Saturday Evening Celebrity Chef Feast at Luma as part of the Florida Film Festival 2012

Last night I had the opportunity to attend a special event at Luma. The Saturday Evening Celebrity Chef Feast at Luma as part of the Florida Film Festival 2012.

"Ever wonder what happens when great chefs cook for one another? Find out at this one-time-only gathering of gastronomical geniuses. Brandon McGlamery, the visionary who created LUMA ON PARK and PRATO, hosts an intimate five-course dinner in his private dining room."

It was held in the private dining room/cellar downstairs in Luma Winter Park. It was a wonderful experience with great conversations, drinks and food. My favorite course was the onion & cauliflower soup with excellent fried onions and olive cream, and the buttery crust of the Gruyère tart. Some of the other attendees raved about the ceviche and the veal sweetbread pot pie.

Chef Brandon and his team prepared all the dishes and the celebrity chefs listed below dined with us.

Frog song farms onion & cauliflower soup
Gruyère tart, pickled-fried onion, olive cream

Yellowfin tuna & red snapper ceviche
rabbit run farms tomato, lemon verbena compressed melon, serrano, hazelnut

spring ramp gnocchetti sardi
Georgia royal red shrimp, guanciale pangrattato, Cortez bottarga

local African pompano
roasted mushrooms, asparagus, eggplant agrodolce, stinging nettle broth

ribeye of wagyu beef
veal sweetbread-beef cheek pot pie, pea shoot purée, golden raisin jam

yogurt panna cotta
king farm blueberries, Thai basil-lime sorbet, cornmeal crumble

Chef bios:

•  

• Brandon McGlamery, Executive Chef at LUMA on Park and Prato, is a graduate of California Culinary Academy and has gained an array of international culinary experiences during his tenure at some of the most prestigious restaurants across the nation. McGlamery has held positions at Stars Restaurant, French Laundry, and Chez Panisse in California; the Ritz-Carlton in Naples; Guy Savoy in Paris; and Bacchanalia in Atlanta. His passion for creating fresh, original, and inspiring cuisine is apparent in every dish he presents at both LUMA and his new restaurant PRATO. McGlamery is dedicated to supporting local farmers, purveyors, and sustainable products. He most recently received an award from the Monterey Bay Aquarium for his support of finding sustainable choices in seafood.

•  

• Jeff Potter

  A science and food geek, Jeff Potter is the author of Cooking for Geeks: Real Science, Great Hacks, and Good Food, which the Washington Post called “one of the most useful books on understanding cooking.” He has appeared on NPR, The Today Show, CNN International, Food Network, and the Cooking Channel. Jeff has been featured on television newscasts and radio shows throughout the country, spoken at science festivals both in the United States and overseas, and is a trustee and spokesperson for Awesome Food, part of the Awesome Foundation.
  
  
  
• 

  Chad J. Galiano

  Chad J. Galiano, Chef de Cuisine at Trump International Beach Resort Miami, birth in the culturally rich rural bayou areas of south Louisiana, Bayou Lafourche (which is French for “the fork”), instilled in him—along with a southern/cajun philosophy—an appreciation for all things edible. Seeking to learn more, Chad moved up to Rhode Island to attend Johnson & Wales University and earn a degree in Culinary Arts, followed by a brief return to New Orleans and a longer sojourn to Santa Fe to gain experience with American Southwestern cuisine and a position as sous chef at the St. Francis Hotel where he found an outlet to experiment with new ideas. Chad eventually moved back to New Orleans, continued to work in grand hotels, and married a Taiwanese woman, Shiau-Ming, gaining exposure to an entirely new food culture. Following Hurricane Katrina, Chef Chad was contacted his old friend, Kurtis Jantz, the Executive Chef of the Trump International Beach Resort in Miami, and gained the position of Chef de Cuisine. Chefs Galiano and Jantz felt the synergisitic ambition to boost their food knowledge further and create a contemporary environment for learning. It was during this time that Chad created the blog, Chadzilla (http://chadzilla.typepad.com).
  
  
  
• 

  Martha Hall Foose

  Martha Hall Foose is a daughter of the Mississippi Delta. She apprenticed at California’s famed La Brea Bakery and trained at a world-class French pastry school before opening Bottletree Bakery in Oxford, Mississippi. She has also served as a food editor for Pillsbury Classic Cookbooks and the Food Professionals Network in Minneapolis. After all these accomplishments, she returned home to Pluto, her family’s plantation. She has since received the James Beard Award for American Cooking and Southern Independent Bookseller’s Award for her first book Screen Doors and Sweet Tea: Recipes and Tales from a Southern Cook, which tells the history of the Mississippi Delta and details Foose’s personal journey through life. Martha recently released her new book A Southerly Course: Traveling Foodways Close to Home, her second collection of recipes and vivid stories.
  
  
  
• 

  Gui Alinat

  Gui Alinat is an ACF Certified Executive Chef, food writer, and a culinary instructor at the
  Art Institute and the Jacobson Culinary Arts Academy in Tampa Bay. His first book, The Chef’s Répertoire has won a Cordon d’Or International Culinary Award for Best Culinary Literature. He has since published Molecular Cuisine: Twenty Techniques, Forty Recipes and is working on his third culinary book. Born, raised and classically trained as a chef in France, he traveled extensively, working in restaurants around the world to finally settle in Florida. In Tampa Bay, he has catered high-end private events with his own company for the last 12 years. With an exclusive client base, and media recognition, his team became a recognized force in the Tampa Bay culinary scene. Gui regularly contributes to the St. Petersburg Times food section and Creative Loafing’s
  
  
  
• 

  Marcel Vigneron

  Dedicated to gastronomy and honing his skills as a chef, Marcel Vigneron lives to express creativity, personality, and passion through his own style of cuisine, coined “Modern Global.” With his new company, Modern Global Tasting, Marcel brings the future of gastronomy to any themed party, event, or venue. The notorious chef has tantalized audiences with Syfy Network’s Marcel’s Quantum Kitchen and infamous appearances on Bravo’s Top Chef and Top Chef All-Stars. At an age when most chefs are just beginning, Marcel has traveled and cooked throughout Europe, the Caribbean, and the United States in search of both gastronomic experience and world knowledge. After attending the acclaimed Culinary Institute of America (CIA) in New York, Marcel served as Sous Chef to Dwayne Lipuma at the school’s award-winning Ristorante Caterina de’ Medici. He has also worked around the globe with world-renowned chefs, including Joël Robuchon, Michael Mina, and José Andrés.