This past Saturday I attended Chicago Gourmet at beautiful Millennium Park, Chicago’s celebration of food and wine.

Chicago Gourmet is a gorge feast of food, wine and spirits, celebrity chefs, live demos, seminars and much much more.

Lucky for us the weather was absolutely gorgeous that day!

 Opening ceremonies started out with a champagne toast thanking the presenters, sponsors, chefs and those that worked tirelessly on this event.

 And look who showed up to give the toast, our own Mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanual! ( Morimoto and Carla Hall too)

He was proud to acknowledge how Chicago has excelled in the culinary world with national and international restaurants and chefs, and how honored he is that Chicago will be hosting the 2015 James Beard Awards. Cheers to that!

 I always enjoy the chef demos because the venue is so intimate,it’s like you’re hanging out in their kitchen. In this demo Chicago’s very own, Chef Rick Bayless of Frontera Grill/ Topolobampo/ XOCO made a quick and easy, dynamic green mole sauce and served it over roasted vegetables.

Speaking of vegetables, they’re apparantly trending more and more in restaurants with an emphasis on healthier eating.

 Along with Chef Bayless was Chef Carlos Gaytan of Mexique, he created a beautiful seafood tamale.

 Chef Stephanie Izard, Girl & The Goat/ Little Goat,  is so laid back in the way she cooks and so at ease in the kitchen, she’s known for her different and unique flavor combinations and she doesn’t really measure as she cooks, she likes to wing it and develop flavors as shes goes, my kind of girl.  No wonder she became a Top Chef winner!

 This dish, a vegetable paella was demoed by Chef Jamie Bissonnette/Coppa, he emphasized using every part of the vegetable, sort of like the nose to tail concept but only for veggies, nothing was wasted and the paella looked colorful and stunning when finished.

 James Beard Award winners Chef Justin Aprahamian/Sanford Restaurant ( Best Chef Midwest) and Chef Jimmy Bannos Jr./The Purple Pig, (Rising Star Chef) had a lively demo together featuring caraway crusted sea scallops and roasted garlic and herb salt encrusted pork tenderloin.

 Jeff Mauro AKA “Sandwich King” so down to earth, stayed and talked with everyone, still lives in Elmwood Park and actually films his show from there, fame hasn’t changed him one bit and of course he made a delicious foccaccia sandwich.

 There were tastings after tastings of over 190 of Chicago’s finest restaurants and chefs, you couldn’t possibly try everything, you’d explode!

Chunky crab dip, jumbo shrimp cocktail, chicken and waffles and an oyster shooter was featured at this Chef tasting pavilion.
 Lobster rolls, bacon wrapped scallops, flank steak with chimichurri, cerviche, bbq, wild boar meatballs, burgers, dim sum, house made salumi.

I could go on and on and on…

 Elite wines, craft beers and other artisan spirits were featured all over, you definitely had to pace yourself, if you know what I mean!

 Desserts? They had it covered. Chocolates, candies, cookies, cakes, cupcakes, panna cotta, ice cream and fried dough, just to name a few.

How about a little donut with cheese popcorn pastry cream, a little caramel frosting and a cheese-caramel popcorn for garnish, sound weird to you? Trust me, they were to die for!

 Look at these beauties, except all I could manage was a tiny bit of each. My favorite was that gorgeous looking, rectangled pistacchio cake with cherries and hazelnuts set in a butter cookie crust, I’m still dreaming about it!

 Chicago Gourmet keeps getting better and better each year!

Until next time, Ciao