Exclusive Kat: Institute of Culinary Education

Monday, October 21, 2013

Events: BV Give & Give Back Chef Challenge at the Institute of Culinary Education in NYC

On Oct 16th, World Food Day, Beaulieu Vineyards in partnership with actor Chris Noth held the first-ever BV Give & Give Back Chef Challenge at the Institute of Culinary Education in NYC. These first-class chefs were stripped of their typical ingredients and challenged to create nutritious, delicious and affordable meals using only ingredients that are typically found in area food pantries at this time of year. The chefs were held to a 30 minute time limit and an ingredient list that contains only commonly donated food pantry ingredients such as rice, pasta, tomatoes, zucchini, beans and peanut butter.

Participating chefs included Executive Chef Orlando Sanchez of Butcher Bar, Executive Chef Luke Venner of BLT Fish Shack, Corporate Chef Jose Luis Flores of Richard Sandoval Restaurants, and Executive Chef Pecko Zantilaveevan of The Four Seasons.

After half an hour of intense competition, Chef Luke Venner from BLT Fish Shack’s recipe of Warm Potato & Kale Salad with Green Goddess and Poached Eggs was named the winner by judges Chris Noth, Gary Oppenheimer, Executive Director and Founder of AmpleHarvest.org, Cindy Avila, PR Director and Sabrina Sexton, Lead Chef Instructor at ICE. A $10,000 donation was given to food-charity Grow NYC in Luke’s name on behalf of BV.

As part of its continued commitment to hunger relief this year, BV has expanded its Give & Give Back program to work with fresh food donation organizations like AmpleHarvest.org and City Harvest who helped provide the ingredient list for last night’s event.

And don’t forget, anyone hoping to get involved in the cause, making a difference has never been easier. BV has teamed up with AmpleHarvest.org to work together to help feed more families across the U.S. From now until the end of the year, you can text “Give” to 79008 and BV will donate $1 up to $50,000* to Ampleharvest.org to aid in hunger relief! See full recipes here at the bottom of my post.