Archive for the 'Vegetables' Category

Sep 24 2008

Posted by chefRob under Glass Door, Vegetables

Our Products part 2 - Produce

Organic heirloom carrots photographed by Chef Robert Conaway & aGreatChef.com

Organic heirloom carrots photographed by Chef Robert Conaway & aGreatChef.com

As a chef, I have always tried to procure the best possible produce for the restaurants I have been in charge of. Back in the Blue Chalk/Steelhead brew days, I was lucky enough to meet Stuart Dickson, the farmer (at the time) at Stone Free Farm in Watsonville CA.

My experiences with Steelhead and Stuart was one of the best relationships I have had with a farm to date. My friend and fellow chef Jeff and I would go down to Stone Free once a month and wander through the fields, seeing and tasting what Stuart was growning. We eventually dumped our flavorless organic greens mix for a custom blend that Jeff and I created “in field”. We spend an hour or so tasting all of the greens that Stu was growing, taking field notes and samples. We then returned to their office and re tasted the greens, working to strike a balance between sweet, salty, bitter and neutral greens. This mix at the time (1996) was revolutionary as not too many chefs were concerned with creating their own mix and certainly not ones who ran breweries. It was fun, and a bit trying to explain Orach to our guests from Europe and the Central Valley, and wll worth the time.

I have carried this long tradition of using the freshest organic ingredients available here at the Glass Door. While Stu and Stone Free are too far away to use, I am working on getting the same relationships together with local soCal farmers while utilizing our rooftop container garden (more on this later) to bring the best organic produce to our friends and guests.

If you would like to look into the past, follow this link to read an article from 1999 about Stu & Stone Free. There are a few free recipes on it too.

Best,

chefRob

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Jun 14 2008

Posted by chefRob under Vegetables

Dumpster Diving v.2.0, Asparagus

Pan roasted asparagus

Dumpster diving usually is something that I reserve for those time between paychecks when the pantry is full and cash is all but nonexistent. Recently I found myself diving for another reason and that reason is I’m tired!

We are getting close to the opening of the restaurant and with that comes longer and longer days (and nights) away from home. I tried to pull off a First Tuesday party this week (postponed until the second Tuesday) and I was burnt. My excitement level generally is high for these events, which I used to do monthly but I am running on empty and am, for lack of a better word lazy.

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