Langdon Hall, Bauer Kitchen chefs among gold Good Food Innovation Awards winners
Chefs from Cambridge, Kitchener, Guelph and Waterloo will have the chance to travel to New York City as culinary ambassadors from Waterloo region and Wellington county in the near future.
The cooks — Jason Bangerter of Langdon Hall, Eric Neaves of Fork and Cork, Shea Robinson of Miijidaa and Todd Clarmo of The Bauer Kitchen — were gold winners at Food Day Canada's and the University of Guelph's Good Food Innovation Awards announced at the end of November.
"The selection process this year was the most difficult ever," said Anita Stewart of Food Day Canada in choosing the gold winners.
"It's funny how these things seem to cluster. Last year, we were heavily into B.C. chefs, but this year there are lots from Ontario among the amazing collection from all across Canada."
The gold-winning chefs will first participate in a food event at the University of Guelph in fall 2018 and then head to Manhattan in May 2019.
Clarmo, a Guelph native and corporate executive chef with The Charcoal Group who created a menu in his role with The Bauer Kitchen in Waterloo, said receiving the award is an honour — though he pays homage first to the ingredients.
"Good cooking is easy in this area, in the sense that there are so many great farms and producers who are willing to get their product out there, and we can simply prepare dishes from the ground up."
"It means a lot to us at the Bauer to be recognized as a food leader," Clarmo said.
The 'wow factor'
"You'll see that the restaurants and winners from across the country are not all high end, which means we're identifying and showcasing some truly great locavore chefs. The current group of award winners will be invited to cook a course at Beard House and celebrate their skill sets and Canada," she said.
According to Stewart, Clarmo has been doing Food Day Canada menus for years and was intent on going for gold this year, while Bangerter has won consistently and was Beard House team leader in May 2017. Eric Neaves presented what she calls a sleek and thoughtful menu, and Robinson has been "honing his cuisine to be truly hyper-local."
Fine cuisine with local flair
The local success is a case of reaping what you sow. For five or six years now, heightened attention has been paid by restaurants to local producers in creating and cooking menus that are inventive and taste delicious.
The dedication to the ingredients combined with the talent of the cooks has meant that the industry elsewhere in the country is taking note of what is happening in restaurants here. One example was the national attention drawn by Jonathan Gushue's cooking at The Berlin in Kitchener. Gushue has just moved to Fogo Island Inn in Newfoundland.
For Clarmo, the trip to Manhattan where the best chefs in the world are asked to cook is not new, so he encourages his colleagues who have not been there to really embrace it.
"I don't know if the cooks really understand the full gamut of how awesome this is, but the James Beard House is a big deal," said Clarmo. "When they get there and start cooking, the shivers up the back of their neck will be wild because it is such a buzz."
As for what he will cook, Waterloo Region will be represented on the plate, Clarmo said.
"I will definitely think of our area here and the farmers and prepare European-based cuisine with local ingredients."