What a great night at Taste the Future! This is the annual event that is held at Columbus State and the proceeds provide scholarships and special programs that help hundreds of students every year. Over 50 of the area’s fine food establishments were there to show their stuff. The weather was perfect! As you will see from my sample of the event, the food was amazing. I was assigned the “blue” section of the event. There were 6 sections so there were 6 times as much as what I am blogging about!

My first stop was Cameron Mitchell Catering where they were serving a braised pork wonton taco with kimchi slaw, avocado and cucumber mousse along with a milk chocolate and chili flake truffle.

My next stop was at Posh Nosh/Katering by Keni. They were serving a lime mojito flavored ceviche with apples and shrimp along with a Cincinnati chili shooter.

From there it was on to Trattoria Roma. Here my treats were some Sante Fe Bison chili on roast corn polenta and some Tiramisu.

Next up? Pasqualone’s La Plaia Ristorante and Daviducc Cafe and Catering. They have catering and a restaurant, which is located at 5766 Columbus Square Shopping Center. Call 614-890-2070 for info on days and times. The catering phone number is 614-301-6423. They were serving Tomato Basil Cous Cous and Marsala Chicken.

The Elevator was serving their Crab stuffed scallops as mentioned in a previous post. Judging by the long line there all evening, many people like them as much as I do.

Moving on to Worthington Hills Country Club and their offerings of Asian Chicken Salad and Cinnamon dusted pork tenderloin with peach balsamic reduction on sweet potato polenta.

And finally there was Barrio’s and their tapa of the evening.

The wine served is from the winery of Bill and Roxanne Wolf of Napa Valley. Bill is a graduate of Columbus Technical Institute, which is now Columbus State.

I also liked that they did everything possible to make sure nothing went to waste. There were numerous bins marked either recycle or composting and they were clearly marked as to what went where. Kudos.

There was some great jazz music playing as we tasted and tasted and tasted. I had a wonderful time and would like to thank our hosts Matt and Elissa! I can’t wait to go to some of the restaurants I have not been to before and to return to the ones that I have.

When the Tastecasting blog post is ready, I will edit this to add a link to it so you can see everyone’s pictures and here about the rest of the food.

At the preview we had a couple of weeks ago, Cheryl Harrison said she would take on the challenge of trying something from every vendor. How did she do? Check it out here! That will also show you all of the participants

M Restaurant is Cameron Mitchell’s marquee restaurant. Let me show you how wonderfully the Tastecasters were treated!

Wasabi – tuna, salmon, avocado, cucumber and wasabi peas.

Tartare – tuna, pickled cucumber, yuzu vinaigrette, wasabi tobiko, white miso aioli.

Crab – Maryland blue crab cake, hass avocado, plum tomato gazpacho

Green – organic little gem lettuce, roquefort cheese, creamy bleu cheese dressing, candied pistachios

White tuna – porcini dusted, spring peas, wild mushrooms, lobster emulsion. This was my personal favorite and I plan to go back especially for this!

Steak-N-Eggs – Filet mignon, goat cheese hashbrown, dippy egg, caviar, sauce bearnaise.

Lobster mashed potatoes – mashed potatoes with a Maine lobster? Oh yes, it was as awesome as it sounds

All of these are the creation of Chef Erin Chittum, a grad of Columbus State culinary school.

Dessert was chilled apricot moscato soup, fresh berries, and organic yogurt sorbet.

I was still full the next day.

M is open Monday through Saturday for dinner. If you’d like to plan a holiday lunch there, you can contact them at (614) 629-0000. They have two private rooms, which can accommodate 8 or 15 guests. You can order from the menu or have a customized menu for your event.

Starting October 1 will be a Happy Hour on Monday through Friday – $5 Selected wines by the glass and $5 martinis. Friday Happy Hour will also feature half-price sushi!

For a limited time, make reservations at M for any Thursday evening and enjoy half off of any wine priced at $100 or less.

There are lots of reasons to try a great place if you haven’t been there before or to go back and treat yourself to a wonderful evening. It’s located on the first level of the Miranova office tower at 2 Miranova Place. Valet parking is available. I found plenty of street parking on Mound and Short street.

It’s almost time for the 21st Annual Taste The Future event! This is a great tasting fund raising event for Columbus State which will be held on Sept. 15th from 5:30-9. All proceeds from ticket sales go to a scholarship fund. Taste The Future will have over 50 chefs offering a sample of great eats. Want to see a list of participants? Look here. Now do you want to see a list of menu items that will be offered? This will certainly entice any food lover!

I was one of the fortunate ones to be invited as part of the Tastecasting team to a preview hosted by Elevator Brewing Company where Chef Nate gave us a cooking demonstration of what he will be serving at Taste the Future. Check this out.

This is his Crab Stuffed Scallop and I can say it tasted as wonderful as it looks!

Some chefs will be serving their most popular item, like the scallops, and others choose to try something new or to serve their personal favorites. It was said that it’s impossible to try everything available because there is so much. Cheryl Harrison said she will take on that challenge. That should be interesting to watch

I am really looking forward to the event and I’ve heard that once you have gone to this, you don’t want to miss it! This is adults only and dress is business casual. I was told by someone who knows that if you’ve hesitated to go to something like this because you think it might be stuffy, don’t worry! This is very relaxed and fun. Great food and a great cause – I hope to see you there!

My pics from the preview.

Located at 33 E. College Ave. in Westerville in the Historic District. It’s not far at all from State St.

Debbie Mitchell, the owner, invited a small group of Tastecasters to sample what she has to offer and I was fortunate enough to be one of the few. She opened up in October 2008 and has done quite a lot in that amount of time. They are open long after many other places in town are closed to accommodate the college students. While we were there, we saw people of all ages coming and going.

Artwork from the local college students decorate the walls and the tables have made use of old cds.

There is a nice outdoor patio in the back that’s not visible from the street, so feel free to wander back there.

She keeps a couple of guitars around so if someone gets the urge to play, they are more than welcome to. Dan The Man got the urge!

But Betty, what about the food? Of course I have pictures of food, and it all tastes as good as it looks!

Caprese Salad

Grilled Chicken Salad

Panini. These are made to order and you have the option of filling out your own order form and handing it to them. She said that’s very popular. Tofu is one of the options! I always like to hear that – I actually like tofu. Debbie said this a vegetarian friendly place. I always like to hear that too.

Here is Debbie with an order form.

Quesadilla

Breaded fried spicy pickles. My personal surprise of the day. Ray likes friend pickles but I have never been fond of them. I really liked these! The breading stayed with the pickle and it was spicy enough to make you go “whoa” for a second

But wait, this is an ice cream and coffee house! Unfortunately, my pics of those items did not do them justice. Here is a pic of a poster that was located in the bathroom of their soft serve with flavor bursts. They aren’t kidding when they say flavor burst!

To hopefully give you a better idea, I have some pics of the menu that are mostly readable.

There are many neat touches like all of the mugs are made by a student and when you order a drink, you pick the mug you want to use. They are all different. She thinks green by using no styrofoam and recycling. You can feel Debbie’s heart in the place and that in itself means it’s worth going back to for me.

This was my first time that Indiana was a destination for me. There were a few things Ray and I wanted to do so he came up with the Indiana idea. It turns out it was a great idea except that the weather was freakishly cold for mid July.

One of the things on my list was water. Here I am at The River Walk in Portage.

The next day we went to Indiana Dunes. Yay, more water! We sat and walked on the beach watching the storm until it started raining. Chicago is behind the clouds.

If death occurs, then they tow your car.

Chicago style pizza was on The List. Here is my veggie version.

On the way there, Ray agreed to drive by Michael Jackson’s childhood home since we were close and it was kind of on the way to getting some pizza. I don’t have a picture of the house though. Some neighborhood guys had the street blocked off and were selling t-shirts. Ray didn’t feel like dealing with all of that so we didn’t stop, but there are plenty of pics of it on the web if you’re interested. One example is Geofftech’s. He was there the day after we were. He was also staying in Lafayette the day after we did. I hope he’s not following me! Ha ha.

We went back to The Riverwalk to see the Chicage skyline at sunset.

The next day we went to Mt. Baldy. Wow, is it gorgeous! I had no idea that such a pretty beach was as close as this is! If only it had been a typical July day instead of a cold July day.

Blueberries – the initial reason for planning a trip. This place was awesome and blueberries are organic.
We picked just over 20 lbs, which is about all the cooler would hold. I’d like to have more. The Blueberry Ranch

Ray found the neatest place for dinner in South Bend – Tippecanoe Place. It’s a former mansion and you are free to walk all over the place – all 4 floors. Each room is set up as a dining room but we were there so early I didn’t disturb many people with my wanderings.

Here is a site for more (and better) pictures. This place was beautiful!! A tour

My first taste of homegrown tomatoes purchased at Dublin Community Market, now happening on Wednesdays from 4:30-8pm at the Dublin Community Church. I got the cherries there too. The fresh basil came from our back yard.

These were extra bright today.

Today I went black raspberry picking at Champaign Berry Farm.

I picked until my back told me to stop.

Here are a few pics from opening night at Dirty Franks.

I had the Chicago Style Veggie Dog. It tasted as good as it looks!

Ray had a Chicago Style regular and this Chili Dog

These are the Double Fried Fries. I probably won’t get them again because I prefer my fries less cooked and they were pretty salty, although since I have eliminated most salt when I eat at home, when I eat out, things tend to taste too salty to me.

What I will order are the onion rings. They were great and I rarely eat onions.

There are several more varieties of hot dogs I want to try. I know this seems contrary to my usual talk of trying to eat healthy, but every now and then I get to be bad

The place was packed but the service was friendly and calm. People were lined up out the door as we left. Parking was a breeze on Main street at the meters during the 4-6 no parking time frame on Fourth. The drafts weren’t ready yet so I settled for some root beer that tasted like root beer used to taste. There are a lot of drinks on the menu I want to try sometime when I’m not driving.
I’d say Liz Lessner has another huge hit here in Columbus.

My knitting group has been meeting at Whetstone for a few weeks now so we can get some fresh air and be outside.
Each week we see the raccoons emerge from their places in the trees.

We haven’t seen anything in here, but there’s plenty of room.

At some point in the evening, we usually take a stroll through the rose garden.

It’s a great way to spend a summer evening. I hate to think about the sun setting earlier. The daylight hours of June suit me just fine.

London is probably my very favorite city in the world. If I ever won the lottery, I would use the money to be able to spend about half of my time there. Since the odds of that are pretty slim, especially since I don’t play the lottery, I use the internet to keep myself in tune with London to some degree. For a few years I’ve been reading diamond geezer’s blog. This is a great blog with a variety of topics that are always interesting. He remains anonymous but he gives enough of a glimpse of himself to keep you interested. It was through this blog that I found Geoff’s blog.

Geoff moved to South Carolina a few years ago and writes about what it’s like for a Brit to live here. He makes entertaining videos and they are very well done. He also does a Year End Music Review that I look forward to hearing. Ok, so the accent might be part of that, but it’s still fun! Hmm, if only there was a way to get people to pronounce my name BeTTy instead of “Beddy”. sigh

His latest project, UndergroundUSA is how I was able to meet him. He is going to each of the 48 continental states and finding a town that has the same name as a London Tube Station. I’ve always wanted to take a road trip around the perimeter of the country some day (another reason that winning the lottery would come in handy), so this is an adventure of his that I am happy to follow. As he was getting close to Ohio, I tried to guess what his destination here might be. I never got it right though. It was Greenford. Then he went to Michigan and I thought the Ohio part of his trip was over, but I was wrong. He tweeted he was on his way to Columbus for the night!

I wondered if it would be possible to meet him. I emailed him to see if he would be willing to meet me and to sign my Tube Map poster (yes, I have one of those, stop rolling your eyes!) and gave him my cell number. It was Knitting Night at Whetstone and I had no idea what to expect. I didn’t mention the knitting thing to Geoff. People who don’t knit can have erroneous preconceived notions about knitters. I was with some people who totally get why I wanted to meet him – yay peeps! Mollylouhoo, I’m sorry you missed him. You probably passed by him on your way out of the park

Here is a picture of us after he signed my poster.

This is Geoff and his traveling companion for the week Katie, who was very sweet.

Here is Lindsey’s pic of those of use who stayed around the longest and Geoff.

You know, maybe we are kind of an odd bunch. That would explain why Geoff asked how many of us have read Harry Potter in the way that he did. That would be all of us, btw

Anyway, Geoff was wonderfully charming and indulgent. I was honored to be the one from Ohio to sign his t-shirt! Today he is in West Virginia and on to his next destination.

Thanks Geoff!

I’ve been on a soup kick lately and I love my new book Vegan Soups and Hearty Stews for all Seasons! I like how the recipes are divided by seasons so you can get the freshest ingredients. As I try to drastically reduce my consumption of meat and dairy, this gives me lots of tasty options. I can also salt to my taste, which I’ve also reduced making pretty much any prepared food too salty for me. I’ve tried 3 of the recipes so far.

This is a Chilled Pea and Cucumber soup with lots of dill from the deck. Next year I want all of the herbs to be on the deck. I keep forgetting about the ones in the garden. Anyway, I really liked this one. It uses a little bit of rice milk and potatos for creaminess and texture.

I came down with a head cold a few days ago and this Japanese Noodle Soup hit the spot. Since I was wanting more salt than usual, I used a can of regular veggie broth, otherwise I would use low sodium. I had another helping right away.

This is another chilled soup – Mixed Berry. It’s more of a dessert for me and has a bit of wine in it. It tastes as good as it looks