I just stumbled over to Starbucks for my mid-afternoon hit and had a sampling of their new Via instant coffee.

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It's here people! As if you haven't already been chatting about it on the boards. 

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If you haven't bought your tickets to tonight's Fresh Forkin' Friday Taste! event, you are sadly too late as the event has SOLD OUT! But fear not, there are still tickets available for the shindig on Saturday. Same place (the new TCF Bank Stadium), tons of wines, gobs of food, PLUS you get some serious local chef action with  demos by Isaac Becker, JP Samuelson, Jack Riebel, and our own Beth Dooley and Bill Coy. Did I mention there will be behind-the-scenes tours of the stadium? I only hope they don't just leave the Goldy uniform lying about, that would be one helluva party favor.

 

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While you can’t eat chef Steven Brown’s food at a venue locally right now, you can travel to and throughout Tuscany for 10 days and enjoy his culinary talent. During most evenings of this culinary excursion, Steven will be creating dishes with locally sourced Italian foods.

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  This Fresh Forkin' Friday I'm deciding which carb-laden treat I deserve. A big, spicy plate of Bucatini alla Amatriciana from Rinata? A couple (yes, a couple) of meatball and ricotta pizzas from Black Sheep? Or should I just go load up on Tater Tots and fries at the Bulldog NE? The pre-meal is just one of the perks of running in Jack's Run for MPS. The main perk, of course, is kicking my butt around a hilly 5K in honor of Jack Mahony, a swimmingly awesome kid who is one of my little heroes of courage. If you're in EP on Saturday morning, please join us. Then on Sunday, we have the Step Up for Down Syndrome Walk in honor of our fabulously loud Aidan Coughlin, aka The Mayor. Our payoff on Sunday includes a post-walk roast beef sandwich at Maverick's while Aidan canvases the room giving fist bumps, making friends, and singing the U of M fight song. Totally worth it.

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What do you get when you gather five chefs, one chicken farmer, a retired mechanic, a nurse, a writer/ photographer, a graphic designer and $600 worth of seafood, Summit beer, and Perrier Jouet Champagne? A Minnesota-style clambake, of course.

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I am glad to see Lenny Russo of Heartland walking back, in his blog, from the cliff of threatening to move out of St. Paul if a local councilman followed through on creating strict standards for how local restaurants deal with food allergens. But a variety of media commentary in recent days on the subject has me wondering just how much anyone understands about food allergies that are so severe you might die.

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Maybe the best thing about summer warmth not arriving until September is that now, instead of being all raucous and pool-splashy, it seems bittersweet and a little quiet.

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The basement level of OM was packed last night with all the usual suspects that attend a restaurant opening. Not shockingly, I was camped out by the food and accosted any passed tray that happened by. Chicken tandoori, coconut shrimp, curried chickpea puffs, pork goan, yes. It was a happy crowd, the drinks were strong, and the staff was informative and excited about the food they were serving. Raghavan strolled the room and had an easy calm about him, fitting for a place named for peace. On this Fresh Forkin' Friday, I'm still carrying the good vibes and planning my return to eat more than a bite of that lamb.

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There are mushrooms all over my woods, which may be fitting as September is "National Mushroom Month". I'm not so lucky as to get an idyllic pocket of morels or a treasure trove of chanterelles, I just have all these odd looking fungi popping up everywhere. Next to the arugula that went feral in my yard, we have these lanky brown boys who seem to reach for the shed. Over by the hammock there are angry red tops that I have never seen in the yard before. So there are two things I'm doing this Fresh Forkin' Friday, first of which is heading off to the bookstore to find a good fungi field guide. The second thing will involve locating the massive puffball that grows in our woods every year, popping it off its stem, and engaging in the annual Labor Day puffball-driveway-hockey game. We follow that with dropped-apple-baseball.

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I have been dwelling on Michael Pollan's NYT article "Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch" for the last month or so. He makes so many points that I feel so conflicted about: I feel pride, I feel guilt, I feel indignation, I feel feministic pissiness.

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