The Hungry Bride has been sated. She was married last Saturday in a simple and beautiful ceremony on the grounds of an estate in Washington D.C., the city in which she and her handsome groom, Jon, fell in love years ago. In addition to being Sarah's co-worker (visit me at ShelterPop.com for home decor ideas!), I was lucky enough to be one of her bridesmaids.
On the day of the long-awaited event, Sarah was as calm, cool and collected as ever and in true food-editor form, she remembered to eat breakfast. The details were thoughtfully chosen and worked together seamlessly. The girls' bouquets even had fragrant herbs like rosemary tucked inside!
After the simple ceremony, guests sipped on lemonade and sangria and waited a bit impatiently for what we knew would be one of the best meals we had had in quite a while. We all knew that baked chicken with droopy carrots and dried-out fondant-covered wedding cake wouldn't be on Sarah's menu. Instead, we were treated to lamb chops, macaroni and cheese, dim sum, s'mores and even cookies and milk.
Click through the gallery of pictures after the jump for pictures of the spread and the beautiful bride.
The phrase "free hot dogs" is music to some folks' ears any time of year, but particularly with Memorial Day weekend around the bend.
Oscar Mayer has stepped up to start the grillmania: if you hit the site right now (until midnight tonight, EST) you can click your way to a coupon for a free pack of dogs. Unfortunately, you can't waltz right into the store, coupon in hand: It's a wait-for-the-mailman dealio. But it's still a pretty grand deal for those who could eat grilled dogs all summer long.
Next week, the Charleston Food + Wine Festival kicks off its fourth annual event enhancing the city's culinary reputation. While tasting the various unique flavors of the South Carolina Lowcountry, guests will enjoy epicurean delights of the country's best chefs, authors and wine makers at more than 50 events throughout the weekend.
On March 6, Bobby Flay will host a Down South Charity Luncheon. Mario Monticelli, winemaker at Trinchero Napa Valley, hosts a seminary on the Napa Valley. There will be several pastry chefs, including François Payard, hosting events as well. In addition, there will be over a dozen chefs from Charleston. The Charleston Food + Wine Festival is a non-profit organization; its proceeds go towards raising charitable donations for the MUSC Children's Hospital and area culinary-related charities.
The festival begins on March 5th and ends on the 8th. Events are quickly being sold out. So, if you're interested, do not hesitate to purchase tickets for events on the festival's website.
Can not airing a commercial bring you as much publicity as airing one? Apparently, the advertising brains down at Miller High Life think so.
High Life has garnered a lot of brand recognition positioning recent spokesman Windell Middlebrooks as a beer delivery guy who's extra picky about which establishments "deserve" to stock his precious product. As beer ads go, these rate pretty high: Middlebrooks brings a lot of energy and personality to the table and the image-building is spot on now that High Life spends more time battling with the anti-establishment antics of Pabst Blue Ribbon for marketshare than Bud's mainstream ideology.
Pushing those ideas to the next level, Miller High Life has announced plans to air a 1-second Super Bowl ad instead of paying out the $3 million dollars required for a full 30-second spot. "I don't care how big the game is, who got $3 million?!" emotes their outspoken delivery man in an online commercial. High Life would rather be "delivering more honest beer at a tasty price."
As with most Super Bowl ads, the details are being kept under wraps until the big game, but you can see "outtakes" at 1secondad.com. (They're actually kinda funny.) However, let's just hope for Miller's sake that this big-budget, anti-advertising adverting-stunt doesn't backfire on the them. (It sounds like dangerous territory!)
Tell you what, I feel a bit like a dirty corporate shill just reporting on it. Blech!
Do you like the idea of an online community devoted to cooking? You must -- you're reading Slashfood. There's a new site you may want to add to your bookmarks: Mixing Bowl.
Mixing Bowl has just been launched by Meredith, the same corporation that owns Better Homes and Gardens. Mixing Bowl is a community hub devoted to cooking. All skill levels, interests and needs are welcomed and seem to be encouraged. Cruising the site, I noted heavy populations of "dinner in a hurry" working folk, healthy eaters and those who are trying to be, and baking enthusiasts bent on destroying the efforts of the healthy eaters (the most active group when I was on the site was "I Only Eat Sweets," which won my heart instantly). Cooks are organized into groups, which once you log in (free, and your Better Homes and Gardens log-in doesn't work, or at least mine didn't) you can join. Two categories I liked were cooking for beginners and cooking for two; both areas that can be underserved for individuals looking for that content.
Have you ever dreamed of having a perfect backyard? One with gorgeous stone paths, an elegant seating area and of course, an envy-worthy grilling station? Well, Crisco is sponsoring a contest in which they're inviting home grillmasters to share their favorite recipe for a chance to win a backyard makeover. The winner will also be one of the first inductees into the new Grilling Hall of Fame.
The deadline for this contest is rapidly approaching - all recipes must be submitted no later than December 15, 2008 (sorry about the late notice, we only just learned of the contest). You can submit your recipe, image of recipe and a 250 (or less) word essay, explaining why your recipe is a winner here.
In a press conference this morning, Tim Zagat announced The Vintage Dinner Series, a gathering New York City's finest Chefs that will create menus inspired by 19th century banquets. Many of the dishes the chef's will be serving have mostly disappeared from the restaurant and even the home scene over the past hundred years. Recreating period-appropriate ambiance and meals will create an unforgettable dining experience.
Chefs from restaurants such as Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Chanterelle, Del Posto, Gramercy Tavern, Le Bernardin, Per Se and many more are very excited to be taking part in such a historic dining event. Tim Zagat says: "This is the greatest group of chefs since Escoffier ate home alone!" These prix fixe dinners will be priced on par with each restaurant's standard menu, but will include drinks, tax and tip. Each restaurant will also donate a portion of the evening's proceeds to a charity of their choice.
Interested? Don't hesitate to make reservations immediately! Seating is extremely limited and expected to sell out possibly by the end of the day. For a complete list of restaurants, menus and charities, please go to ZagatPresents.com.
Are you one of those people who lives for the holiday season? Have you planned and re-planned your Thanksgiving menu? Do you set the table a week in advance, just to make sure all your china is perfect and smudge-free? Do you spend ever free moment during the month of December making cookies, candies and sweet breads for family and friends?
Big thanks to everyone who took the time to enter the Amy Sedaris I Like You giveaway this week. The contest closed yesterday afternoon and we used the Randomizer to selected three winners from the pool of submissions. We've been in contact with our winners and their books will be shipping out tomorrow morning. We're hoping to do more giveaways like this soon, so keep your eyes peeled!
With so much good food content popping up on the interwebs every other minute, it's sometimes hard to know which sites to turn to for the best in recipes, polls, product reviews and other food-related goodness. We know you love Slashfood, but what's a foodie to do on those occasions when you've devoured everything Slashfood's got and there's still half an hour of the work day still to kill?
How about checking out our buddies over at YumSugar? They consistently offer high quality content covering all things tasty. We like them so much that starting tomorrow, we'll be offering up a weekly round-up of some of our favorite YumSugar posts from that week. They think we're pretty nifty too, and so will be doing a round-up of our stuff on Thursdays as well. Hooray for food blog buddies!
Do you love to cook and want to learn more about it, but don't really have the time or inclination to go to culinary school? Maybe you just need to fill in some of the gaps in your self-taught education. There's a new online resource that could really be for you.
Called Rouxbe (pronounced roo be), this wesite offers cooking lessons, short video tips, and step by step video recipes. One aspect I really like about Rouxbe is that it focuses on technique but then supplies a recipe to go along with that technique. That is exactly like culinary school. There, you learn a technique and are then expected to be able to apply that to any recipe that you come accross. There's also a store and a community/forum section.
You have two basic membership options: free or premium, which is $99 for one year or $199 for a lifetime membership. The free membership level will get you access to text recipes and the drill-downs (videos featuring techniques and tips), and you get recipe previews and one free cooking lesson. To get full recipes and access to all cooking lessons you have to get the premium membership. Sure, it's no substitute for culinary school if you have career ambitions, but $99 is quite reasonable for an online culinary school if you really want to get cooking.
You may not know this, but Slashfood is a member of a blog family. Our sibling sites deal with everything from parenting to Apple news to green issues. One of our sister sites, Styledash, has recently gone through something of a makeover and we wanted to share the good news. Styledash has become the Stylelist blog and has a fresh look to go along with the new name. They'd love for you to drop by and say hello!
I first learned about Twitter in the winter of 2006, when several of my friends simultaneously joined up. It took me a little longer, but eventually I became convinced that starting an account would be a good way to keep up to date with the happenings and activities of the many people in my life. Over the last year and a half it has become an invaluable addition to arsenal of communication methods and I've become something of an addict.
Lots of people have been joining Twitter lately and so I thought it would be a good time to tell you that Slashfood has a twitter account and we want to be your friend! We tweet links to our posts, occasional contests and giveaways and just generally participate in the Twitter conversation. So head over and make Slashfood your friend on Twitter.
Women's Health is great, but they obviously made a typo when writing about the top food blogs - they listed Chow.com instead of Slashfood!
It's okay, though...we all make mistakes. I'm sure the copyeditors will fix that soon.
In the meantime, here are what WH thinks are the best food and drink websites, followed by my suggestions for others you may enjoy.
What's for Dinner is a rudimentary site with a great concept: it provides a week's worth of new recipes at the beginning of each week, so you don't have to rely on your own creativity when you come home exhausted from work. The recipes are certainly easy and not too time-consuming, but don't expect huge nutrition benefits: several of the dishes are fried, and only one is vegetarian-friendly. All Recipes has a "Recipe of the Day" feature, as well.
The Eat Well Guide is a decent search engine for finding local, organic foods nearest to you. There are other sites that offer this service, too - check out Local Harvest for co-ops and farmers markets near you, and visit Organic Highways for organic restaurants in your area.
With Cork'd, you can read and share wine reviews with other vino lovers, so you know exactly what to bring to your next BYOB. But Snooth and Wine-Searcher are just as good.
Look no further than Beer Suggest, a new website that - well, isn't it obvious?
The site is a work in progress, with its simple design and rudimentary tools (it only went live about a week ago). So far, the site boasts over 4,000 beer listings and over 1000 breweries. There are also beer-centered events, and reviews of various brews.
Think you can walk the walk when it comes to beer? Register for an account, and feel free to review and rate beers. Check here for the current Top 10 lists of rated and reviewed beers, including the Shiner Bock and the Gonzo Imperial Porter.
The site is slow to load, so be patient. But with a few tweaks and a few more ratings, it could develop into a seriously helpful tool for beer lovers.
Can not airing a commercial bring you as much publicity as airing one? Apparently, the advertising brains down at Miller High Life think so.
Big thanks to everyone who took the time to enter the 
With so much good food content popping up on the interwebs every other minute, it's sometimes hard to know which sites to turn to for the best in recipes, polls, product reviews and other food-related goodness. We know you love Slashfood, but what's a foodie to do on those occasions when you've devoured everything Slashfood's got and there's still half an hour of the work day still to kill? 
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