Video Monday - Avocado Recipes with the Too Hot Tamales

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Sunday Brunch Recipe From Mary Sue Milliken

Top Chef Masters Contestant, Mary Sue Milliken, offers this recipe suggestion for Easter.


Posted on AllTopChef.com

All Top Chef Mail Box Monday

Here's a great interview with the Moto boys, who cooked at the James Beard House last week.

Curious about Top Chef Masters Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger's new sitcom? Read more here.

Looking for a Christmas gift for yourself or another Top Chef friend? Check out this piece about judge Hugh Acheson's new cookbook, about how to start out Canadian and end up in the South.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Top Chef News, Shoes, and Shows

Zac Young of Just Desserts 1 at the James Beard Foundation annual gala and auction: “I promised if the bidding went high enough, I'd cook in Gail's shoes. It did and La Simmons handed over the goods.”

We mentioned yesterday that we spotted TC: Texas contestant Nyesha Arrington on last Sunday’s “sneak peak” at the new Food Network show, Chef Hunters. Now comes word TC Masters Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger will be looking to hire an executive chef for their restaurant Border Grill on the show’s official premiere this Thursday night at 10:00 Eastern.

And if that’s not enough, there’s a 1980s-era sit-com in the works based on Too Hot Tamales Mary Sue and Susan’s long-standing friendship and business partnership (and there's that husband they have in common . . .)

Missing Anthony Bourdain as a judge on the new season of Top Chef? Never fear. His new show, The Layover, premieres on the Travel Channel Monday, Nov. 21. Click here for video of his segment this week on Letterman, where he explains how The Layover is different from No Reservations, and why “the smell of failure is French toast.”

Bourdain will also make an appearance, as it were, on The Simpsons this Sunday (Nov. 13 at 8:00 Eastern on Fox), in which Marge becomes, yes, a food blogger. Grub Street has a great interview with the show’s executive producer about the episode (don’t miss the slideshow).

Posted on AllTopChef.com

All Top Chef Interview with Mary Sue Milliken

Top Chef Masters finalist, Mary Sue Milliken, talks about her experience on the Bravo show.

Click here for the podcast.

Click here to learn more about "Share Our Strength."

Thank you Chef Mary Sue!
Posted on AllTopChef.com

Bravo Exit Interview - Mary Sue Milliken

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Reactions to the Top Chef Masters 3 Finale

This week's finale episode of Top Chef Masters season 3 had the three finalists - Floyd Cardoz, Mary Sue Milliken, and Traci DesJardins - creating a three course meal based on three criteria. The first course needed to draw from an early food memory. The second course needed to reference the meal that made each contestant want to be a chef. Finally, the third course had to be based on a specific memory from one of the Critics. After drawing knives, Mary Sue finds that Ruth Reichl would love a lemon soufflé, Traci needs to make a memorable duck and Bernaise dish for Gael Greene, and Floyd has to recreate a spicy Indonesian rendang for James Oseland.

To aid them in this task, the chefs are assigned sous chefs with whom they are very comfortable, namely their own chefs from their restaurants.

Off for shopping, which is not limited to Whole Foods.With only 8 hours combined to shop and prep, Mary Sue plays it safe and buys all of her ingredients from Whole Foods. Floyd, on the other hand, needs to rush all over LA to source his ingredients and gets stuck in traffic. So while Mary Sue and Traci are cooking away in the Top Chef Masters kitchen, Floyd is nowhere to be found. Eventually he shows up with a mere 3 hours to spare - and two types of meat to braise to tenderness in that short time.

The next day, they are taken by car to a mysterious location, which turns out to be a house near the Hollywood Hills where Curtis Stone is waiting to make them breakfast. Afterwards, fueled by mimosas, they head back to the TCM kitchen to cook for another two hours.

While it seems they all have some issues in the kitchen -  Traci is not happy with the quality of her duck, Mary Sue is forced to use liquid nitrogen to make her lemon ice cream, Floyd's fish was badly butchered - they somehow all make it work.

When the Critics arrive, we see they've brought Danyelle Freeman, Alan Sytsma, and Tom Colicchio, plus former TCM contestants Jonathan Waxman, Susan Feniger, Rick Moonen, Jody Adams, and Susur Lee along to dine with them.

For the first course, Floyd serves an upma (semolina) polenta with wild mushrooms, Mary Sue brings out an Asian-style steak tartare, and Traci does a shrimp creole, all based on early food memories.

For the second course, Floyd made a rice-flake coated snapper, Mary Sue has shrimp two ways, and Traci offers a quail salad with sweetbreads.

Finally, for the third course, Floyd offers his rendang two ways (shortribs and oxtail) with tapioca pilaf, Mary Sue brings her lemon soufflé, and Traci has a duo of duck.

While the critics nitpick most of the dishes, Mary Sue's soufflé is faultless, and Floyd's rendang is highly praised. Traci's duck dish doesn't evoke the proper memories for Gael Greene, however, so it looks like she's out of the competition at that point.

Just when it seems that Mary Sue has it in the bag, Curtis announces that the winner is Floyd! Perhaps a surprise, but a pleasant one.

So what did you all think about this episode? Please tell us in the comments!

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Congratulations, Chef Mary Sue Milliken!

In the penultimate episode of Top Chef Masters season 3, Chef Mary Sue Milliken created a buffet meal for a Guatamalan-born serviceman recently arrived home from active duty. Her pork ribs and potatoes rajas thrilled him and his family, and scored her the most points from all of the diners. And that earned Mary Sue her fourth win this season and a trip to the finale.



Can she win it all? Tune in next week!

This post is only for positive comments about Chef Milliken and her dishes. If you have anything negative to say, please do so here

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Congratulations, Chef Mary Sue Milliken!

Wow - this week we had yet another win from Chef Mary Sue Milliken! She's won so many Elimination Challenges so far, I've lost count (but I'll bet Floyd Cardoz remembers, since he was on the top with her every time).



Congrats Chef! Only 2 more episodes to go - will you win those, too?

This post is only for positive comments about Chef Milliken and her dishes. If you have anything negative to say, please do so here.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

TC News and Information 5.17.11

Let's start today's post with Stephanie Izard, who is doing a special "Dueling Pigs" limited seating dinner May 29 featuring humanely raised pigs of two different heirloom breeds. She'll announce only on Twitter - and soon - when tickets to those 16 seats will be available.

Then there's Carla Hall, who's out and about offering fish recipes as part of a "Go Fish" campaign with CanolaInfo.org. She demos a dish and talks about her new TV show, "The Chew," in this video with local Hawaiian station KITV.

We're glad Carla survived the tornado that shut down the St. Louis airport last month. But she has stirred up a bit of a kerfuffle by becoming a spokesperson for Fancy Feast cat food, which is sponsoring a "flavor creation contest" where cat owners can submit suggestions to be turned into actual catfood - the reverse of what most TC contestants aspire to - as reported here and here.

A kerfuffle of an entirely different color has emerged in Canada, where Food Network Canada is broadcasting the first season of Top Chef to be produced in a country other than the U.S. Toronto Life and HuffPost talk about the blogospheric backlash that ensued after previews aired at the end of last week's TC Canada episode foreshadowed Daniel Boulud and a "classic French-themed challenge" where one contestant would have to cook horse meat (which is apparently legal in Canada, although not in the U.S., and considered something of a specialty in France). The actual episode is airing 5/16/11 as I write this post and autolaunch it for Tuesday morning, although we in the U.S. are barred from legally viewing it. Top Chef Canada's facebook page said this prior to Monday evening's episode:

There has been a great deal of conversation around the use of horse meat in tonight's episode of Top Chef Canada.  The premise of this particular episode is traditional French cuisine and horse meat is selected as one among several other ingredients that represent traditional French foods. We assure our viewers that the horse meat along with all protein featured in this episode was federally approved and meets HACCP standards. . . . What has become clear in the past few days, however, is that there are many varying opinions and claims surrounding the commercialization of horse meat. In light of this, Food Network Canada pledges to investigate the various issues and will carefully consider all the facts around this topic should horse meat be suggested for any future production.

And we thought bugs were hard to stomach.

To end this post on a more light-hearted note, check out this video from CNN, where Suvir Saran and Mary Sue Milliken run into James Oseland for the first time since filming Top Chef Masters 3.


Posted on AllTopChef.com

Congratulations, Chef Mary Sue Milliken

Congratulations to Chef Milliken on her second win in this competition! It's been a bumpy ride for this chef, who ended up in the bottom three even more often than she pulled out the victory. This one she had in the bag, however. With her experience on the Border Grill food truck, she was able to make a dish that pleased guests and judges alike without a lot of sweating.



Keep up the good work, Chef!

This post is only for positive comments about Chef Milliken and her dishes. If you have anything negative to say, please do so here.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

TC News and Information 4.20.11

All-Star contestant Spike Mendelsohn will be back on the small screen in October, competing on the next "Next Iron Chef." And he'll be going up against TC Masters 2 winner Marcus Samuelsson and two-time TC Masters contestant Michael Chiarello. Odds, anyone? Grub Street has the full cast lineup.

Not to be outdone, All-Star Fan Favorite Carla Hall will be joining the "The Chew," a daytime talk show devoted to "food from EVERY angle," says the press release. Carla will be part of a "rotating cast" of hosts that includes former Iron Chef Mario Batali, current Iron Chef Michael Symon, "entertaining expert" Clinton Kelly (TLC's "What Not to Wear"), and "nutrition expert" Daphne Oz (who apparently is related to Dr. Oz, also of daytime talk show fame). Eater is all over this story, with the full press release, news of the ire it has inspired in fans of "All My Children" (the daytime soap that will go off the air in September to make room for "The Chew"), Mario Batali's response to the soap backlash, and best of all, a photoshopped image of The View, er, Chew's foodie cast.

Season 4 TC winner Stephanie Izard keeps racking up so many awards it's almost hard to keep track of them. She somehow managed to find time in her crazy schedule to write a blog post about the thrill of being named one of Food + Wine's 10 Best New Chefs of 2011, and it's a a sweet and funny read.

All-Star winner Richard Blais is everywhere these days too. Check out this piece from Yumsugar, where he says he's opening "several restaurants in the Southeast" and confirms he will be part of this year's Top Chef Tour.

The TC Tour got underway last week in St. Louis, and Bravo's website is continuing to add and change details as plans firm up. Click here for the latest and to see if they'll be stopping near you. Season 6's Hector Santiago (who talks about the Tour here) competed against Season 4's Nikki Cascone at the St. Louis stop, which current Masters contestant Celina Tio judged, according to her facebook page.

For an even more impressive Top Chef Midwestern meal (sadly for the rest of us, not part of the Tour), check out this post from blogger Big Shamu at The Karmic Kitchen, who was fortunate enough to taste a six-course meal prepared by Carla Hall and Antonio LoFaso in Kansas City, appropriately dubbed "Girl Power."

In light of the events of last week's Top Chef Masters, here's an interesting piece the LA Times that ran just before that episode aired. Of John Rivera Sedlar (who disappeared from Episode 2 with little fanfare - hence, the return of Hugh Acheson), the LAT says: "As will be seen in an upcoming episode, Sedlar was opening his new restaurant, Playa, at the start of the five-week Top Chef Masters shoot. 'I had everybody working double-time,' Sedlar said. When he saw how the restaurant's marketing campaign was unfolding without his guidance, 'my blood was starting to boil' but he couldn't leave the show to deal with it. That's when he considered fleeing to France." The article also says that Mary Sue Milliken, "clearly a bit more unflappable, decided to leave her restaurants in [business partner and former TCM contestant Susan] Feniger's hands and even moved into the Top Chef Masters contestants' hotel for much of the production, hence her description of it as the 'evil vacation.'" Future episode reveals? A sequesterville hotel? Hmm.

A tip of the hat to my co-blogger here, Minx, who has deduced that this season of Top Chef Masters will conclude June 15, when Rocco DiSpirito's "Dinner Party" prepares to take over the coveted Wednesday night timeslot on Bravo.

And finally, are you as charmed by Suvir Saran as I am? Love his dry wit. Here's a cute piece - and cuter photo - of him. He doesn't seem to be doing a lot of appearances, but if you're near Silicon Valley, you can catch him at the Dining Out for Life fundraiser April 28-29.


Posted on AllTopChef.com

Top Recipe - Mary Sue Milliken's Deviled Eggs

Bravo's not giving us Top Recipe videos this season, but I thought you might be interested in seeing the winning recipe in print.

Japanese Style Poached Egg, Umeboshi & Mustard Miso Mayonnaise

Traditional Deviled Eggs:
10 hard-boiled, medium-sized eggs, peeled and cut in half lengthwise
1/4 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons crème fraiche
1-2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Piment d'Espelette or paprika, for serving

Modern Hot Springs Egg with Ume Porridge and Japanese Mustard Mayonnaise:
1 tablespoon Yuzu Kosho (Japanese condiment made from Yuzu zest and chile peppers)
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
3 cups Ume Ginger Dashi (see recipe below)
1 cup cooked sushi rice (leftover is fine)
4 slow-cooked eggs (see recipe below)
Garnish: julienned, toasted nori (seaweed), toasted sesame seeds

Ume Ginger Dashi:
3 1/2 cups water
1 4-inch piece dried konbu (kelp)
1 cup bonito flakes
4 large Umeboshi (Japanese pickled plums), pitted and roughly chopped
3 tablespoons roughly chopped mitsuba (Japanese herb) or substitute cilantro stems
1 1-inch piece ginger, grated and juice squeezed (about 1 teaspoon juice)
Soy sauce, to taste
Salt, to taste

DIRECTIONS

Deviled Eggs:
1. Pack a pot with room temperature eggs, just enough water to cover and a few tablespoons salt (salt sets the whites if an egg cracks accidentally). Bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer 6 1/2 to 7 minutes for medium eggs (8 to 8 1/2 minutes for large or extra large eggs), transfer immediately to ice water. When cool peel and slice in half lengthwise.

2. Remove yolks from eggs and reserve whites. Push egg yolks through a sieve into a mixing bowl. Gently combine with mayonnaise, crème fraiche, and mustard. Season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

3. Fill a pastry bag fitted with a star tip with egg yolk mixture. Pipe mixture into reserved egg whites, sprinkle with Piment d’Esplette and chill before serving.

Hot Springs Egg with Ume Porridge and Japanese Mustard Mayonnaise:
1. Mix Yuzu Kosho with mayonnaise and reserve.

2. Heat dashi with cooked sushi rice to create a porridge and adjust seasoning with salt and/or soy sauce.

3. Immediately transfer to 4 warm serving bowls and crack a Slow-Cooked Egg over the top of the porridge. Top each egg with a small dollop of Yuzu Kosho Mayonnaise and sprinkle with sesame seeds and nori. Enjoy immediately.

Slow Cooked Eggs:

1. Place an upside-down saucer in a small pot and fill it with boiling water. Place the eggs gently into the pot, just enough to fill one layer. Check the water temperature, looking for 145 degrees F.

2. Keep the eggs cooking on the lowest setting (or turn the burner on and off occasionally) for 50 minutes, keeping the temperature as close to 145 degrees F as possible. After at least 50 minutes of cooking (more time at 145 degrees won’t change the outcome), remove eggs from water and simply crack and eat! Alternatively, you can cool these eggs in ice water and then heat one at a time in warm water as needed.

Dashi:
1. Bring water to a boil then reduce to lowest possible heat and add konbu. After 5 minutes add bonito flakes and turn off heat. Let steep 5 minutes more, strain carefully through a cheesecloth or very fine sieve. Season broth with chopped Umeboshi, mitsuba or cilantro stems, ginger juice, soy sauce, and salt to taste.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Congratulations, Chef Mary Sue Milliken!

Chef Mary Sue Milliken went from the bottom two in last week's Restaurant Wars episode straight to the top, winning the 60s recipe redux challenge with her very unusual Japanese-style take on deviled eggs. The judges raved about the flavors and the fact that she took a real chance with her dish.


Chef Milliken, you are possibly the most widely known chef in this competition, so your reputation is at stake - how far can you go?

This post is only for nice comments about Chef Milliken and her dishes. If you have anything negative to say, please do so here.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

TC News and Information 4.11.11

So, what did you think of the new format and team of host and "critics" for Masters 3?

If you're among those wondering "Who the Hell is Curtis Stone?" Eater has a pretty thorough run-down of answers, and WWD has an insightful piece as well (Stone does not seem to be a Housewives fan - lol).

Bravo has blogs up from Ruth Reichl and James Oseland, both of whom vigorously disagree with the diners, who were allowed to select the winning TCM Restaurant Wars team. Bravo also continues its extended Judges' (ahem, not "Critics') Table videos, and in this week's clip, Oseland talks about how "weird" and "space-alien-like" he found poor Hugh Acheson's scallops.

Before you become too attached to Ruth Reichl as a Masters critic, read this TV Guide interview with Magical Elves producer Dan Cutforth. Ruth was not available to film all the episodes (kind of like we were teased that Anthony Bourdain would be on more All-Stars episodes than proved to be the case?). However, Cutforth says Gael Greene will be back for “a few” episodes, Gail Simmons for “a couple,” and Padma Lakshmi for “one.” Sadly, no mention of bringing back Jay Rayner.

Cutforth also talks about the difference between “critics” and “judges” and says: “We were actually really happy with the panel of critics we had assembled, but you always want to keep evolving and keep things moving... That said, we wanted to reflect the new reality of food criticism, which is that food blogs and online criticism are a huge part of the restaurant business now. So critics panel will also include people from sites like Grub Street and RestaurantGirl." Danyelle Freeman of the blog Restaurant Girl was, of course, among the critics for the first TCM3 episode. Grub Street (New York Magazine's food blog) fesses up that its own Alan Sytsma is also a guest judge this season.

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal has an interesting piece on Masters contestant Naomi Pomeroy, with more of her back story (plus a recipe for the former Mrs. Hebberoy's Potato and Green Garlic Soup).

Mary Sue Milliken turned down TC Masters repeatedly, accordingly to the Las Vegas Sun.

And here's an interesting interview with Masters contestant Sue Zemanick, of New Orleans' Gautreau, who says she prefers to stay out of the spotlight.

While Top Chef Masters contenders are competing on behalf of charities of their choice, other TC'ers are lending their names to causes as well, including All-Stars Richard Blais, Mike Isabella, Carla Hall, Antonia LoFaso, Jennifer Carroll, Angelo Sosa, Dale Levitski, Jamie Lauren, Dale Talde, Tre Wilcox, Casey Thompson, and Fabio Viviani, who have signed onto the Humane Society of the United States’ Protect Seals boycott of Canadian seafood in an effort to end Canada’s commercial seal slaughter.

And a host of New York chefs are joining in HRC's Marriage Equality Campaign, including Tom Collichio, with this video.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

Meet the Masters - Mary Sue Milliken

Mary Sue Milliken is co-chef/owner of the popular, critically acclaimed Border Grill, serving modern Mexican food in Downtown Los Angeles and Santa Monica, California, Las Vegas at Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, and on the Border Grill Truck. A pioneer of world cuisine since the creation of City Café and CITY Restaurant in Los Angeles in the 1980s, Milliken is also well known as one half of the dynamic "Too Hot Tamales" with longtime business partner Chef Susan Feniger. Milliken is a preeminent ambassador of authentic Mexican cuisine, setting the standard for gourmet Mexican fare for over two decades and co-authoring five cookbooks, including Cooking with Too Hot Tamales, Mesa Mexicana, and City Cuisine. Always a trailblazer, Milliken was the first female chef to work at Chicago's prestigious Le Peroquet in the late 1970s, going on to train at a Michelin two-star, female chef owned restaurant in Paris, and later joining a handful of progressive women chefs to found Women Chefs & Restaurateurs. An active member of the community, Milliken is on the national board of Share Our Strength, committed to ending childhood hunger in America by 2015 with the No Kid Hungry campaign. In addition, Milliken is passionate about the environment and leads the culinary industry with eco-friendly policies at her Border Grill restaurants and Truck.