Also, I got to judge Top Chef while they filmed in Chicago. I had to sign a 12 page confidentiality agreement, though, to do it so I think that’s really all I can say about it right now, except that it’s airing May 14 so tune in.

I got to judge the Bucktown Apple Pie Contest, an annual event in Chicago’s Bucktown neighborhood. 81 glorious entries, all lined up in a school gym on tables like a science fair…the sight brought me to tears…it was so beautiful I could just feel the love and caring wafting off these hand made pies.

It got narrowed down to 9 from the 91 and then we tasted through them carefully, analyzing for taste, texture of the cooked apples, flakiness of the crust, was there too much liquid in the bottom, too much starch or the wrong kind of starch, appearance, doneness, and could it be an icon or was it just too far out to be “The One”…very tricky business judging pies. The winner was a reliable one with cut outs of leaves an top, so it was decorative, but not too much, and “ate well”, as I like to say. The creator was Linda Schmidt of Chicago who won a $250 gift certificate to Sur la Table, a culinary supply store. I judged with Nancy Mathieson from the American Pie Council (I didn’t even know there was one) www.piecouncil.org and she asked if I’d like to judge the National Pie competition in Orlando next year. So I’ll see you there in April 2008. I’ll be giving a demo too.

The highlight of this months events was I baked for Scott Tyree’s wedding. He was my sommelier at Tru for 8 years and recently left to get the Oh-so-coveted-in-my-business day job. The invitation said the dress was “Morning Smart.” I couldn’t wait to see what THAT was! When we pressed Scott he said “Think Breakfast At Tiffany’s”. He asked me to make a little something to pass with champagne (I just love a morning wedding with champagne, don’t you?) So I thought I’d do something kind of monochromatic. I did mini chocolate cupcakes which a kiss of bone colored almond butter cream decorated with 3 mini malted milk balls. Understated and delicious, if I do say so myself. Crunch, creamy and moist all in one quick bite. I was baking them off at the same time as a news crew was filming in my house taping a segment on healthy snacks for kids, so I had bowls of raspberries, fresh mozzarella cubes, and grapes on the table plus fixins’ for the kids to make turkey and muenster cheese roll ups and fruit kebabs. Ruby was cutting watermelon for it on camera. Gio’s friend Ryan was over so the four kids hammed it up for the camera. We even went outside to the garden with the camera man and shot the kids picking the last lonely overgrown cucumber off the vine.

I flew to St. Louis to do a Satellite Media Tour for the American Association of Orthodontists. I had written some braces friendly recipes for their web site www.braces.org like Savory Chicken Pot Pie and Baked Bananas over Ice Cream and was doing interviews about what not to eat from your Halloween hall that might hurt your braces like candies that are chewy, sticky crunchy or hard and reminding people to floss. Apparently the day after Halloween is the busiest day of the year at the orthodontists office. I was on about 15 different morning news programs talking about it.

I co-chaired the annual Bag Hunger event with Ina Pinkney and Susan Goss this month which was a big success. Our event featured 25 chefs with tasting stations. My staff made mini chocolate cupcakes, again, like from Tyree’s wedding.

I did a cooking demo and book signing at the Arts in Riverwoods event. My dad’s Big Band was playing and then while they were on break I demonstrated chocolate dipped peanut butter balls. There was leftover filling so I brought it home and rolled and dipped for a neighborhood party.

Events I went to
Alice Waters was in town signing her new book Simply so Jimmy and I picked up Gio after school and took him with us to meet her at Prairie, Sarah Stegner’s restaurant. We explained to him that she was a very influential culinary luminary. I think he got it. It’s always inspiring to hear her talk about what she’s doing and who she meeting with about it. This time it was our mayor Daley about the public school lunch program. We ate hors’ d’oeuvres and got a bunch of books signed by her and she was very gracious when I introduced her to Gio.

Home Cooking
At the end of the month we drove to southern Michigan with the last apple pie I made of the season in the back of the car. I used Honey Crisp Apples because I’m just getting tired of always using Granny Smith’s, which I’d never done before and it was fantastic. Did I miss a memo that that variety makes great pies or am I the first to try it? It had no bottom crust so I guest it was more like a pot pie and I cut a Jack-o-lantern face out of the top crust. I just tossed the apples with some spices, sugar, and little flour and then turned it into my mother’s Pyrex pie pan from my childhood, then I dotted it with butter and rolled out some pie dough from the freezer (that was the whole point of this was to help empty out the freezer). There were some trimmings left so I did what my mom always did which is make a tiny pie with just a bottom crust and monogram it with an initial, sprinkle it with cinnamon and sugar then bake it. To serve it I pour milk over it and it warms the milk. I made them for Gio and he made it even better by replacing the milk with whipped cream.

I also tried a plum cake from Bon Appétit magazine. I was interested in it because the recipe called for almond paste, which I’m crazy for. It was good eating and one of those cakes that ages well and gets even better the next day. Ella and Ruby helped mix the batter so I give them credit for it when friends came over the next morning to sample it.

We were on our way to a Harvest Party at Seedling’s Farm and Pete Klein is the farmer. He served hot cider, fresh pressed from his orchard, a table full of salads and another full of pies, a goat roasting on the grill and root vegetables too. There were washtub fires for making S’Mores, hayrides, apple bobbing and pumpkins to pack up in the car. It was one of those perfect crisp fall days.

Meals Out
I went to a Pig Roast at Dela Costa, Douglas Rodregus’ new-ish place in Chicago. It was a fund raiser for Common Threads, Art Smith’s foundation (Oprah’s chef) I went with my friend Kathy and we stopped at Fox and Obel first and bought 3 kinds of pork (French poached ham, Calabrian sausage, artisanal bacon) and then went to the pig roast.

Jimmy and I went to China Town for the day to scout it for an AIWF event (I’m on the board in Chicago) www.aiwf.org and saw some cool stuff. We went to Captain Bakery and tried a bunch of things. Some favorites were the little custard tart, an extremely light sponge cake type muffin, and a curried chicken filled bun. We went to a grocery store and saw black skinned chickens, live eels for sale a box of live soft shell turtles apparently sold for use in soup and these little white pots of fruit flavored jelly which we bought to give out for Halloween. We walked past the Pui Tak Center, a large traditional looking Chinese building from 1932 where every thing from classes on how to fill out your taxes to violin lessons are given to the community. It was up for an architectural preservation grant from American Express, of which I was on the advisory board, so I was curious to see it. For lunch we went to Penang Malaysian restaurant. The most impressive part was a young man in the kitchen rolling out then tossing thin dough for a griddled pancake or flat bread that was served to us to wrap pork and yams in with spicy sauce. We also ate deep fried birds nest made from yams filled with vegetables.