"You don't need a silver fork to eat good food" ~Paul Prudhomme
The stage..Catalina OP... the people, a group of talented chefs, sponsors, volunteers and food lovers, coming together for a night of awesome eats, for great causes.
From the handful of events this year, Collaboration Kitchen has donated $17,500 to San Diego charities.
What makes this event so great is, not only do you get to taste creative and phenomenal food creations, but you also get a live demonstration and recipes to help you recreate them at home.
On this special night, the featured chefs were, Logan Mitchell of Cellar Door, Christina Ng of Whole Foods Market Del Mar and Quinn Wilson of Balanced and Bright Traditional Foods.
What was cooked up:
Asian inspired Nicoise salad (that tuna!!)
Steamed clams in bone broth
Opah fish taco with mole
Grilled Baha shrimp with white bean succotash and Logan's amazeball chimichurri
Seared and chilled scallops with marinated vegetable ribbons
Salted Caramel Uni Profiteroles
Curds and Wine also provided delicious drink pairings, my favorite being the hard apple cider (and I'm not even a cider person).
The final treat was that everyone got to take home a bit of the beautiful decorative produce provided by Specialty Produce.
I love that Collaboration Kitchen is just about a good time and sharing tasty food, no fancy plating or silverware, no pretention surrounding ingredients and you get to see all the work that goes into making the event happen, through the open back kitchen. Following the demonstrations and after the event, you also get to talk to the chefs, pick their brains and get cooking advice on their recipes.
Be sure to follow them on facebook to see when their next event is. Tickets always sell fast.