"charlie trotter" news and stories

• The Cake Boss has an Easter surprise for you. (Hint: It's not cake.)
• Remember Chicago's Charlie Trotter? No? He's trying to change that.
• Meet the man behind the East Village Japanese food scene.
• How to braise meat without browning? That is the question.

The recession is wielding its ax on high-end dining in Sin City.

Celebrity chefs David Burke and Charlie Trotter are walking away from the Las Vegas restaurants that bear their names, Nation's Restaurant News reported.

Burke announced last week that he was ending his affiliation with the restaurant David Burke at The Venetian, a joint venture with Orlando-based E Brand Restaurants. E Brands chief executive Rashid Choufani said the recession was to blame for the split.

"Celebrity chefs in restaurants there today, with this economy, it's a little hard," he told NRN. "It was hurting our concept."

Not that I've ever done it, but I've always known in-flight dining in the first-class seats is, well, classy. Now United Airlines has upped the class factor by teaming with Charlie Trotter. This isn't the first time United has teamed up with a restaurant, either. Earlier this year it introduced a menu from Trader Vic's on its first-class flights to Hawaii.

The famous Chicago chef has crafted two menus, one for first class and one for business class. If I were flying first class, which I expect to be doing after I win next year's James Beard award for food writing, I'd start with the sautéed prawns and crispy short rib won tons with organic Thai barbeque sauce and chilled sweet and sour cucumber relish. I think I'd follow that with orange and ginger cured duck confit with roasted shallot vinaigrette, braised fennel and hazelnut jasmine rice. The very idea of eating duck confit at cruising altitude sounds like some sort of culinary Mile High club.

In the not unlikely event that I don't win a Beard award, the business class menu ain't so bad either. I'd be more than happy to lunch on citrus cured smoked salmon with a caramelized fennel citrus salad. For a main course, I'd go with the mustard braised pork medallion.

Source

In just 90 days, restaurants and retailers in Chicago will face $500 fines for selling or serving foie gras, according to the New York Times. The fines are the result of a ban approved 48 to one yesterday by the Chicago City Council. While California has long term plans that would ban the rich goose and duck livers several years from now, the Chicago ban makes the Windy City the first in the nation to put the kybosh on them. Many are opposed to foie gras because of the intensive force feeding of geese and ducks that its production often requires. While local chefs like Charlie Trotter have already stopped serving foie gras, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley was quoted in the Chicago Sun-Times, saying: "We have real issues here in this city ... Let's get some priorities."

Slashfood's Nicole Weston also posted about the ban when it was proposed last winter.