Bringing Local to a Whole New Level - an evening with Jeremy Umansky & Elaine Cicora
Hosted by the Cleveland Chapter of Les Dames d'Escoffier
In Cleveland, we are so very lucky to have innovative chefs like Jeremy Umansky who really get the link between our natural world and great food. His restaurant Larder is simply wonderful… A traditional European delicatessen serving the most intelligent farm to table food that I’ve eaten anywhere, a foragers dream restaurant. You haven’t lived until you’ve eaten his fried chicken sandwich with fries and koji fermented vegetables. It was the last meal I ate before everything shut down from COVID and I intend to go eat it again this weekend, possibly adding some kind of dessert like a creampuff, apple dumpling or piece of cheesecake. I’ll be the one rolling down West 29th, but I’ll be smiling!
As a member of Les Dames de’Escoffier Cleveland, I’m so proud that we are hosting a virtual evening with Jeremy on Monday March 14th. It’s going to be wonderful!
Here’s the Eventbrite Link! You don’t want to miss this fabulous evening!
From the link:
“At Larder, Umansky and his partners and staff serve housemade fried chicken sandwiches, ferments, pickles, salads and gigantic pastries to diners throughout the week — many of which are made with ingredients harvested from Northeast Ohio's collective backyard.
"Personally, I work with about 150 to 175 different species of mushrooms," says Umansky." Plants, we probably use over 300 different species. When we use the ingredients [at Larder], they're just fully integrated into our cooking. They aren't called out as something special or unique because we want everybody to be able to relate to it."
Umansky holds a Wild-Foraged Mushroom Certification from the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, one of only a handful of qualifications professional foragers can receive in the United States. Growing up in Solon, Ohio, Umansky began foraging with his mother, harvesting wild blackberries from a dirt-bike pathway in a wooded lot near his home. He began foraging professionally in New York, working as a land manager for a farm that partnered with Cornell University, New York's state agricultural school.
"In most of the rest of the world, foraging is a normalized activity that's just part of how you put food on the table," says Umansky. "In Eastern Europe, most of Asia, from Russia down to Thailand, large parts of Central and South America, that is just as much a regular thing for putting food on the table as it is for us to go to the supermarket. To find something here that you can get with your own hands, that you can enjoy eating with your family ... it's captivating."
Join host, Cleveland Dame Elaine Cicora, and the rest of the Cleveland Dames for this fascinating conversation with Jeremy. His works have been featured in numerous publications including NPR’s Science Friday, Bon Appetit, Saveur, PLATE Magazine and he was named “The Deli Prophet” by Food & Wine in its March 2019 Makers Issue.
One lucky attendee will win a signed copy of Jeremy’s book, Koji Alchemy.
Your donation of $10.00 or more will get you a virtual seat (with proceeds to be used for our Grants Program, supporting organizations that strive to help individuals of all ages in Northeast Ohio better understand the link between farming and the food on their plates).”
Date and time
Mon, Mar 14, 2022, 6:30 PM EDT
Location
Online event - Here’s the Eventbrite Link! You don’t want to miss this fabulous evening!