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Food experts confer James Beard awardsBy CHRIS SHERMAN © St. Petersburg Times, published May 16, 2001 Restaurateurs got out their black ties and chef's whites for the chance to wear red ribbons with the medallions of the 2001 James Beard awards in New York last month. The awards, decided by food experts from around the country, cover restaurants, cookbooks, and broadcasting. Best U.S. chef was Patrick O'Connell of Idyllic Inn at Little Washington, who has spent more than 20 years transforming a tiny Virginia town on the edge of the Shenandoah mountains into a foodie shrine. Meals are made from the finest local produce and game and are served in an opulent setting by a world-class staff. The inn requires a special trip and a tab of $100 a person, but few food lovers begrudge it as a once-in-a-lifetime indulgence. Top U.S. restaurant was Campanile in Los Angeles, an Italian restaurant that owners Mark Peel and Nancy Silverton made famous for its bread as well as its other food. The South's best chef was from Alabama, Frank Stitt of Highlands Bar & Grill in Birmingham. Not all honorees were high-priced. The Beard awards for regional classics included the Versailles, the mirrored palace of Cuban food on Miami's Calle Ocho, and H&H Car Wash and Restaurant in El Paso, Texas. The H&H has combined both businesses for decades, serving pineapple empanadas and huevos rancheros while customers wait. That's worth a road trip, too. Awards also went to 13 top authors whose food and wine books can now carry gold James Beard stickers. Among the winners: Cookbook of the Year is Hot Sour Salty Sweet: A Culinary Journey through Southeast Asia by Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid (Artisan, $40), who won in 1996 for Flatbreads and Flavors. Kitchenaid Cookbook Hall of Fame chose A Book of Mediterranean Food, a 1950 classic by Elizabeth David, reprinted by Penguin. Best single-subject cookbook was The Good Egg by Marie Simmons (Houghton Mifflin, $17).
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From the Times Taste section From the features wire |
