I’ll be on KFRU tomorrow morning at 10:15am. We’ll be talking World Harvest (focusing on products, not legal wranglings) and two other markets you may not know about. Other topics include our annual patio-dining rundown, summer beers and the official kickoff of grilling season this weekend. We’ll get through what we can.
If you’ve never made cajeta – sort of a Mexican goat milk cinnamon caramel – do it today. It’s freaking amazing (and you can make it with cow’s milk too). • You’re probably not following the locally-focused team blog at Re-Fresh, but you should be. • One outfit you REALLY need to be following is *Pepé’s of Columbia, newly opened and serving true Mexican-style tacos and tamales. On the taco side, I highly recommend the adobado, asada and carnitas; as for tamales, the poblano and cheese is fiery and delicious. • I’m working on a biscuits and gravy round-up; what are your favorite spots to get that all-American classic? • Thomas Keller is getting some serious blowback for tut-tutting the hyper-local, farm-to-table movement, saying his primary responsibility as a chef should be “quality, not geography.” For what it’s worth, I’m 70-30 with Keller on this. • The Wall Street Journal’s MarketWatch helpfully points out that the Obama spending binge actually never happened. • One Columbia restaurant is planning on moving into the ground floor space of the 5th and Walnut parking garage. No idea which one it will be. • I ran into Trey Quinlan, formerly of Bleu and Red and Moe, yesterday and asked him how his plans for Trattoria II were coming along. He reports that they have financing in place and are moving away from the original, Trattoria-focused concept, instead gunning for a bistro. More flexibility, less baggage, I suspect.
* Disclosure: I play soccer with Pepé and our kids go to school together. I consider him an acquaintance, if not a friend. Great guy.
