The 19th annual International Restaurant & Foodservice Show of New York will be taking place March 4 – March 6, 2012 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center. This event is owned and sponsored by the New York State Restaurant Association and produced and managed by Reed Exhibitions.

The Show floor will offer focused product areas, information-packed seminars, and many renowned special events. Over 15,000 industry professionals come to discover tens of thousands of new product options at the New York restaurant and foodservice venue’s place to gather for trends, education, and solutions in today’s challenging market. The educational opportunities presented at this event offer access to the latest food trends to educate guests, as well as up-to-the minute business practices and strategies to optimize operations and stay profitable. New this year to the show are the Front of House Experience, Healthy Trends Theater, and Fast Track Education series.

The $25 admission grants you 3-day access to:

• The Exhibit Hall, featuring more than 550 leading vendors
• Live Culinary Demonstrations and Competitions
• Ferdinand Metz Foodservice Forum education sessions
• Special features including: Pride of New York, Japan Pavilion, Dessert & Coffee Pavilion
• Idea generating events such as: The US Pastry Competition, Ultimate Barista Challenge and The Foodservice Council for Women
• The co-located New York Wine Expo

Show Days & Hours:

Sunday, March 4, 2012 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Monday, March 5, 2012 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Tuesday, March 6, 2012 10:00 am – 4:00 pm

Admission is for the trade ONLY. No one under 18 years of age, including infants, will be admitted to the Show at any time. NO EXCEPTIONS.

For more information, visit International Restaurant & Foodservice Show of New York.

It’s been a few weeks since the last fridge cleanout, and at least a couple since the last big shopping trip. You’re broke and/or lazy, and there will be no grocery run tonight. Sure, you could boil some water and use up that last chicken flavored Cup Noodles with its funky chewy bits of dehydrated vegetable goodness, but you want something that tastes like actual food and won’t leave you starving 15 minutes later…

So you forage through the remains of the kitchen and you come up with a wrinkly carrot in need of a little blue pill, an onion that’s molded 4 layers in, 2 potatoes sprouting roots so long they’ll soon be able to walk off your counter, garlic so dry it peels itself, ground beef so freezer burnt it’s practically cooked, and you think to yourself

Self, this stuff doesn’t look so fresh, organic, uhMAYzing, fanTASStic,

or anything that you could say was “grilled/baked/broiled/braised to perfection” while making love to the camera and talking with your mouth full because the stuff you just made is apparently so bomb it hurts not to declare it out loud.

But it’s what you got, so the question is…

“TO USE OR NOT TO USE?”

For me, 9 times out of 10, the answer is USE. And use it well!

There is something satisfying on so many fronts about making good use of stuff on its last leg. I love redirecting a pile of sad veggies en route to the garbage can into a Dutch oven full of chicken stock, some bay leaves, a can of tomatoes, and the freezer burnt ground beef, and turning out a hearty soup for dinner. A month-old wedge of Fontina finds new life when I cut away the benign but unattractive mold and it suddenly looks fit for a melty, gooey grilled cheese on sourdough with a bowl of creamy tomato soup. Neglected green apples don’t look nearly so unappetizing after they’ve been peeled, sliced and baked with some butter, cinnamon and brown sugar between sheets of golden brown puff pastry.

Sure it’s preferable to have the “freshest” and “best”, but life doesn’t always serve up a perfectly beautiful and bountiful cornucopia of ingredients. Transforming dull, lifeless, worthless looking ingredients into something delicious is really the height of the alchemy we call cooking, and perhaps more importantly a great lesson in resourcefulness and gratitude.

So the next time you see mold creeping on your Costco bag of brown onions, remember that you’re just a few layers away from a Costco bag of perfectly good smaller brown onions and perhaps a perfectly delicious bowl of French Onion soup (topped with de-molded Gruyere…)

Shinae Godinez is a kitchen hack from way back and is constantly looking for ways to repurpose produce on Death Row.

A couple of months ago, we bought ourselves a Cuisinart Counter Top Brick Oven Pizza & have been experimenting with many different styles of pizza ever since.

Below is a list with some of our favorites (minus the obvious traditionally topped pizzas).

Buffalo Chicken Pizza: 50% cooked basic pizza shell, topped with chunky bleu cheese dressing (Marie’s works best), shredded cheddar cheese, a layer of sauteed buffalo chicken with diced tomatoes and some more shredded cheese. Pop it back in the oven for a few more minutes and you have a spicy pizza perfection.

Hummus Pizza: A fully cooked garlic baked pizza shell spread with Supremely Spicy Sabra Hummus (you can use regular if you want, we like the spice), diced roasted peppers, sliced black olives, diced tomatoes & chopped marinated artichokes. Once the Hummus is spread and the toppings are placed on the pizza shell, it is ready to serve.

Nacho Pizza: 50% cooked Pizza Shell, topped with a layer of refried beans, mixed with green chili, sliced fresh or pickled jalapenos and then topped with a layer of shredded cheddar cheese. Put it back in the oven until the crust is golden & the cheese is melted. Once it is out of the oven, spread a thin layer of sour cream over the top of the pizza followed by a thin layer of guacamole. Then cut the pizza in slices and top each piece with a small amount of salsa. You can now enjoy your first bite.

Last but not least is the Nutella Pizza, which is very similar to the pizza Giada De Laurentiis makes in the video below. Just like hers, I cook my pizza shell 100%, then brush the shell with melted butter. Top it with a nice thick layer of Nutella. Instead of topping the Nutella Pizza with chocolate & chopped hazelnuts like Giada does, as I feel that is a bit of sugar overkill, we top ours with freshly sliced strawberries & banana. Dust this dessert pizza with powdered sugar & you can now enjoy a delicious pizza dessert.

Below you will find the exact recipe I use when I make my pizza dough. Of all the dough recipes we tried, this one works out the best for us.

If you have any other cool ideas or flavor combos you think we should try, let us know!

Last time I went to the hospital, my doctor informed me that my blood type changed from A positive to Light & Sweet. This is a sheer sign that you know you are now drinking way too much coffee, but what can I do, I am addicted.

Some people drink one or two cups in the morning to start their day. Not me. I can easily drink one whole pot by myself a day, sometimes more if we are having one of those days.

Over the years I have experienced many different ways to make coffee. Some of those ways include Instant, Basic Drip, French Press & Keurig Instant K-cup.
Instant is just miserable. I have not tried a note worthy instant coffee.

Basic Drip is good because most of them have timers that are easy to set up & have a heating element to keep your coffee pot hot.

The Keurig Instant K-Cup is also great for that quick cup on the go. This machine allows you to brew your coffee in seconds & comes in a variety of flavors. You can also even make hot cocoa & an assortment of teas with this machine.

Last but not least we have the Bodum French Press. This coffee pot probably takes the most time since you have to brew it manually but by far the end result is well worth it. The downfall is that there is no heating element to keep this coffee pot hot

Of all the coffee pots I have used throughout the years, the Bodum French Press coffee pot is the one I have been coming back to over and over.

There’s just something about a cup of coffee that doesn’t lose all its natural oils to a filter. If you have never tried one before, spend the extra $20.00 and try one. You will not be disappointed.

Almost everyone can relate to this topic, as we all have been stricken with a sweet tooth at one time or another.

I don’t know why but my cravings come and go.

You name it and I crave it: gummy bears, cupcakes, pastries, donuts, cinnamon bears, chocolate and peanut butter cups just to name a few.

I would get struck with a really bad sweet tooth for a week or so and go overboard with my craving by eating as much as I can. Once my body feels satisfied, it disappears and I won’t have another one for 3 months.

I can’t explain it. Can you? Why does one get a sweet tooth? Does it have to do with our diet or maybe our genetic makeup? Why do we get these craving?

If you have an answer or an explanation for this, please let me know, until then BRING ON THE SWEETS!!

If you are a kitchen appliance junkie like me, this is the blog post for you!

Just over a year ago, my buddy and I went to the Martha Stewart Man Show (Don’t Judge!) & Top Chef Judge Tom Collichio was the special guest. On this show he did a food demonstration for a Panini of some sort on this really cool looking grill.

After the segment, Martha Stewart announced that everyone in the audience would receive the same Breville BGR820XL Smart Grill as our audience gift! From seeing the demonstration they did on the show I was pretty pumped about this as I saw the potential this product has!

I have to be honest as this was my first Breville product. I have always been a Cuisinart or KitchenAid kind of guy, but not anymore. While this product is a little pricey, it is worth its weight in gold & built to last.

There are so many uses for this Smart Grill!

I have made steak, paninis, pancakes, shrimp skewers, burgers, hotdogs, chicken, french toast, crepes and way too many more things to name.
What I love about this grill is that there is an extremely accurate temperature gauge and a timer as well.

The temperature gauge is fool proof for even the most inexperienced home cook! This Smart Grill has temperature features such as Low, Panini & even Sear with temperatures going up to 450 degrees!

This grill also has NO cool spots, everything cooks nice and even.

The wife & I live on the 3rd floor of an old colonial, so if we want to BBQ it is a real pain for us (me) to go up and down the stairs 10 times, while my burgers are cooking.

This grill is perfect for counter top cooking. The smart grill allows you to interchange the cooking plates too. You can have this grill set up to be ½ grill & ½ griddle, or if you buy 2 extra “plates” (which we did & at only $49 each, it was a steal & so worth it! you can have this set up as a full griddle or grill! I can now have a full grill or a full griddle if I choose at anytime!

We always have friends visiting with us and this makes for easy breakfast and dinner!

In the morning, we can easily fit 10 pancakes on the full griddle at once and when we are grilling we can fit between 10-12 burgers or 4-6 steaks depending on the size.

All in all, this grill is a quality product and I would recommend it to EVERYONE! If you buy this grill and don’t like it, feel free to email me and I will gladly take it with a smile as I am now a Breville Believer.

So I love food just as much as the next person. Everything about it – how it looks, how it smells, how it tastes, the texture and so much more. You name it, I dig it!

So while lying in bed one night thinking of new blogging ideas, I came up with a pretty awesome idea that would introduce me to some new techniques & that would expose me to some new foods!


Here’s what I’m thinking:

First off, I believe this would be a pretty cool idea for this blog & this is how I am going to tie the two together.

I want to go around to all my favorite spots to eat in the NJ/NY area & I will propose to them that I work a day for free with them & in exchange, I want them to teach me all about the skills they use in the kitchen to execute their top products. I want to learn their inspiration for the menu & the dishes they create. From how they choose flavor combinations, special cooking techniques & everything else that helped them get to their signature dish on the map.

Not only will this be a great way for me to get some more experience in the kitchens, but it would serve as another exposure for the company as well.

I highly doubt many restaurants or businesses would allow me to video tape the experience, but one will never know unless you ask.

Some of the jobs I was thinking about doing:

• Working in the New Fulton Fish Market down in Hunts Point.
• Working in a cake or cupcake shop.
• I want to see what goes into bread baking at a bakery.
• Working a day at a butcher shop.
• Working a day at a homemade ice cream shop.
• Working a street cart in NYC.
• Working on a farm.
• Being a bartender for a day.
• Working in a Thai, Mexican, French, Italian, Greek, Chinese, Japanese restaurant.
• Working in a busy coffee shop or breakfast spot for a day as well!

What other places do you think I should check out? Do you think this is a good idea? Do you think it will take off into something good?

Let me know your thoughts, as I am all ears!

Everyone has watched TV & has experienced this happen to them at least once in their lives.

You are watching one of your favorite shows & then a commercial with a catchy jingle or line will air.

No matter how hard you try to forget the commercial, sometimes you just can’t! As a boy, I was like this with the Tootsie Pop commercials. This has to be one of the most recognizable, memorable food commercials ever made.

How many of you recall the little chubby boy going up to the owl in the tree, asking him,”Mr. Owl. How many licks does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a Tootsie Pop?” Then the next thing you remember is the little boy distraught because the owl just chomped away at his Tootsie Pop, leaving him with a stick! Now, not only does this kid have the answer he was looking for, he also got jacked out of his Tootsie Pop!

I know each & everyone of you can relate to this. I do not know about you but this is one of my biggest pet peeves when we decide on where to go out to dinner.

Do we go to a nice restaurant with AMAZING food but miserable service or do we settle for a subpar restaurant food wise with great service. Should we have to choose or compromise? No freaking way!

I know people get into the food industry & especially the serving aspect of it for the quick money. I used to be a server & know just how easy it really is to clean up money wise. Because people think they are going to get tipped regardless, they figure why work for it. They are just content with bare minimal & are more concerned about socializing with their co-workers or when their next cigarette break is going to be.

PRIORITIZE people! You are at work to make money. You can socialize when you are done.

This does not apply to all servers, just a very big chunk of them. Many can’t even argue this statement as they know it is true.

To all the servers in great restaurants who feel their job is to just take orders and bring drinks & food, you are off – way off. People dine out at  restaurant because they want an experience and not the experience you give them with your lack luster service. I am not praising myself, but when I was a server, I went to any length to assure that the guest was satisfied & had no needs or wants when they were at my tables. Is that so hard to do? I know at the end of the day when I went home with a fat stack of cash in my pocket, I knew it was a job well done & that all my guests went home with the experience that the restaurant owner intended them to have. Why do something if you don’t put your all into it?

I don’t want to rant about this, as this is not the basis for the blog, but food is not just about what is served to you in a plate or the drink you have in your glass, your meal has all sorts of dimensions.

However, I think this is a great way to start the blog off. I know many people have experienced this & few have spoken up about it.

But onto the future, I have some big plans for this blog & website. I hope this struck your interest & that you want to read more! Leave a comment if you want to share your personal service disaster experience.