NYC Wine & Food Festival begins!

Hey! I hope you are in NYC for the Wine and Food Festival, but if not ... I hope to bring you along for the ride with a few pictures and stories! Last night was the unofficial kick-off party hosted by Food Network Magazine for it's readers. Subscribers were invited to come hang out and since I love the magazine I was more than excited to meet some readers. Here I am with some other attendees ...
That's Marcela from Mexican Made Easy, Food Network Magazine Editor Maile Carpenter, me and Food Network Magazine Publisher Vicki Wellington. The event was also a chance for all of us to raise money for Share Our Strength. Some signed items will be auctioned off for donation. There were so many Food Network hosts there and every time I turned around I got a chance to talk to someone that read the magazine and also watched Food Network. I gotta tell ya, if you want to meet any one on Food Network, these festivals are the place to go because every time I turned around I was bumping into a host. When I was in radio, there was a person notorious for having high-priced birthday parties and the guests would pay crazy amounts of cash to get in only to find the host locked away in the VIP section. Out of sight, no pictures, no chance meeting, not even a chance to say happy birthday. I felt it a waste of people's money and couldn't believe they did it year after year and got away with it. If I pay $$ I want something for it! lol, So the cool thing is here you get great wine, food, experiences and at these events everyone is approachable, so it's not like you have to look from afar. Get up close and personal and say hi! If you are here in town and reading this, please stop me and say hi if you see me and want to meet!

Check out my girl aka "hot mama" ...

It's Melissa d'Arabian, host of $10 Dollar Dinners! Even though she lives all the way in Washington we keep in touch pretty well over the phone and her kids and I are fast friends! They are too cute! There was plenty of tiny finger food around to nosh on, but the treasures of the night were the regulation-size Sprinkles cupcakes being offered as dessert. One of the owners Candace Nelson and I met back in 2006 before I was on Food Network. I was trying to get a show on the network and they sent me out to Los Angeles to shoot a pilot featuring some great places to eat in Los Angeles. Sprinkles was my first stop and after traveling to many other places and eating more food, Sprinkles was also my last stop that night lol. No shame in my game, I went back when the cameras weren't rolling that evening and indulged some more. Suffice it to say, it was a neat reunion with Candace because now not only do I have a show on the network, so does she! She judges the popular show Cupcake Wars! Here we are along with Maile, Aarti and Cooking Channel's newest addition, Lee Anne Wong (you may remember her from Top Chef).

Lee Anne hung out for a second and promptly found out we had the same goal ...

Eat cupcakes!!!! This actually was right before I left the party, so I made sure to grab another one and take them with me for a late night snack at home. Again, no shame in my game ... I'm pretty sure I was the only one walking out double-fisting cupcakes. Then when I got to the car I realized I had to find a way to transport them. I give you the reason why all cars should have cup holders ...

Because every once in awhile, a girl needs to travel with cupcakes! I thought I was pretty clever with this discovery and felt good about leaving them in the car while I mingled at the next party. This one had no press, so I bring you some real behind the scenes pics! The next party was thrown by a company many Food Network hosts work with as well as other television hosts and production companies. I walked in happy knowing I had cupcakes for dessert and immediately got another happy surprise ...

That's Travel Channel's Samantha Brown! I watch her show allllllll the time and really enjoy the way she tells a travel story. She really makes you feel like you are a friend on the trip. What a sweetheart in person and come to find out, she lives in Brooklyn! Her husband was there with her and they looked so cute together. I see a Brooklyn dinner in our future! It was pretty crowded at the bar so I wiggled my way around and ran into the Cake Boss ...

That's Buddy Valastro, owner of Carlo's Bake Shop and the producer of Cake Boss, Art Edwards. Then I ran into one of my favorite people ...

That's Spike Mendelsohn of Good Stuff Eatery. I have to say he makes one of the best burgers ever and if you live in the Washington D.C. area, it's a must try. The shakes are crazy too. I'm looking forward to this week's Burger Bash in Brooklyn. I'll make sure to stop by his booth and get a close up of the juiciness. He also has a pizza place next door to his burger place, but I haven't tried it yet. I think I need to give Amtrak a call and make arrangements! I can't wait for the Burger Bash and I hope he makes a repeat effort on the milkshakes he did at the last South Beach Food & Wine Festival. Can't wait for Burger Bash! Ok, last pic then I'm headed into the city to pick up my passes...It's Guy Fieri and Cooking Channel host Darryl Robinson from Drink Up.Darryl and I worked together on an episode of Next Food Network Star: After Party. He made some really tasty drinks, I remember a cucumber one that was soooo good. I'm a sucker for cucumber drinks. Try my Mean Green Cucumber Juice if you are like me. Alright, I have to get out and start my day. Hope you enjoyed the pics. Like I mentioned before, if you are here for the festival and you catch me walking around, please stop and say hi! The weather is perfect! I have plans to head out to another kick-off party tonight hosted by Art Smith, so if I see anything fun, I'll snap a pic! Check back in ...

AC Food & Wine Festival: Surprise, Surprise, Surprise!

Hey! I got my Gomer Pyle on last night here at the AC Food & Wine Festival and surprised a packed house of over 700 VIPs at Harrah's for dinner! I couldn't tell you about the planning stages here because it was supposed to be a secret, but early yesterday when I went to the venue to check on my recipe and ingredients, people started to ask me why I was there and I had to just answer very vaguely. It was funny and I really just wanted to burst and say "Oki'mhereplanningasurprise!", all in one breath. It was in a huge ballroom and as soon as I stepped inside, I realized just how big the crowd was going to be ... That's not even a good picture to represent the span of the room, but the room was long and every table was already set and ready to go at around 2PM. There was a set menu for the VIP diners, but my part was to interrupt between courses and prepare a recipe for them. When we were planing the surprise, my first question was ... "Do, they get to eat it?" and to my surprise, the planners said "That's up to you". I quickly said that of course I want them to try what I'm making, that would be crazy to cook something in front of you with no tv screen between us and when I'm done I just pack up and go ... taking my food with me lol. So, I also made sure my recipe was easy to prep for 700+ food people and small so they could easily pass them to the tables. I decided on my Cod Fish Puppies ... They mass produced them catering-style and planned to do a quick run in some heat before they served them with a Mango Habanero Sauce recipe I provided. I usually serve the puppies with an avocado mash, but this was for a large group and 1. no one wants to break down all those avocados, I try to take it easy on the kitchen at events like this because they are already stretched thin. And, 2. Avocado just doesn't hold up well in catering conditions. Can you imagine dolloping 700 trays with avocado mash only to look at the first one and realize the time it took to finish allowed for the oxidation and color change to start? Only so much lime I'm willing to squirt on my avocado to keep it pretty, before it ruins the flavor profile. I am so proud of putting my catering hat on for all events now. I had no idea years ago when I began catering that it was training me for moments like these. Here are the chefs that brought it all together ... That's Chef Robert and Chef David, both were so nice and actually had little tasting plates ready for me when I arrived to check the flavor and texture of my puppies. They were perfect and I was very happy they didn't dial back the heat on the habaneros. For 700+ servings they used 25 habaneros! That may not seem like much, but imagine just putting a whole, un-chopped habanero in a pot of soup will spice up the whole thing ... to chop them down and add to a sauce, the heat is crazy! Crazy good, I hoped. :-) Happy the chefs liked it and so did the committee with me that was escorting me around. All I had to do was wait for the attendees of the VIP dinner!

On the way out of the dining room is when I got stopped with all the curious questions and it's partly my fault for almost blowing my cover for the VIP event that night, but there were some neat back drops set up in the hallway and I wanted to take a few pictures in front of them ...The scale was large, but the mix of colors and the proper depth in some of the backdrops made me feel like Alice in Wonderland, after her first sip of "poison". :-) Crazy right? I don't know if it's me, but it looks like I'm actually in the kitchen! The artist didn't sign a name and none of the planners with me knew who did them, but I just think they are so neat. Here's another one ...It was up pretty high, so I played along with it and tip-toed to act like I was trying to see over the stove. These are in the event registration hallway at Harrah's if you are here and feel the urge to take some kooky photos. I didn't see one person using them, but I just loved them! After taking the pictures and almost blowing my cover, I headed back to my room to get ready for the rest of the day and ran into this sign, take a look! It says "Saturday, July 31 The pool and gym will be closing for a private event." Wooohoooo! That's my Sold out Soiree! Sunset, Sliders and Spirits on the rooftop pool at Caesar's! Can't wait to see you there tonight if you have plans to attend! Here are a couple of pics from the VIP event last night ...It was packed! Sorry it's a bit blurry. I had a great time and thanks to everyone that came up and said hi! Also a big thanks to Sandra Lee, she had a surprise visit to a VIP dinner right before mine and left plenty of her cocktail ingredients, so I begged the kitchen to shake up a pitcher for us and we all enjoyed a sip back stage ... I don't know what it's called, but it had me at Goldschlager and Grand Marnier :-). Thanks Sandy!

Afterwards I went to hang out at some of the after parties and ran into 2 of my favorite people ...Can you see them? It's the Neely's! Also if you look close (sorry about the blurs), on the left you can see Cooking Channel host Darryl Robinson of Drink Up! and on the right you can see Roger Mooking, host of Everyday Exotic on Cooking Channel. Darryl and I worked together on NFNS: After Party and he knows his drinks! Really cool guy and I just met Roger the other night at the kick off party, but he escaped before I could get a pic. Everyone else in the picture are co-workers in our PR/Marketing department. They shine up the engine and make it run! Here's me and my girl! Ms. Gina Neely. I so wished she lived closer to me or vice versa, she's a ball of fun and energy. I'm often mistaken for her and end up sending her texts like "someone just mistook me for you while I was with my boyfriend, so just in case people think you are cheating on Pat, it's really me and my guy" lol. Too funny. They have a brunch thing going on today at noon and looking at the time, I need to hurry up with this, so I can head over to that! Hope you enjoyed the sharing! If you are here and checking my blog between sips and bites, can't wait to bump into you. Please say hi!

Oh wait ... one more thing ... did you know Caesar knew how to fry ... in a pan ... with a spatula??? Totally wrong ... lol. I feel like a person watching Mad Men pointing out all the era errors ... say that fast.