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As part of a movement to bring craft beer and craft food together to a higher level, Ommegang Brewery has started a competition called Hop Chef. In three different cities, top chefs will compete to see who can create the best Ommegang infused dishes. Here’s the details:
George Sabatino Joe Cicala
Stateside Le Virtu
@GWSabatino @Joe_Cicala
Nicholas Elmi Scott Schroeder
Rittenhouse Tavern SPTR/American Sardine
@nicholaselmi @foodsyoucaneat
*not pictured: Jon Cichon: La Croix at Rittenhouse Hotel – @Lacroixbar210 and Jason Cichonski: Ela – @JasonCichonski
On Tuesday, July 10 at 7 p.m., Philadelphia’s most talented young chefs will compete in Brewery Ommegang’sPhilly Hop Chef (click for tickets) for a chance to represent the city in a cook-off at the brewery’s annual Belgium Comes to Cooperstown event. Six chefs will each create two dishes showcasing their imaginative beer and food pairing skills. The 12 dishes, all paired with Ommegang beers, will be served to a panel of judges and to all attendees. Philly Hop Chef will be held at World Cafe Live (3025 Walnut Street, 215-222-1400) and tickets are $55 per person.
“Beer and food belong together – whether as a thoughtful beverage pairing or as an ingredient – and this competition will bring together some of Philly’s best young chefs into the kitchen with our beers,” says Megan Maguire, Ommegang Market Manager. “We can’t wait to see what the chefs will dream up.”
The outstanding line-up of competing chefs includes: Joe Cicala of Le Virtù; Jon Cichon of LaCroix at Rittenhouse Hotel; Jason Cichonski ofEla; Nicholas Elmi of Rittenhouse Tavern; George Sabatino of Stateside; and Scott Schroeder of South Philadelphia Tap Room and American Sardine Bar. The chefs will be judged based on five pairing principles: Simple Pairing, a direct interaction between food and beer; Incorporation, utilizing beer in the cooking process; Mimicking, matching the flavor profile of a dish with the flavor profile of a beer; Story Telling, tracing the history of the dish and the beer; and Experimental, making beer the star of the dish.
The Hop Chef Competition is part of the Ommegang program known as Great Beer Deserves Great Food®, a national initiative dedicated to the idea that fine beer deserves its rightful place at the table with fine foods. The Philadelphia event is the final in a series of chef’s cook-offs across the U.S., culminating in a Grand Hop Chef cook-off at Ommegang’s Belgium Comes to Cooperstown festival on August 4, 2012.
In the weeks leading up to Hop Chef, people can follow the chefs on twitter (hashtag #HopChef) as they taste Ommegang beers and create their competition dishes. For more information, or to purchase tickets, please visit www.brownpapertickets.com/
