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September 2010 
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Olive Oil Primer: How to Poach Seafood at Home in EVOO

An Eating Checklist to Combat the Bulging U.S. Waistline

Reinventing the Salad Bar

If There's Smoke, It Doesn't Mean Your EVOO is Burning

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Events in Season
Flavor, Quality & American Menus
St. Helena, CA
Sept. 8-11

Kendall-Jackson Heirloom Tomato Festival
Santa Rosa, CA
Sept. 11


Harvest: Farm-to-Table
Carmel, CA
Sept. 25-26
 A Primer on Sweet Corn
Nebraska's state capital, Lincoln, is home to the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers. So maybe it was good karma for the university's football team that a dozen stalks of corn mysteriously cropped up along a busy street in Lincoln this summer. Nobody knows how they landed in the small strip of earth in front of Barry's Bar & Grill. One theory has it that a passing truck carrying corn accidentally spilled some. "The corn has people grinning ear to ear," quipped one TV newscaster.
Artichoke Fresh from California
We have plenty of reasons to love corn.

"If corn is freshly harvested and at its peak, there is no need to cook it," writes Napa Valley chef Michael Chiarello.

But it also takes well to different cooking methods: steamed in the husk, grilled, boiled, roasted and baked. It's an essential ingredient in soups like corn chowder, as well as corn salad and corn souffl�. Cut fresh from an ear, it adds color and crunch to salsa. Our featured chef, Greg Strickland, even makes corn flan.

Corn is an American culinary icon. It originated in Mexico and Central American and has been cultivated since at least 3,500 B.C. Incas, Mayas, Aztecs and native North Americans ate corn as a basic part of their diet.

"Corn is the New World's most important contribution to the world diet," Aliza Green writes in the Field Guide to Produce (Quirk Books, 2004).

Corn's many varieties include: white corn like Silver Queen; sweet yellow corn such as Tuxedo; and bi-color corn including Fleet.
Photo by Vassia Atanassova
Artichoke Fresh from California

Family tree: Botanical name is Zea mays. Corn known as maize throughout most of the world.

Health info: A good source of thiamin, vitamin B1, vitamin C, folate, dietary fiber.

Vital stats: U.S. farmers harvested 2.8 billion pounds of sweet corn in 2009, says the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Florida is the No. 1 sweet corn producing state, accounting for 24% of the crop. California is No. 2 with 16% and Georgia is No. 3 with 11%.

How to prepare: Whenever possible, buy corn the day you plan to cook it to ensure maximum flavor. Shuck at the last minute. Store in a plastic bag in the refrigerator.

How to buy: The fresher the better. Looks for husks that are fresh and green. Pull back part of the husk to examine the kernels. You should see evenly spaced rows of "pearly rounded teeth," Green says. When pressed with your fingernail the kernel should give off a milky substance.


 Featured Corn Recipes
Recipes Courtesy of Our Featured Chef Gregory Strickland

Olathe Corn Flan


Olathe Corn Flan









Additional Recipes

Corn with Sugar Snap Peas and Mint
Recipe courtesty of Marie Simmons



Corn and EVOO Bread Pudding
Recipe courtesy of Clive Berkman



Halibut & Corn-Chiarello
Halibut and Corn Salad with "Broken" Tomato Vinaigrette
Recipe credit: The Tra Vigne Cookbook: Seasons in the California Wine Country
Reprinted with permission of the publisher
(Chronicle Books, 2008), by Michael Chiarello with Penelope Wisner

Roasted Corn Chowder with Chicken, Lime and Cilantro
Recipe courtesy of Karina Allrich


Recipes Courtesy of Karin Calloway and Viking Range

Grilled Vegetable Gazpacho

Grilled Vegetable Gazpacho


Farm Stand Stew
 Featured Chef
Gregory Strickland
Vi
2850 Classic Drive
Highlands Ranch
CO 80126
(720)747-1234
Greg Strickland gives his customers plenty of face time. The chef walks diners through the menu explaining what dishes are high in fat or carbs. He details the types of fat - monounsaturated fat, say. And he guides diners who've developed diabetes because of decades of unhealthy eating.

"That's one we get a lot of," Strickland says. "It's hard because  they've been making the wrong choices for a long time."

Strickland's clientele are senior citizens, which can make things trickier when it comes to how he prepares food.

"Our palates tend to fade as we get older," Strickland says. "So we have the challenge here of making things flavorful without using too much fat."

Strickland is an executive chef for Vi, the upscale senior living center chain formerly known as Classic Residence by Hyatt. Strickland heads the kitchen at the Vi in Highlands Ranch, Colo., near Denver. He's been with the company for six years.

Strickland straddles the culinary and health care fields. He's a certified executive chef. And he's a "certified dietary manager" and a "certified food protection professional." That means Strickland works with a dietician and calculates the number of nutrients his meals provide. He holds regular meetings with Vi "members" to get feedback and address individual needs.
Greg Strickland's Broiled Tomatoes
"It's a lot more personal than most chefs get. When I was a restaurant chef you didn't get that contact or personal relationship," says Strickland, 38.

Strickland began cooking as a teenager in Gainesville, Fla. His first dish: key lime pie, at 16. "It was my first job as a cook working in a small seafood restaurant in Gainesville," Strickland recalls.

Strickland headed to New Orleans to seek his culinary fortune when he was 20. "I'd decided that cooking was what I wanted to do," he says. "If I wanted to learn better cuisine I had to be in a 'food city.'"

He arrived in the Big Easy in the summer of 1992. Hurricane Andrew blew into Louisiana two weeks later. "Everywhere in the street there were Mardi Gras beads that had been blown from the trees. "They'd probably been there for years," he says.

Strickland landed a line cook job at the highly acclaimed Mike's on the Avenue. The chef, Mike Fennelly, was at the time named by Food & Wine magazine as among America's Top Ten Young Chefs.

"One of the biggest things I learned from Mike was food presentation," Strickland says. "Mike was an artist who turned chef later in his life. All of his dishes were visually stunning."

Strickland stayed at Mike's for 2-1/2 years and became "hooked on becoming a chef."
Greg Strickland's EVOO-Poached Halibut
He moved back to Florida where he worked for other fine chefs. And at 25 he headed the kitchen at a small restaurant in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.: Las Olas Caf�, which recently reopened as the Mason Jar Caf�.

Strickland opened the kitchen at the Highlands Ranch Vi two years ago, having previously been the chef at the Vi in Pompano Beach, Fla.

He cooks with local seasonal ingredients. In August, for example, he uses Colorado peaches or melon. He chose corn, which he sources from Olathe, Colo., as September's featured vegetable.

And that raises another challenge for Strickland, in addition to his diner's dietary needs. "The trouble with Colorado is you have only two or three months of seasonal produce available," he says. "Seafood and tropical ingredients aren't so available."

Strickland's Vi clientele still enjoy a diverse selection. "You might see a Dijon-crusted rack of lamb on the same menu with meatloaf," Strickland says.

Sounds like they're making do just fine.






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