Upcoming Schedule

Upcoming Schedule for the next month!  Come and say Hi! if you are around any of these events.  

5/29 Baby Riley's 1st Bday!!

6/4  Top Chef Tour, Des Moines, Iowa

6/6  Top Chef Tour, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

6/8-6/10 LA Concept meetings

6/19-6/21  Aspen Food & Wine Festival

6/25  Gettysburg Festival Dinner

6/27  Variety Playhouse Show in Atlanta.  Not just your usual cooking demo... Tickets here!

6/28  Career Builder Event @ SHRM,  NOLA

Busy-ness

So this week has been an absolute crush. I’ve been in three cities. I’ve been in a car, a train, a plane, and a boat. 7 demonstrations in 7 days. I am exhausted as I type this.

The week started in Tampa, where we were met by a serious group of fans. Most notably, a young culinary student, Kassandra, who was so eager to learn, that she came over to Orlando later in the week to help with our demo at Universal City Walk.

So, after spending some much appreciated family time in TB, ( it was Riley’s first plane trip), I headed over to Orlando for a few more classes. I stayed at Portofino, a hotel at Universal that was modeled after an italian port city. That was neat, until I facebooked, "in Italy", and felt bad as many of my friends were all excited for me. Not that Italy...

Ate at a few restaurants while in Florida.

Sideberns, Tampa. Really progressive menu and got a neat tour from Asbel.

restauarntBT, Tampa. Great Asian / French food. Riley's first fine dining experience, very cool

Emerils, Orlando. On the ol' corporate dollar, I ordered the biggest steak they had. Someone please buy new plates at Emerils. When china has so many scratches, that it looks grey, it’s time to reinvest...

Highlight of Orlando, having a small arsenal of stages to help. We are starting to roll deep!

Than, in a slight mix-up, I needed to drive back from Orlando to Tampa at night, and catch a 530 AM flight to 

Atlanta to shoot an episode of Movie and a Makeover.

It is set to air the day after Thanksgiving. The holiday themed affair was awesome. I really enjoyed playing within the theme and want you to check it out if you can on that Friday.

And scripted television... a very good experience for me. It’s a different game and it’s the balancing of improv that makes it great. This was an awesome run for me and I’m hoping Turner, a local giant, invites me to do a bit more work. I was feeling it.

And without break, I was at it again for two separate days of shows in Atlanta, the last at Piedmont Park, where I received a much warmer welcome than I anticipated.

I did have to skip a dinner at Restaurant Eugene where I was supposed to meet the Real Housewives of Atlanta.  I will be blogging the show so it would have been interesting to meet them off camera. 

Tomorrow, finishing the week, I am at the Atlanta Home show at Cobb Galleria, before getting on a plane to LA for some private functions.

West Coast Stomping, Part 2

Back from Los Angeles today and feeling quite exhausted from 2
consecutive tour stops, and a little too much entertaining.

But first, I was stopped in the airport in ATL. That happens, and it
seemed pretty standard…

Them: " I loved you on the show, you were great"

Me: “Thanks!”

Them: " I really loved you on American Idol"

Yikes !!!!! Of course I just said thanks, I mean it's a popular show.

I worked two tour days. The first day with Brian Malarkey from Season 3 and the second day with Antonia Lofaso, my cast mate in Season 4.
We batted it back and forth and really gave a good show on both days. This was the
first stop where I really brought out the toys. Equipped with a
little, OK, a lot of liquid nitrogen and immersion circulators, I
really ramped it up.... I mean it's Hollywood right?

Now here's the thing.... Being ON STAGE all the time is tough. I don't
mean physically on stage, but knowing that everyone you meet, or who
recognizes you walks away with an impression makes you really want to
validate yourself, your performance, your personal character. I've
never not given any supporter or fan everything I have even if it's
only for 2 minutes in passing. It's important. We (Top Chef, quasi
celebrity, e- listers, whatever ) really need to validate the
integrity of what we do. It's a responsibility. But this trip grinded
on me, and for the first time I just wanted to throw on a baseball cap
and some sun glasses, maybe even a fake beard, and just chill out for
a bit, alone...

But I was also doing some business in Laguna Beach, so for really 3
days straight I just really needed to push and be “on”. I love Laguna Beach, what
a place, really gorgeous, like post card beautiful. I got the tour
from my new friends Monica and Brad, had a great meal, even better
conversation, and I hope to be seeing a lot more of Orange County, and
next time with Jazmin and baby Riley.

I'm typing this on my flight back now, in a Dodgers cap.... no beard )

And I am exhausted.

West Coast Stomping, Part 1

For Part One of my trip to LA hop over to Bravotv.com

http://www.bravotv.com/Top_Chef/season/4/blogs/index.php?blog=top_chef_the_tour&article=2008/08/richard_blais_los_angeles

Oooo Buuurn!

Antonia Lofaso's (http://www.bravotv.com/Top_Chef/season/4/bios/index.php?cat=chef&p=antonia ) liquid nitrogen burn (on her foot) from our last tour stop in LA. I've seen better!

More to come on my trip to the West Coast.....

HOME

Back HOME, literally, the restaurant is coasting at a good pace. My chef Jef Wright seems like he's starting to hit his stride, and the feedback, and business is very good. Unfortunately not good enough for all, as I can start to feel the slightest bit of pressure from my "touring" lately. We will try to ride it out and see if there really is an understanding in place, we'll see.

In other news, again literally, we shot 2 pieces for the local CBS affiliate that air this week http://www.cbs46.com/video/17108066/
http://www.cbs46.com/video/17066755/
we shot some video for a food website, www.Eatdrinkordie.com , and did a few print pieces and 1 radio show. It's crazytown son !!!

so I am off to LA for another tour stop, with a new Macbook, and the coolest gadget since the immersion circulator......... The I-phone....I have now joined the rest of humanity!

A Reverend, an Ambassador and a bottle of soy sauce...

So I’m back from Phoenix a few pounds lighter for sure and minus a few articles of clothing.

Kecap manis (a sweet, thick soy sauce) doesn’t do too well at 30,000 ft. As my parcel came out on the carousel, that beautiful aroma of the shiny condiment hit me and probably a few others as well. Back at the hotel, the cleaning person probably thought I murdered someone as I left more than half of my clothes drenched in a dark viscous liquid. Oddly enough, I usually leave an article of clothing behind in hotels, I’m not sure why, but I do. I left my pink crocs in Chicago for example.

Aside from the explosion, the trip went well. Betty Fraser was a trip, even though she kicked her fish back at the restaurant we went too! I’m looking forward to catching up with her again next week in LA.

The fans in Phoenix were awesome. As I was sweating my Parisian scoops off, the natives were perspiration free, and a lot of fun. Another super clean city, as I got a chance to jog both days around downtown, and see the baseball and basketball stadiums. I forgot my ipod, and so once again, I had to run w/o the influence of mid nineties hip-hop.

The next stop on the tour for me is LA next week and I’m looking forward to working again with Antonia Lofaso, my colleague from season 4.

So with the long flight back east, and a longer lay over at the airport ( something I don’t mind, as I get strange enjoyment from airports ), I really started thinking about how all of this traveling, presenting and demonstrating could really have an impact on the creative food movement. And that’s a new goal. I really want to turn as many people on to trying new things with their cooking, or better yet, their dining options. So, I hope I can become a good ambassador of my craft, a much misunderstood genre of food.

Which brings me to this….the day before I flew to Phoenix; I did a phone interview with a Phoenix journalist. (http://thedish.freedomblogging.com/2008/07/24/qa-richard-blais-talks-burgers-top-chef-and-31-course-menus/ ) and the guy, Jesse, really asked some of the best questions I’ve had thrown my way in a bit. I mean, I’m just tired of people asking me if Lisa was a bitch, or if Padma’s hot, like either of them needs my validation.

So then THE question comes, and it always comes…is Atlanta the city for me, or would I be better off in San Fran or NYC. So in answering I, and if you know me, make this long connection to the South being a conservative town and how it may take a bit for them to embrace creative cooking, because, hey, lets be honest, it took the South a long time to embrace civil rights…. And if you just winced, like my wife did, or like my friends at Amuse-Biatch did (http://amuse-biatch.blogspot.com/) then I get why. I guess I have a way of talking that does not drive a direct A to B line, my mind takes the scenic route and I go along for the ride. I certainly didn’t mean anything news worthy of it. However, ironically, on our night out in Phoenix we ran into Jesse Jackson… in Arizona… weird.

So the lesson of the day is to find out if I’m being quoted verbatim, or if the writer is going to write the piece and pepper in a few quotes. This one was verbatim, and inflection, tone and sarcasm just don’t come off well in print.

So it’s back to running a restaurant for a few days, and then, back to Jamaica doing more product development for the new launch of Red Stripe… speak soonest.

Postcards from Phoenix

A recent interview...

http://thedish.freedomblogging.com/2008/07/24/qa-richard-blais-talks-burgers-top-chef-and-31-course-menus/

Blais on Ice

Top chef tour

So in a few days I head out to Phoenix for my second stop on the top chef tour. The tour brings top chef contestants from different seasons together for a day of demonstrations on a 48 foot bus equipped with a kitchen of course.

My first stop was Columbus Ohio, where I teamed up with Hung from season 3. And although I was a bit apprehensive of the tour in the beginning ( feeling like it had a bit of muppets on ice aspect to it ) now I’m pretty damn excited about it. See I’m a pretty big college football fan, and I like traveling in general, so visiting Columbus, a city I’ve never been to, and a college football Mecca, was pretty special. Unfortunately, I only glimpsed the Horseshoe as we flew over it on my why back to Atlanta.

I loved Columbus for a few reasons besides the football tradition. It was a really clean city, and when I checked in I immediately went for a run down what I think was actually “Main Street”. The air was fresh, that sounds silly maybe, but it just had a kind of happy quality to the place.

And the people were just amazing. A ton of fans showed up, waving banners, and cheering, and well, if you’re not a rock star, and I’m not, this was a small taste of what it must feel like. It’s pretty damn cool for sure.

Hung was a trip, we have met before, when out of no where he and Casey ( season 3) showed up in my restaurant, but we didn’t get a chance to hang out that night. I remember Hung got a lot of junk for being a jerk during his season, but his personality is pretty common in a professional kitchen. He’s just a confident guy, for good reason , and I’m glad I got a chance to work with him. I really think he’ll be someone I’ll stay in touch with. Hung, a few days later in NYC, returned volley on the meal I prepared for him in ATL, and it was excellent.

So, next on the tour is Phoenix, Arizona. Another place I’ve never been and another chef to work with that I don’t know much about. I’ll be working with Betty Fraser ( season 2) and I’ll be bringing some very cold ingredients to combat the desert heat!