A Little RecognitionBy Brooks Hamaker The James Beard Foundation held its annual award ceremonies in New York May 7 and 8, and several New Orleanians came out on top. The Journalism Awards had a decidedly New Orleans theme when they were presented May 7. Chefs from here and around the region were invited to work in tandem, under the direction of cooking legend John Folse, to prepare some of the dishes that have made New Orleans one of the culinary capitals of the world. Greg Sonnier, Donald Link, and Cynthia Schneider were among those who helped put the dinner together. Brett Anderson, restaurant writer for The Times-Picayune, took home the top honor in the “Newspaper Feature Writing about restaurants and or chefs with or without recipes.” The feature that helped him earn the prize was a highly detailed account of the career of the legendary Paul Prudhomme, owner and chef of K-Paul’s Kitchen and author of many influential cookbooks concerning Louisiana cuisine. The next night, the meals for the Restaurant awards were under the supervision of Susan Spicer, chef/owner of Bayona. John Besh, who defeated Iron Chef Bobby Flay on Food Network’s Iron Chef America earlier this year, came out on top in the “Best Chef-Southeast Region.” Besh is better known as chef, owner, proprietor of Restaurant August, and he was one of the featured chefs for the evening. The James Beard Foundation, through money raised via ticket sales for these events, made a generous donation of $28,000 to the Gulf Coast Renaissance Fund, and this money has been earmarked for use towards the rebuilding of Willie Mae’s Scotch House (see June’s OffBeat). Subscribe to offBeat and receive a FREE JazzFest CD! |
