's
gonna be fantastic. To get moved in though, the kitchen needs to renovate the facility. Renovation costs
are expected to be $700,000 to $800,000.
They've already secured $350,000 of the funds necessary, but still need the balance to get there. When
the renovations are completed, they will have approximately 1,200 square feet of kitchen and prep space,
dining room capacity nearly double of what they currently have, a family dining room for families with
children to have a more intimate family-style meal, private consultation space for referrals and other
potential one-on-one services, 23 parking spaces, ample bike parking,
all the food stored on site, they haven't been able to do that for 10 years, appropriate flow of food
through the building, necessary office and public restroom space, and a stable future for the Community
Kitchen operations. All this information is in your brochure that you got in your programs that comes
in. Please take a time to check this out and look at the stuff that Community Kitchen does and how much
it is needed, this new facility is needed and how you can help. I say this every year when we do the,
when we do the Bloomington Chef's Challenge is that the community kitchen does amazing work and we're
going to see more about the numbers and how many meals and all that kind of thing. It would be great
not to come back here next year because there is no need for the community kitchen. It would be great
for us to be able to do the Bloomington Chef's Challenge just for fun. But the fact remains is we need
to do the Bloomington Chef's Challenge. We have to do the Bloomington Chef's Challenge because of the
great need in our community. So once again, please,
Thank you for your support tonight at the Community Kitchen. And remember that more support is needed
throughout the year. Thank you. We have, Jake, we have one minute and 45 seconds to your finish. One
minute and 45 seconds. So, folks. Can anyone tell me the first bar and restaurant in Bloomington to
have a sidewalk patio?
What was that answer? Wrong. Wrong. No, not the scenic view, no. What? No, not the Irish line,
but very close. Crazy Horse, who said it? Right there, you're the winner, come on. You get a Crazy Horse
gift certificate.
But I want you to realize that Lynn tried to win the prize, even though she's a judge. And I'm not sure
if that's not a breach of conflict of interest here. So, tell you what, Lynn, you and I will go to the
Crazy Horse and we'll have lunch sometime. Just to prove that you can see the, yeah, I just heard from
my voice that you buy. I don't know. Joe just said you pay my lunch. That's what, yeah, not me.
Hi, everyone. How are you doing? We're back here at the Bluetooth Chef's Challenge. We are literally
seconds away from Chef Jake Brinchley finishing. We're going to hear this again. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5,
4, 3, 2, 1. Jake Brinchley is done.
Jake has five minutes to plate his food up to the judges right now from this point on. And in those
five minutes, let's do another trivia question. Bloom Magazine. Bloom Magazine has been a great supporter
of local business and culture. The cover of their first issue featured a local farm family. Featured
a local farm family. What farm family?
I can't hear you, but I'm going to say, yes, sir, you are correct. There you go. And you win a gift
certificate, a $25 gift certificate to the Scholar's Inn Gourmet Cafe and Wine Bar. Okay, we're going
to, if the camera guys can come by, we're going to try to get an early look at that plate as it comes
up here from Jake Bridgeley. Dave, can you tell us what's going to be on that plate?
Well, we've got this pork loin that's been seared off and then is sitting in this kind of stock that
he's made. We've got, it looks like a cheese sauce over here to the left. We've got some, we've got
over here on these flat top grills, we've got this mixed fruits. And then there's a mystery pot to the
right that I didn't actually see what went into there. I'm assuming that the pork loin is going to be
sliced thinly with some of the fruit as
with some of the food on top of it and the cheese sauce around it, but we'll see. There's all kinds
of wonderful smells and flavors going on over here on Chef Frenchly's station. I don't know if you can
smell this or not, but it's absolutely fantastic. Can you smell it all the way up there in the balcony,
guys? Got three more minutes left to play here.
We've got just about coming up in five minutes there. Tom, can you tell us what that looks like over
there? Well, yeah. He's got his quinoa. It looks like kind of a quinoa risotto over here with like a
kind of a quinoa risotto pilaf kind of thing over here with some cream and corn and onions and leeks
in it. Looks like that's done. It's off the heat. He's got some peaches, some apples, and some bacon
sauteing in a pan right now. He's flipping it.
He's got that goat cheese bechamel is done, you know, and he's got that pork back on the grill probably
to finish cooking. He probably seared it off and then finishes it. He's going to finish it off here
at the end to make sure it goes out nice and hot. He's got some bread cubed up here real roughly. And
it looks like that's pretty much everything we're looking at over here.
Over on Chef Talent's station, he's got that thing that I think might be a soup with the tomatoes and
basil. He ran that through a food mill, which is kind of like a very fine sieve that presses out all
the solids. He's got some little, looks like, herbed goat cheese sandwiches that maybe are going to
be grilled. He's got that chicken under a brick, which is, you know, a classical sort of
Classical sort of Italian preparation where they actually take a chicken and put it under a foil-wrap
brick. He's mimicked that with a sheet pan with a lot of heavy stuff on top of it. That chicken has
browned up real nicely, as you see, in that pan. He's got, and like I said, he's got these herb goat
cheese sandwiches over here, and then he's also got that red onion and peach that he charred in that
grill pan somewhere around here.
Again, there's a lot of stuff going on here. And then he's also got these grits that he's added cream
to. I'm not sure if he's added cheese to those yet, but I'm assuming there's gonna be cheese in those
corn grits right there. And so one very interesting thing is it looks like every chef has corn out on
their station, which is a great seasonal ingredient. And I'll take it back to Brad now. Chef Brinsley
is just about finished plating here. Let's get a real, let's take a look at that. These are fantastic
food. Look at that.
Once again, this is the kind of cuisine you're going to be able to see at the Scholar's Inn. The Scholar's
Gourmet Inn Cafe and Wine Bar, but you know it is at Scholar's Inn. You know what the great place, you
get half Irish martinis on Thursday, and the food is just exceptional. The staff are great at the Scholar's
Inn. You cannot go wrong with that restaurant, and you can see why right now. I mean, take a look at
that. Five minutes.
And that was the five-minute warning for Chef Dempsey. You may have heard that. So we're going on. I'm
sorry I got struck kind of dumb by just staring at how beautiful that food is. Now I understand pornography.
All right, ladies and gentlemen. I apologize for that. I'm really sorry. My daughter is right there.
It looks like I better start saving therapy. Huh?
So right now, the chefs are getting up there, the food to the judges. That is an unbelievable sight.
And Dave, what's going on down there with the... Okay, we're going to go to Rags here, and Rags is going
to talk with Chef Frenchly and describe what we've got in front of him. You can describe what it is,
and he'll give you an initial comment. Okay, Jake, you've got to speak right in that mic.
Tell the guys what you got going here. I'm not going to say this was an easy battle. An easy battle,
that's for sure. Our burner side, it did not want to cooperate with us today. So we made do with, just
like a chef is supposed to do. Hopefully, my culinary instructors will be proud of what we did. We made
do with it. What you have from the bottom up, we originally had some polenta. However, that did not
want to cook for us today. So what we did instead was we did a creamed corn. I am proud to say that
we used every single cheese
in the cooler today. So we're proud about that. Good for your score, for sure. Yeah. So again, it's
kind of like a cheesy cream corn on the bottom with a basic bechamel sauce. There's flavor with a little
bit of mustard and a little bit of cardamom. You're going to taste that in there too. Yeah. Then we
did what we could with the pork to give it a braise. However, like I said, the temperature
was not cooperating. But I think it's got good flavor. And then on top of that, you have a little bit
of chutney, which is made with pears.
peaches, apples, a little bit of crisp bacon, moonstar cheese. I like the texture of moonstar cheese.
I think the flavor complements the fruit very well, so I think you'll get a nice hint of that.
Also in the, we have a little bit of basil pesto on top of that, which has a little bit of Swiss cheese.
A lot of people prefer to use Parmesan. I like to use Swiss. I think the bite's a little bit different.
It gives it a better flavor. And then some fresh herbs to garnish. Thank you very much. Wow. Okay, just
stay right here, Jake, because
initial reaction here from the judges. Let's start out with Jeff. Go ahead. It's delicious, Jake. Thanks.
What are the cheeses that you used in this dish? Every cheese that was in there. We're just trying to
go through it again. Moonstar is in the chutney and then the more artisan cheeses you'll find in the
actual creme de cordon. Okay. Charlotte, take a deep breath from that
beautiful plate and think of something you need to ask him there. In the chocolate, you included cheese
and fruits. Which fruits did you include? There you go. Some peaches, pears, apples, and that's it,
right Josh? It's what? It's some red onion. Yeah, we like to cook with fruit at the Scholars Inn, incorporate
everything. Thank you. All right, Lynn, here you go.
Now, what did you flavor your creamed corn with, besides cardamom, you said? Is that it? Yeah. Actually,
we used a little bit of the... There you go. We actually used a little bit of the braising liquid from
the pork in there as well. And mushroom stock, chicken stock, had some fresh bay leaf in there as well,
but you'll taste the aromatics, like leeks, fennel, garlic, so forth. Super. Thank you, Jake Brinchley
and Josh Miller. From scholars in Gourmet Cafe and Wine Bar,
That just shows the man's skills, okay? His equipment wasn't working. He's in front of this big audience,
which is going to be played on bean cat for the next year. No sweat. The guy got it done. The plates
are absolutely beautiful. You guys, this is what makes chefs real chefs. I'll tell you, this is really
the restaurant business, because anybody of you who have ever worked in a kitchen in a restaurant here
understand what we're talking about. Things don't always go right. And he is our very first Chef's Challenge champion.
So let's have a big round of applause. Jake did a fantastic job there. Fantastic. Wonderful. Got about
20 seconds to 15 seconds before, 15, thank you very much. Until the voice from on high signals the end.
Two, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
Chef Jemcee, stop your cooking. All right, let's give away another gift certificate real quick,
shall we, while we get some plating done here? How about this? What restaurant had a House of Ill Repute
brothel above the restaurant? Does this mean a house?
Okay, there's a lot of wishful thinking out there, which I appreciate. Let's try this again. What restaurant
had a house of ill repute, a brothel above the restaurant, and a bar downstairs for weary railroad workers
during the 40s and 50s? Right in front of the soundboard. Wait, wait, out in front of the soundboard.
Yonkos is the exact answer, young lady. That is correct.
I already gave Bianca's gift certificate away, so how about another gift certificate to Pizza X?
There you go. Right back there. The person I'm paying therapy for. There you go. Dave, what's it look
like over there on the plating? Over here on Chef Dempsey Station, we've got that pork down.
Over that quinoa risotto, we've got that goat cheese bechamel going down over the top of that. Looks
like he's got two dishes today. His second dish over here, we've just got some bread chopped up. Then
we've got that sauteed apples and peaches with bacon. And what's going to be the cheese component on
this dish? Goat cheese sprinkled over the top. And there's going to be some fresh goat cheese sprinkled
over the top. And then over here in this pan over here, he's got a little reduction. It's a balsamic, herbed,
garlic reduction. And that's probably going to, I'm assuming that's going to go over this salad over
here. And there he is sprinkling the fresh goat cheese. And this is Capriol goat cheese from Greenville,
Indiana. Like I said before, this Capriol is a pretty interesting story. The woman who runs the farm,
Judy Shad, decided after finishing her master's and doctorate that instead of going into academia, she wanted to
raise goats, and milk them, and make cheese from them. And that was 20 years ago, and she's
a now world-famous cheese maker, and we should all be proud to call her a Hoosier. Wow, that's some
serious information. Dave Koons, everybody, Dave Koons. Working to Google. All right. Hey, Dave, it's
harder for me to see from over here, and I'm distracted by the food over here.
Does that look good? Does it look like something that you personally would enjoy? This looks absolutely
outstanding. Chef Deft, he's done a great job with the colors and textures on these dishes. And over
here with this crispy coffee rub pork, over this nice, tender-looking quinoa risotto, and this bechamel
goat cheese sauce that I would absolutely pour all over myself. It absolutely looks wonderful.
The chef's over there, way down there at the Scenic View restaurant, and I'm not sure that everybody
here has been there, but if this is the kind of food he's turning on a regular basis, this is a really
extraordinary new talent in town, and it's another really good... And that is the... Absolutely. Scenic
View restaurant there on 446, right on the edge of the beautiful Hoosier National Forest, where you
can see Lake Monroe from the...
from the dining room around there, or if you want to take your food across the street and not get hit,
you can actually get in the water with your food. Just please bring the plate back. That's all they
ask that you do. I'm kidding. Don't do that. Don't do that. All right. Ladies and gentlemen, hey, for
those of you who know me in a different life, I mean, obviously you know that I am the director of Rhinos
Youth Center, which is another United Way agency. Thank you very much. Thank you.
But maybe you also don't know that I'm also one of the house emcees at the Comedy Attic, Bloomington's
first and only all-comedy showroom. And I'd like to give away two tickets to the Comedy Attic right
now to our next answer, quiz answer. I haven't cleared this with the owner, but since he's sitting right
down front, he can't say no now. So here we go. Here we go. What year did Nick's English hut open? Ma'am,
right here in the middle.
1978, 1982, 1972. Five minutes. Yes, sir. 19 what? 1926 is wrong.
I said 1926 was wrong. 1927, right there. And by the way, Paul Busby did most of these quiz questions.
So thank you, Paul, for coming up. I'll get you two tickets to the comedy attic here as soon as I pull
my thing out of my wallet. So there you go, which is the tickets. That's what we're talking about. No,
go ahead and sit down and we'll do it. I got you right there.
All right, how are we coming down there, Dave? Rags. We're going to go back up to rags and we're going
to discuss the next plating. Yeah, we have plates. We have plates come up here in a second.
Is that right? You ready to go? All right. All right, let's go. Chefs, want to follow me this way?
He's had a little refreshment here. He's had a rough hour here. Smooth. All right, let's grab your plates.
Let's bring it up to the judges. And they'll have a chance to ask you a couple questions. Go this way.
OK. Watch the cord. Looks beautiful.
Wow. Just hand them down. There you go. And one more. OK. There you go, judges. I think we have one
more plate coming here. That looks gorgeous. Quite a different plate than Jake's plate in here. There we go.
and then Thomas, after you present those plates, I need you to tell them what you got here. All right.
Right over here, sir. There you go, chef. Yep, you're live there. So maybe a brief description of what
you guys put together here for us. Well, we started off with a quinoa risotto that we... Keep it up.
There you go. ...slowly reduced with mushroom stock and then later added
some cream and goat cheese, added corn, leeks, garlic, and onions to that, just for some texture and
extra flavor. On top of that, we have a coffee-infused pork loin, which was seared in rendered bacon
fat. Then it's topped with an apple goat cheese bechamel. The bottle that you see on top there is pure
goat cheese to break up and spread over the plate. Then for dessert, I'll follow it up with two kinds
of sauteed fruit.
There's a peach and balsamic vinegar with goat cheese sprinkled on top. I tried to go for the sweetness
of the peaches to bring out the creaminess. And then opposing that, I have the tartness of the apples
to bring out a little bit of the creaminess to relax the palate. All right. Jeff, you got a mic right
next to you there. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thomas, they're going to ask you a question or two
here. So just chill out. There you go. You're doing great. All right, Jeffrey.
Bacon for dessert, you're a man after my own heart. Tell us about this, the sauce that the pork is setting
in there. The quinoa. It's quinoa and is it mustard seed? No, no, that's actually a red quinoa.
A red quinoa, okay. Got it. Which as many of us, maybe not all of us know, is a Chinese grain that's
filled with many proteins. It's actually a complete protein
though it's not a meat. And how many cheeses did you use, Thomas? In that, I only used goat cheese.
But in the bechamel, I used goat cheese and feta. All right. Thank you. OK. Stay right there, Chef.
Charlotte, what do you think? OK. In the bechamel, you used goat cheese and feta. And in the dessert,
you used goat cheese. So goat cheese was your primary use of the cheese. Is that correct?
I figured I should stick with one goat cheese and try and bring out as many characteristics as I could.
I see. But the feta help accent, or I feel help accent. Yeah. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Stay right
there. Yep. All right. Got plenty of time there, Lynn. Go ahead.
I just have one comment. Anybody who includes bacon in dessert is my kind of cook. Amen, brother.
Thank you. Yeah. Yeah, it looks like all those quick fire challenges, your help kind of threw at you
before the competition definitely paid off. You don't see this kind of stuff every day. And we, I mean,
we've talked about bacon for dessert, bacon in your coffee, bacon for everything. I mean, bacon is a universal
the universe of food. Great job, Chef. Thank you very much. We really appreciate it. Good luck. Good
luck to you, too. Thank you, Regs. Thank you, judges. It looks amazing. Hey, very quickly, one of the
great things about living here in Bloomington and Monroe County is when you do something like this,
All of a sudden, people start coming up and wanting to help out and give out, too. I mean, after I offered
up Comedy Attic tickets, all of a sudden, someone from the Bleeding Heartland Roller Girls comes running
up and says, let's give away two tickets to the Bleeding Heartland Roller Girls, too. So let's do that.
And we'll couch those tickets with another Scholars in Gourmet Cafe and Wine Bar gift certificate for
$25. So this is dinner and a Derby for you tonight. Dinner and a Derby.
And let's find your thing. Okay, here's a good one. The Bira, the Bloomington Independent Restaurant
Association, this Bloomington Independent Restaurant Association member's wine cellar used to be a part
of the Underground Railroad. The Scholars in Gourmet Cafe and Wine Bar, you're absolutely correct.
Okay, so here's what you've done. You worked there, that's great that you know that, and so now I can't
use that question and give this away. Thank you very much, that's lovely of you. No. That's called cheating
is what that's called, but thank you very much. No, I've got other questions, that's fine. It's important
information to have. I think that's very good. So let's try a different question, shall we? Thank you
for ruining that. All right, here we go.
The upstairs of this restaurant used to be a brothel. There used to be quite a few here in town.
But then, of course, the university came in and there was no use for brothels in the town. I'm not even
sure what that means. This used to be a brothel, the upstairs of this restaurant, but not anymore. You know.
The scholars in Gourmet Cafe and Wine Bar, absolutely. There you go. Thank you very much. See,
that was easy. I could just do the same thing. Wow. I didn't realize so many of our local restaurants
have such a colorful past. I think that's pretty interesting. I'm assuming that Paul Busby has had a
great time researching this. So there you go. Who knows?
Who knows what Night Moves is gonna be someday, huh? Who knows? All right. A steakhouse, there you go.
All right, how are we doing over there, Dave? What do the plates look like? Well, we're still in the
process of plating right now, but it looks like I'm gonna go out on a limb. I'm guessing we're gonna
have a kind of a classic tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwich, just like mom used to make, except
the cheese won't be orange this time and the tomato soup won't be from a can. He's got that tomato basil
soup and these little flat plates, and then he's got these herbs, goat cheese,
Sandwiches right here on this flat top he's about to put down over here He's got a salad with grilled
peaches and those charred red onions and he's got some bacon in there because everything goes better
with bacon and and then And can the chef start taking some stuff up Let me just tell you the other part
of his dish here He's got some grits the chicken under a brick and he's got this leak and she's aged
Dutch cheese house fondue over in this pot. And that's probably going to be the entree part of this.
So what I think we have here is a soup, salad, and entree. So all we need to do is get Christy up here
to make the dessert. And so we need the dessert portion of this, right, Christy?
Chef, we're about ready for you. Let me take this moment to... Sorry. Go ahead. Let me take this moment
to... Task for a round of applause for all of our chefs.
Absolutely, absolutely. Also, please do not forget about the People's Choice Awards where you can vote
for your favorite chef of the three here tonight. Do that right out in the lobby. That voting is still
open. It's going to close very soon. So once again, the People's Choice voting right there in the lobby.
Who stole my peach? Was that you? All right, there. Awesome. It was my daughter. She came up and stole
my food. All right, that's awesome. How are we looking over there, Rags? Dave? OK, let's go.
comes right now. Where'd you go right now? And you can see it. We got sous chef Tony Cooper here presenting
the first course and one need Tim Clower or Charlotte can hand those to me. There you go. Oops.
Take these, put them somewhere I need.
Yeah, go ahead. Great. How is it down there in the bistro seats? Was it worth the money? Especially
knowing that it's going to serve hungry people here in Monroe County?
So there might be somebody out here in the audience tonight, or maybe more importantly, watching his
home one of the 50 times they're going to rerun this on Cats. If you or maybe your company or your friends
all want to get together and buy a bistro table or buy bistro seats, please contact the Community Kitchen
because I think all these folks here can attest this is a sublime experience. Am I right? And once again,
it not only tastes good, but it feels good too. So think about those bistro seats for next year.
And once again, Martin O'Neill and the staff at CAS has done a fantastic job. They're working very hard.
This is not an easy thing to film or do. And they promote this thing all night long. So can we give
them another round of applause for all the work that they do? The technical staff here at the Buskirk
Chumlee Theater do a fantastic job. And also Blue Ace Media putting all this together. Remarkable.
I also want to mention that the Bleeding Heartland Roller Girls came up during the break. And ma'am,
you also get two free tickets to go to the next roller derby bout, which is October 9th, correct? Is
it next to the center? Yeah, so there you go. Just putting the last plate down. Excuse me, what? Sell
more stuff?
I've got this peach for sale right now for the community kitchen. Five dollars. Five dollars. She's
already stolen one for free. Okay, do I hear ten for this peach? Ten dollars. Ten dollars right here.
Fifteen. Fifteen for this peach. All money goes to the community kitchen. Fifteen right there. Twenty
dollars for this peach. Seventeen? Twenty.
Someone just said 20, sir. Did you say 22? 22, right there. What was that, sir? $30 for this peach,
ladies and gentlemen. $30 for this peach. Where are you guys when I'm doing rhinos fundraisers? $30,
going once, going twice. Sir, come on up here and give me your $30 and take the peach. Come on, yeah.
If you're going to spend $30 for this peach, I've been rubbing my fingers all over. Where's the money,
dude? $30? Come on. $30? Now? Now. Now. I'll gladly pay you on Tuesday for a peach today. Do we take
Visa? Tim, where are you, buddy?
You'll vouch for him? That's my neighbor over here. All right, we'll go, we'll go. Okay, Greg's. You
guys ready? All right. Okay, Chef, a brief description of what we presented here. Okay, so where we
started our first course, initially when we started talking, we thought we would do
We're going to try and do three courses. So we thought we would do soup, salad, our salad soup, and
then an entree. So it worked out. We got to do that. So in the first course, the cheese that we're featuring
is the Swiss connection feta. With that, we did a grilled peach and red onion spinach salad. Got a little
bit of candied maple glazed bacon on there.
So that's what you have for your first course. Second course, we have a tomato soup, kind of a cream
of tomato soup, classic cream of tomato soup, with a Caprio Farms basil goat cheese grilled cheese,
because you have to have grilled cheese with tomato soup or tomato soup with grilled cheese. So that's
what we did. And then for the entree, I took the chicken, broke the chicken, boned out the legs and
thighs, and did the breast, boneless breast. Threw them on the grill, cooked them under brick.
because I wanted to do the leg meat, leg and thigh meat, as well as the breast meat, because I think
the dark meat's the best, but a lot of people like the white meat. So I wanted to give a little combo
of the both. On the underside of that, we've got the cheese grits. We used the Colby, the Colby Jack,
and the farmer's cheese, because they're both really, really creamy,
and they work really good in grits. And then for the sauce, I did a leek and, I can't remember the name
of the cheese, it's just a really dry cheese from Swiss Connection, almost similar to like a Parmesan.
So I did like a leek and Parmesan type fondue. So I used some melted leeks and a little bit of mustard,
cream butter, and a bunch of that cheese. So, enjoy.
Jeffrey I just want to make one comment before I let start I found out what the secret ingredient was
I was sworn to secrecy not to tell anybody but anyway one of the first things that me and the other
guy said I bet you David talent does a grilled cheese sandwich because the things you do with simple
things is so amazing anyway go ahead
Well, first to comment, this is the kind of salad I like, Dave. It's got about two leaves of spinach
on it. It's fast food. Really? Three courses in what? An hour. I don't know what to ask you, Dave. I
was very impressed that you made this beautiful soup in that quick. Where did the tomatoes come from?
Do you know? They're from the larder, I guess. Who brought the tomatoes? They're from Blooming Foods,
I believe.
Are they Teresa Bertels? They might be, I don't know. How many, so cheeses, Dave, you used four cheeses,
goat, the dry parm, the feta, and the... I used three in the entree, the goat cheese, the feta, so yeah,
we used four cheeses, so. Okay. Thanks, Dave. It looks great. Thank you. All right. I wondered if there
was cheese. David, is there any cheese in the soup?
No cheese in the soup. No cheese in the soup. Okay. So you decided to use chicken and tell us again
about exactly what you did with the chicken. The chicken boned it all out, a little salt, pepper, just
a tiny little bit of the chili powder and threw it on the flat top, on the skin, on the brick in order
to render out that skin and make it crispy. And then we flipped it over and just cooked it kind of all
the way through like that.
And there's cheese it with the leeks and the salt. And then I use the, that dry. That whatever it is.
The really dry cheese. In the, with the fondue I did some melted leeks through a little bit of Dijon,
some pepper, salt, a little bit of butter and cream. And then finish it with the cheese and a little
bit of black pepper. Okay. And then we've got the Colby and the farmer, the farmer style cheese.
In the grits. The really creamy cheese is in the grits. Okay. Thank you. There you go, Lynn. You got
something for David here?
How did you manage your time? Did you make all three dishes at the same time? Did you assign one out
to your sous? How did you utilize your hour to come up with three completely different dishes? Before
we started, depending on what, no matter what the ingredient was gonna be, we were gonna do a salad
and a soup, regardless. So as a matter of when we got up here, we just started talking about it.
Tony said, I'll start working on the soup. So he took that course.
He started doing all the cutting and chopping first, because I knew I would have to deal with the protein.
So I figured going third with what was up here, that the chicken would probably work better than the
shrimp or the trout, if that's what was left. So that's kind of the way we went. I would take care of
the protein and get that rolling. He would do all the cutting and chopping, and then we'd kind of meet
in the middle and go from there. All right. Thank you, Chef. Wonderful. Thank you.
Thank you guys. One more round of applause for all three of our chefs here this evening. Truly remarkable.
And another round of applause for Cheese, please. Another round of applause for Cheese. Yes. And now
I'd like to throw back real quick to Rags, who'd like to talk about something near and dear to all of
our hearts.
Yeah, I mean, you see the comments that we had. Jake over there had problems with his technical equipment
and still came through. We got the new upcoming chef over here who was really creative with stuff that
we haven't seen here on the stage before. And he got David Talent kind of throwing everything together,
very simple comfort food. He showed that creativity and the passion, all these guys, the creativity
and passion. That kind of shows what Bloomington's about. And one thing that we have here in Bloomington,
There's several different outlets, so you can go ahead, and especially youngsters out there, especially
watching these things on BCAT, hopefully in the next several months. There's a lot of schools out there
to help you guys out. You've got passion, you've got creativity, you love food, and you love local food.
We've got the Hoosier Hills Career Center. We've got, for the kids, something to get started, so they
realize there is a future in this industry. It's a great industry. I mean, I've done really well in
it. Jeff Meese has, too, and all these people are on the board, and the judges.
They're very vibrant in how they feel about food in Bloomington. Then you've got the Ivy Tech people.
I think we have a group of them up top. They're young up-and-coming chefs that have a future in this
business also. And hopefully they stay here in this community. If not, they take the love and the passion
that they've learned here in Bloomington and take it to wherever they go. And also we have the Bloomington
Cooking School down on the square by Goods Incorporated. In case any of you people out there want to
take a quick little class,
Jan runs that, it's a wonderful thing. Anyway, as I was saying, it's about creativity, it's about passion,
it's about Bloomington, it's all about local. So there you have it, thank you. Maybe a round of applause
for all of our local restaurants, eateries, watering holes, taco trucks, whatever they are. I've been
eating in this town for over 20 years and I can tell I'm all the man I am because of what's going on
right here.
in Bloomington, Indiana. Folks, once again, I've said this before, I'm gonna keep saying this, the reason
we are here tonight is for the community kitchen and for the folks in the booth, let everyone ready,
I'd like to present to you some more information about the great work that is done at the community kitchen.
Kitchen, board members of the Community Kitchen, and supporters to please stand right now. If you're
on the staff of the Community Kitchen or on the board of the Community Kitchen, if you could please
stand, be recognized for the work that you do.
of us who work in the nonprofit sector know that sometimes this isn't fun and there's not a lot of money
in it, there's not a lot of chance for advancement or raises or any of that kind of stuff, but what
we do do is we sleep really well at night and the folks at the community kitchen should sleep really
well because they do fantastic work and I would please like you to give them one more round of applause.
Vicki Pierce, the executive director to Tim and everyone down. Fantastic, fantastic work. Yes, Tim,
Tim, there you go. Tim Flower. All right, Dave, if you could, can you please thank our sponsors again
for us one more time? Because this would not happen without their help. Yeah, I want to thank all of
them again. Cisco, Blooming Foods, United States Food Service, Fine Print, Gouldy and Sons,
Relish, Green and Schultz, Attorneys in Law, WFIU, Oliver Winery, The Bloomington Herald Times, Goods
for Cooks, The Inner Chef, and the staff at the Busker, Chumley and Katz. They make all this possible.
I also want to thank all of our local farmers who have provided so much wonderful bounty. And of course,
And last but not least, this event would not happen and it would not be a success without the work of
all these amazingly talented chefs who have been up here all night. And also, most importantly, without
all of you for coming out and supporting and being part of such a great, great cause. I want to thank
you all. We really appreciate it.
This time, the voting is still finishing up. We've got just a few more minutes to go. If we can, can
we bring all our chefs and our sous chefs back out right now? If you're back there, will our chefs come
back out, please? You can see how much pull I have with the chefs here, because they just came running
the minute I asked if they could all come back out.
Yeah, so if we can have all the chefs out, please. We'll send Tim to go get them because obviously,
there we go. I do. And once again,
We've talked a lot about the chefs, but we haven't talked about the sous chefs that much I'm sure that
the chefs are going to tell you that they could not have done this without the sous chefs like Tony
Cooper and Jamie Buck and Josh Miller The chefs get all the glory and all the money and the sous chefs
sit there and do all the work So we want to thank them all for doing all that Folks have you had a good
time tonight?
I think now might be time to announce the People's Choice Award winner And it's me thank you very much
Tim we have a gift certificate for our People's Choice Award winner Tim Clare once again is gonna get
our President a $30 gift certificate to goods all right
And this year's People's Choice Award winner is Thomas Dempsey. A standing ovation. Look at that. Hey,
Thomas. Congratulations. Congratulations. Hey, turn around. Let's get the audience here. Regs, won't
you find out what Thomas thinks about this? Here we go. Wow.
That's awesome. It's incredible. I know it sounds really odd, but how do you feel right now? I feel
incredible. I don't know. I feel like the underdog. Hey man, that's what America's about, you know?
I mean, you're cooking up a storm over there. Beautiful plate. The inspiration just came from, you just
came out here and started doing it, and the bacon fat definitely helped. Right? Okay, let's look at
it this way. Okay, you're really successful. What was your biggest fear?
when you walked out here on stage? Well, five minutes after I walked out, my shoe came untied. I really
thought I was going to trip. Did the dog have to eat your homework also? The shoe's untied. Jamie, you
did a fantastic job, too. Why don't you say a few words, let us know how you feel about this competition.
And being in a role reversal here, because usually, you're the executive, you're chef, and you're the
sous. How'd that work? Let's kind of turn to the audience here so they can see a little bit. Go ahead.
Hold the mic up. There you go. I'm just really excited. And I'm so proud of Thomas. And this is something
he really wanted to do. So that's why I told him he could be the chef. I'd be his soup. So I'm just
really excited. I've got one question, Janie. Because chef over here said he was practicing all week
long. Just by chance, did he practice with Ain't Cheese this week? No, we didn't at all. We kept thinking
it was going to be fruit or vegetable.
Yeah, well, we got all these great local cheeses here. We kind of think about this as we're playing
out the competition. Like I said, I had absolutely no idea until we showed up today, but you guys did
a fantastic job. Thank you. We had so much fun. Congratulations. Jamie will be very proud. Thank you.
One more question. Was there an ingredient maybe that you really feared? Is there something you don't
like to cook with or something that isn't your specialty?
Well, I really thought that soy might have been an option, and I just felt that can go so many different
ways. I didn't know how to accent soy itself. So I really feared that that could have been what it was.
Yeah, where did you get all of your talent from? Did you go to CIA? I'm sorry I didn't get your background
there. Well, really most of it's just been family, traveling a lot, going through different region to
region. But my official training is from Ivy Tech here in Bloomington. See, there you go. What'd I tell
you guys? What'd I tell you guys?
There you go. All you people out there watching in the middle of the winter, and you're watching this
in the middle of the night, said, you get some inspiration from guys like this. Because if he can do
it, you guys can do it, too. Here's all you Ivy Tech guys out there. Congratulations. All right. We're
going to move on here. The judges put in their, is the judging final? All right, Bradley. Here we go.
All right. Just so everyone know.
Everyone knows about the taste of Bloomington. Every year the taste of Bloomington each year. This year
the taste of Bloomington raised for the community kitchen and for the Hoosier Hills Food Bank $8,000
a piece. And tonight you have raised over $15,000 for the community kitchen.
We're still waiting on the tabulation for the Bistro champion, but we do have the winner from the Chef's
Challenge 2010. But we're going to wait until we get the Bistro seats and get all those votes tabulated.
So in the meantime, we have given away everything. You know this is, I don't know if you guys have seen
this, this is going local week here in Bloomington. We still have some events coming up.
Thursday, the King Korn film screening, King Korn will be screaming, but the screening is from seven
to nine at Rachel's. On Friday, the 10th, Sustained IU Day in Dunmetal all day long. Saturday, the 11th,
Bobby Lancaster performance at Barefoot Kids at 10.30 a.m. Also on Saturday, Panache Dance Fitness Sampler
at Panache Dance from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. And then that night, next Saturday,
When you're watching this, it will have been on Saturday the 11th, the Christa de Tor CD release right
here at the Busker Chomi Theater at 8 o'clock, and then the Going Local Week grand finale on Saturday
the 11th at the Bishop from 6 p.m. to close. So all those are the events.
And also don't forget that in your brochures, you'll be able to see exactly how this judging was done.
We're going to take a look at that. And also in your brochures, you'll find information about this year's
United Way campaign. Please take a look at this. Please keep this out of your program. Take a look at
this and support the United Way this year more than anything. Your support is needed. All right.
All right. We have our winners, ladies and gentlemen.
We have the bistro champion. These are from the judgments from the folks here at the bistro table. And
it's another gift certificate. To goods. And your winner from that is Dave Tallent.
So before we name the 2010 Bloomington Chef Challenge winner of the Golden Spatula direct from Spatula
City, USA, our judges are going to have a chance to talk to the chefs one more time before we name your
winner. Go ahead, Lynn. Jake, it seems like the secret ingredient posed a big challenge for you. That
was my observation.
You don't cook with cheese much. Well, being a French chef, I kind of cook with a lot of cheese. No,
I wanted to make sure that we incorporated cheese and gave you different textures. I wanted to use all
of the cheese and really make that the focal point. You were very successful at that. Thank you very
much. Glad to hear that. Thomas, I was impressed with your knowledge of ingredients, especially when
you explained quinoa to the audience.
told me that you know what you're about in the kitchen, and you were new to me, so I'm very impressed.
Very impressed. Thank you. I don't know if I have a question. I'm very glad you brought your own plates,
though. It was a great touch. Thank you. All right. Charlotte. Oh, my goodness. Let's go back this way.
There you go, Charlotte. You have David's got the mic now, so go ahead. David has the mic.
You decided beforehand that you wanted to have three courses. That was a big challenge for you, but
why did you do that? We just kind of wanted to push ourselves and kind of challenge myself. Challenge
yourself. Yeah, and my sous chef. And you brought your dishes so you could do it. It was wonderful.
Yes. Beautiful. Thank you. Thank you.
Yeah, you've been cooking, I don't know how long, but it was a very creative thing. You made some very
creative foods today. How did you decide to use coffee on the pork? Actually, the Javanese pork is something
that I've been doing for a couple of years now. Normally, I do it with a fruit reduction to kind of
balance out the bitterness of the coffee. Similarly, I do a tea with any sort of poultry, duck, chicken.
I find that coffee cuts deeper into the meat though, so whenever I'm using a red meat or something other
than poultry, I'll use coffee. It was really, really interesting. Thank you. And Jake, I think it was
brilliant that you couldn't get the polenta quite to work.
And then you came up with this cream corn and cheese mixture. Explain. That was fast thinking, also.
But I can say it was delicious. It was delicious. Well, I think cream corn is one of my favorite things.
We have it on the menu at the restaurant. So we just got lucky to have some great product. The corn
was so sweet and nice. I think it complemented kind of the sharpness of the cheese. So it was an easy
brainer for us. It worked very nicely. Thank you very much. I'm glad to hear.
Thank you. Jeff, it's your turn. Guys, as you know, and for people who have been here before, I got
chosen as a judge to fill Steve Mangum's seat. And if you remember Steve, he was the hard ass. So I'm
just going to say, guys, it was a fantastic meal. Thank you so much. You did a great job. All right.
That's it.
And by that, Jeff, you mean tough donkey, right? Tough donkey. That's what you were saying. Tough donkey,
right? Yeah. All right. Ladies and gentlemen, I've just been informed of your winner. And I've also
been informed that this was the closest of any of the Bloomington Chef challenges from the judges right
now. This is quite literally minute points separated the three
And so, Tim, if you would like to take the golden spatula over to our chefs and award the 2010 Bloomington
Chef's Challenge Grand Prize Golden Spatula Trophy made right here in Bloomington, Indiana to Chef Dave Tallent.
Once again, you've thrilled Bloomington with your great culinary skills. It's a fantastic competition.
All you guys did a fantastic job. You're a great inspiration to all of us. Dave, I don't know, two times
in a row, is this a dynasty? I don't know, but I know I can sleep tonight, so that'll be good. But yeah.
Thanks to everyone that came out. Looks like a larger turnout than last year. So that's the most important
thing about this event. The money that arranges for the community kitchen. So thank you everyone for
coming out. Thank you, David. Thank you, Chef, very much. All right. Dave Towne, everybody. One more
time for all three of your chefs here this evening. For your judges.
Can we get a mic over here to Tim, because Tim would like to say some parting words for us before we
let you all go. Thanks everyone for coming. It's been a great event. I've just got some thanks that
I'd like to pass along. The first, of course, is to the chefs. I know some of this is going to be somewhat
redundant, but it's really a big thing for them to come out.
from their restaurants one night and show us their skills. Okay. Watch your back with this crew, Tim,
watch your back. You're gonna dump some Gatorade on me or something. I'd also like to thank the judges,
Charlotte and the rest of the crew for giving up their time.
There's a lot of volunteers that are involved in this that are kind of behind the scenes. You saw some
of them serving hors d'oeuvres and serving the bistro seating. We couldn't really do all this without
them. So I'd like a round of applause for them. And then we have kind of a little hodgepodge of a local
community committee group
that helped me put this together. It's made up of Jim Becker, who's on the board of Community Kitchen,
Joe Throckmorton, who is the voice of God. Joe said that this one came out dreamy for him. I think this
is how he wanted it to come off. And just so you know, he's got it down to a minute, what takes place up here.
Lynch Wurzburg, Rags, Charlotte Zietlow, Dave Koontz from Blooming Foods, your emcee, Brad. They've
all been a big part of this. Then also, you probably noticed as you came in, the Growers Guild and Local
First Indiana. The reason that we invited them to be a part of this
Is because the community kitchen gets a majority of its support from people here in the community hence
the name and it's a way for us as an agency to kind of give back to those people if you will and.
The reason we came up with this event is a good fit for the kitchen because even though our staff don't
have the plethora of things they had to choose from, it's basically what they do each day, Monday through
Saturday, year round, even on holidays, is they come up with food for people based on what they have
to work with. And when I went around collecting food for this, I of course went to the farmer's market
and everyone that I asked
is happy to give of what they have. Even in the case when some of them, you know, right after they gave
me the last of the okra that they had to sell, someone came up asking for it. They were happy to give
and be a part of the event and support us. And incidentally, I just heard recently that our farmers
market this past Saturday surpassed 10,000 attendees.
And I think that says a lot about our community, not only that local people support the kitchen, but
that local food and local businesses are really at the forefront. We had some big sponsors, WFIU and
the Herald Times both provided lots of free advertising for us.
Cisco food, US food, Blooming Foods provided the pantry that you see. Anything that farmers weren't
able to provide, Blooming Foods provided for us. And then only two more groups. One is the Board of
Community Kitchen who help us
Pull this together and then also most importantly the staff of community kitchen many who have been
helping in the background here tonight You know, we're really fortunate to have people that stick around
for a long time at community kitchen and help us do what we do we serve over 500 meals a day on average
about 60% going to children and
You know, as a community, we should be proud of the efforts we're able to do there. So thank you all
for coming out. And just very quickly,
Once again, we want to thank Cisco, U.S. Food Service, and Blooming Foods for being table sponsors.
This would not have happened without those three, the major sponsors we have. Thank you very much. From
Martin, O'Neill, and Katz for all the work that you've done. Thank you. Once again, to Joe back there
in the booth, to the folks here at the Busker Chumlee Theater, to Paul Busby, and amazingly, and the
heart and soul of this operation is Tim Clower, who's just here. This doesn't happen without Tim. That's the guy.
because he works on this all year long. Thank you very much. Thanks for Rags and David Koontz. I'm Brad
Wilhelm. Thank you. Have a nice tomorrow.