Dinner with the First Family

Local chef assists with state dinner at the White House

Story by Chris Graham
newdominion@ntelos.net

Mike Lund found himself a few feet away from the First Couple at the November state dinner held at the White House in honor of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his wife, Gursharan Kaur.

President Barack Obama broke away from small talk with First Lady Michelle Obama to talk with the people in charge of preparing the dinner, and Lund, the executive chef at Zynodoa in Downtown Staunton, had to take the lead after a fellow chef had trouble finding words.

“I said, Doing good, sir. He said, Well, everything’s looking great,” Lund remembered of the conversation with the president at the Nov. 24 state dinner, which Lund helped prepare at the invitation of White House executive sous chef Tommy Kurpradit, a fellow alum of the prestigious The Inn at Little Washington.

Lund, who took over as executive chef at Zynodoa in August, spent two days in the White House working with White House executive chef Cristeta Comerford and celebrated New York City chef Marcus Samuelsson on the meal, which featured on its menu red lentil soup, roasted potato dumplings and green curry prawns, among other items.

It was difficult at the outset for Lund to get to work. “It’s one thing to go on a tour of the White House and get to walk around the exterior. But to actually get to go down on the inside and see what most people don’t get to see, that in itself is kind of distracting at first,” Lund said. Read more

Our own ‘Julie and Julia’

Story by Theresa Curry

It was an ambitious undertaking, so we split it up. Three Waynesboro women made five dishes from Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking;” and we served them on Aug. 15, which would have been her 97th birthday. Sylvia Woodworth, a retired educator, realtor Dixie McClenahan and I prepared a four-course meal chosen by Bon Appétit magazine as a meal from “Mastering” that would come together well. Read more

The miller’s life

Story by Theresa Curry

Two or three times a year I dodge the barreling southbound trucks on Interstate 81 and travel towards Raphine, to cook with Georgie Young at Wade’s Mill. She and her husband, Jim, left fast-paced urban jobs to restore the old, water-powered mill and the miller’s home across the yard.

Jim oversees the grinding of yellow Virginia corn, wheat and rye, and Georgie gives cooking classes in her comfortable farmhouse kitchen.

On the opposite side of the mill store from the flours, meals and whole grains are shelves of French linens, knives as sharp as razors, non-stick baking pads and wonderful stoneware pots able to stand the heat of a gas flame. Georgie – who once led culinary tours of France – has collected a small but dazzling array of cook’s helpers and adornments, high-tech, low-tech and no-tech, tools distinguished by their practicality and durability, put to daily use in her own kitchen. Read more

Can-do: Canning, freezing all the rage again

Story by Theresa Curry

No one’s buying cars or new homes, but families everywhere are investing in jars, lids and giant pots to preserve the fruits of Virginia’s harvest and save a few dollars in the process.

According to Nielsen figures released last fall, canning and freezing supplies were posting unit sales growth of 14 percent, and the trend has gained more steam as the first vegetables and fruits ripen. Jarden Home Brands, owner of the popular Ball line of home canning products, had already seen a 30 percent increase in sales of jars and lids in early June, with the main harvest season still weeks away. 

Preserving food in glass and freezer jars is not exactly a new trend. Families from Waynesboro to Winchester are using the same Ball and Mason jars their grandmothers used, replacing only the vacuum lids each year to make a perfect seal. Others, just beginning, are investing in brand-new pint, half-pint and quart jars in the growing numbers that drive the sales increases noted nationally. At the Waynesboro Kroger, non-foods manager Jody Coiner reports a steady increase in the sale of canning jars and lids; and out in Stuarts Draft, Gary Eavers is expanding The Cheese Shop’s line of canning and pickling supplies to meet the growing demand.  Read more

Groceries and lunch: Local food pantries, soup kitchens see spike in demand in downturn

It’s like the parking lot at Wal-Mart outside the door to the Verona Community Food Pantry, located on the backside of the Department of Social Services building at the Augusta County Government Center complex off U.S. 11.

Inside it’s just as crazy as the Wal-Mart on a weekend, long lines at the counter and shopping carts banging into each other and all.

“It’s like this here every day,” said Hunter Fauber, the executive director of the all-volunteer pantry, the biggest pantry of its kind in the Greater Augusta region, serving just short of 8,000 people in the month of April, and distributing more than 270,000 pounds of food to its patrons that month.  Read more

Mollie and Mrs. Rowe: Local author carries on restaurateur’s legacy

Her baked pork tenderloin was legendary; her breakfasts made famous by interstate word of mouth long before the Internet, her spoon bread praised by neighbors and food critics alike; but these were all runners-up, mere bit-players in Mildred Rowe’s story when compared to the star. Pie was the dish of choice of Mrs. Rowe, founder of the eponymous Staunton restaurant. Up until she died at 89, Mildred Rowe carried pies to family picnics and bereaved neighbors. Mrs. Rowe’s bakers now roll out 100 pies a day: pies with fruit and cream, chocolate and brown sugar, peanut butter and maple syrup. 

Mrs. Rowe’s particular fondness for pie wasn’t lost on her biographer, Mollie Cox Bryan, who wrote Mrs. Rowe’s Restaurant Cookbook, a Lifetime of Recipes from the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. That volume took years to write, and at times the effort resembled a battle of wills, Bryan said.  Read more

Three bowls of soup: Local restaurants using local ingredients affect communities in unforeseen ways

Story by Theresa Curry

Will Richey began to notice a difference in the Charlottesville Farmers Market in the late ’90s. Besides the usual Charlottesville crowd seeking coffee and muffins or a week’s worth of groceries, he started running into Charlottesville’s best chefs. “I noticed the chefs – and of course sous chefs and other people connected with the city’s restaurant business – and I thought it was great,” he said. Read more

The old way of doing food

Story by Chris Graham 

It’s not quite perfect - somebody still has to drive the food to the pickup points in Lexington and Staunton each week, and most likely you’re going to drive there to get it and take it back home.

Aside from that almost infinitesimal carbon footprint, though, the Beyond Organic vegetables available through the community supported agriculture program at Cherry Ridge Farm are fresh-picked (as of the day each week the baskets are dropped off at Woods Creek Cafe in Lexington and Cranberry’s in Staunton), and oh, so good to eat. Read more

Spring Reading List

Story by Carey McCallum

Although the global economic crisis has had many tragic consequences for people all over the world, it is also true that many individuals, families and communities have taken this challenging time as an opportunity to reflect on their current lifestyle choices and to begin making real changes in their lives. Read more