18 • Thursday, September 9, 2021
FOOD
OVER THE MOUNTAIN JOURNAL
FOODIE NEWS
Middle Eastern Food Festival Returns Sept. 23-25
Photos courtesy Les Dames d’Escoffier
Photo courtesy St. George Melkite Catholic Church
Birmingham Dames will again mask up for Champagne & Fried Chicken at Pepper Place Market on Oct. 3.
Dinner With the Dames Birmingham’s LDEI Chapter Gets Ready for a Drive-Through Picnic
By Donna Cornelius
L
ast year, COVID-19 restrictions had organizations rethinking their usual fundraising events. The Birmingham chapter of Les Dames d’Escoffier International, a nonprofit, professional organization for women in food, beverage and hospitality, came up with Champagne & Fried Chicken, a drive-through picnic at Birmingham’s Pepper Place Market. The event proved to be such a hit that the Dames are hosting it again this year on Oct. 3, 3-5 p.m. For a $150 donation, you get your own tasty picnic. Each basket, designed to feed two people, includes Southern food with a French accent: fried chicken, new potato salad, kale salad, corn muffins, biscuits, fresh fruit, cheese and desserts. You’ll also get a bottle of champagne and a bouquet of fresh flowers. Take your baskets home for your own backyard party or to a Pepper Place picnic table to enjoy while listening to live music. Other fundraiser features are raffles for collections of gift cards from some of Birmingham’s best restaurants and, for additional donations, cocktail kits and premium items such as cooking classes and Spotify dinner playlists. The cocktail kits are $25. Classes being offered for $20 each are: Becky Satterfield: The pastry chef and owner of Satterfield’s Restaurant and El ZunZun shows you how to bake two of her favorite things: French sablé cookies and buttermilk biscuits. Master these French and Southern treats, and then share what you’ve learned. Buyers will receive recipes and a link to a digital class.
Sidney Fry’s heirloom tomato tart.
Sherron Goldstein: She is the author of “Fresh Fields, A Celebration of Good Food” and “Fresh Fields, Entertaining with Southern Comfort” and the co-author of “From Generation to Generation.” She also is owner-director of her own cooking school, Fresh Fields Cooking. Goldstein’s teaching encourages home cooks to create good food for their families and friends as they create tastes that endure. In this virtual class, she’ll teach you how to make a beautiful and delicious raspberry lemon-mint trifle. Buyers will get the recipe and a link to the digital class. Kathy G. Mezrano: This is your chance to have Dame Kathy G. teach you how to make mezze, which are small plates or appetizers, including her wildly popular Lebanesestyle grape leaves. Available as a virtual class,
you’ll get her own family recipe, and she’ll show you how it’s done. This award-winning caterer is known for her design skills, so she’ll share presentation tips, too. Buyers will receive the recipes and a link to a digital class. Andrea Kirkland: A registered dietitian, Kirkland is the owner and founder of Culinary Med Ed. Her Southern roots, along with her career as a food writer and recipe developer, have taught her a thing or two about good home cooking, and she’s on a mission to prove that the words “healthy” and “delicious” can coexist. Her online class will show you how to master comfort food makeovers, and she’ll walk you through her pro tips for giving a hearty chicken pot pie a healthier spin. She’ll reveal the secrets of how to achieve bold, satisfying flavor without any of the guilt. What’s dinner without music? For an additional donation of $20, you’ll get a curated Spotify playlist delivered to your inbox at the beginning of the month for six months. For tickets and more information about the event, visit www.ldeibirmingham.org. Last year’s event was a sell-out, and only 350 baskets will be available this year. Proceeds help the Birmingham Dames fund the future of food in Alabama through scholarships for culinary students of all ages at colleges and universities as well as entrepreneur grants for new women-owned food businesses in the state. To date, the Dames have awarded almost $85,000 in scholarships and grants. Pepper Place Market is at 28th Street and Second Avenue S in downtown Birmingham. See DAMES, page 19
Saint George Melkite Catholic Church’s cooks already have begun preparing (and taste testing) for the 39th Middle Eastern Food Festival, set for Sept. 23-25. “We anticipate a full-fledged festival, though there may be a few modifications made based on CDC guidelines,” co-Chair Annette Ritchey said. The festival will include a selection of Middle Eastern foods, savory and sweet. During the festival, which also marks the church’s centennial year, tours will be offered of the Byzantine church every day until 8 p.m. The festival will be at the church, which is near UAB at 425 16th Ave. South. The hours of operation are 10:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Drive-thru service will be available 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Deliveries can be arranged for orders of $75 or more to the downtown area on that Thursday and Friday. For takeout and delivery orders, call 205492-9621 or email foodorders@saintgeorgeonline.org. The menu includes baked kibbee, stuffed grape leaves, spinach pies, meat pies, falafel, Mediterranean-style chicken and other dishes. For variety, try the Nile Plate or Oasis Plate. The Nile includes kibbee as its entrée and the Oasis includes Mediterranean-style chicken as its entrée. Both plates include rice and green beans cooked in seasoned tomato sauce, freshly made salad, grape leaves and hummus and pita bread. The menu offers vegetarian plates and sides, as well. An array of Middle Eastern sweets will be offered, including zalabieh, a fried doughnut dipped in rose-flavored syrup and dusted with powdered sugar. Arabic coffee also will be offered with or without cardamom. Ten percent of proceeds raised will benefit local and diocesan charities. For further information visit saintgeorgeonline.org.
Taste of Hoover to Return Oct. 7
Celebrating the variety of culinary experiences throughout Hoover, the annual Taste of Hoover fundraiser will take place Oct. 7 at Aldridge Gardens. Representatives from local restaurants, caterers and other food service operations will serve tastings of their cuisine alongside spirits,
See HOOVER, page 19
