AS THE FOOD WORLD TURNS
Event
What do EATS3 and a roller coaster have in common? Ups and downs, baby. Take Saturday for example. We arrived at the grand tasting about 2 hours late (hey, it’s a 4 hour event) and within minutes knew that we had made a HUGE mistake. What we encountered was possibly the finest collection of food and wine ever gathered together in Phoenix. Obscure wines (like the ’07 Stuhlmuller Chard pictured above!), common wines pouring their best, 40 restaurants, and a mild-mannered, manageable crowd … it was sheer perfection. We capped the tasting with a cooking presentation by Mr. Pépin himself.
We should have left it at that, because the finale event – BBQ & Bubbles – was neither BBQ nor Bubbles. Jacob’s Creek sparkling is hardly a follow-up to the great stuff being poured earlier. Jacob’s $%^&* Creek! And the dinner that followed was average at best. Canned peaches, overcooked salmon, dried up mac n’ cheese, and servers who were refilling glasses with whatever they had in hand … this is one $200 ticket that did not live up to its name.
But, EATS3, we understand this is your first year. We heard rave reviews of some Gallery events and scorn of others. We heard some chefs were happy, some were not. But overall, everyone’s glad you pulled it off and look forward to seeing what you do in ’09. We, for one, hope to find a re-run of Saturday’s Grand Tasting.
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