February 2014

true love

how local chocolate is after our hearts

Lavender truffles from Kakao Chocolate p. 34

Sherry,

b a by

t h e n e w fa c e o f fa r m i n g

Hanky Panky D r i n k i n g

Super Bowl Fare

p. 29

p. 40

p. 25

p. 30

st. louis’ independent culinary authority

February 2014

Fit for Vegans

FREE, february 2014

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fe b r ua r y 2 014 • VOLUM E 14, Issue 2 PUBLISHER EXECUTIVE EDITOR ART DIRECTOR MANAGING EDITOR MANAGING EDITOR, DIGITAL SPECIAL SECTIONs EDITOR Fact checker PROOFREADER PRODUCTION DESIGNER EDIBLE WEEKEND WRITER CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS

What's your favorite romantic date spot?

A table by the fireplace at Dressel’s Public House

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February 2014

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contents february 2014

editors' picks 11

EAT THIS Ozark Forest Mushroom Salad at Farmhaus

12

FIXATIONS 8 products on our shopping list

15

HIT LIST

Pimento grilled cheese at Juniper p. 17

6 new places to try this month

reviews 17

NEW AND NOTABLE Juniper

by michael renner 20

POWER LUNCH

27

Southwest Diner

WINE

by byron kerman

Best house reds

by glenn bardgett

48

29

by byron kerman

23

NIGHTLIFE Gamlin Whiskey House

DRINK THIS

by matt berkley

Sherry is so very ...

wine & dine Photo by jonathan gayman

25

A SEAT AT THE BAR

STUFF TO DO 50

by daniels and lauren blake-parseliti

WHAT I DO

30

by ligaya figueras

VEGETIZE IT

Features

Vegan buffalo wings and dip

by kellie hynes

Four experts tell us what to sip, stir and shake

32

by glenn bardgett, cory king and ted and jamie kilgore

Savory oatmeal

February 2014

last course

MAKE THIS by dee ryan

Stephen and Sara Hale

40

the changing face of farming story and photos by carmen troesser cover details true love: how local chocolate is after our hearts Kakao’s lavender truffles recently earned a Good Food Award, the first for any St. Louis company. For more on the local chocolate scene, turn to p. 34.

photo by greg rannells

34

Big kids in a candy shop How St. Louis chocolatiers are raising the bar by ligaya figueras

correction Photos in the January 2014 Make This and Vegetize It columns were shot by Greg Rannells.

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letter from the editor newlywed nights rocking out to bands were quickly replaced by the reality of rocking a wailing newborn to sleep. But it has all been good.

Most recently, our family hobby of keeping chickens is one that I never would have predicted. I know I’ve reached Crazy Urban Chicken Lady status because I have nightmares about the neighborhood hawk snatching Perrault, Francois, Tikka and Cacciatore from my caring clutches.

Unlike real farmers, my livelihood doesn’t depend on the success of my backyard chickens. The female farmers featured in Carmen Troesser’s “The Changing Face of Farming” (p. 40), however, are wholly invested in their farms. As Carmen explains, it has long been the tradition in farming communities that men drive tractors, herd cattle and mend fences while women assume a supporting role. Carmen introduces us to five women who don’t fit that mold, and she explores the path that led them to become the driving forces behind their farms. In some cases, they purposefully chose the job; in others, life had its funny way of handing it to them.

Sometimes I wonder what things would be like had I become a flight attendant.

Then I dismiss the whole thing. There are plenty of ways to earn one’s wings.

Cheers, to be a flight attendant for Iberia Airlines, flying the route between JFK and Madrid-Barajas airports. I had it all worked out in my head when the man who would become my husband

entered my world and put an end to that Euro jet-setter fantasy. (Thinking back, he played “Waitress in the Sky”

by The Replacements with alarming frequency.) Dreams of passing our

Ligaya Figueras Executive editor

Looking to become more connected with your food sources? Tune in to St. Louis Public Radio 90.7 KWMU’s Cityscape Friday, Feb. 21 at noon and 10 p.m. to learn how two area organizations are making fresh food available to the St. Louis community. Sara Hale of Fair Shares CSA (p. 50) and Jeffrey D. Randol of newly opened grocery store Fields Foods (p. 15) join Sauce executive editor Ligaya Figueras to discuss their work with area food producers and the ever-increasing options to support the local food community.

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Photo by elizabeth jochum

I

consider myself a planner. I keep a calendar and don’t miss appointments, but life has a way of rerouting even the best-laid plans – like the one I hatched 20 years ago

February 2014

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editors' picks

eat this

The Ozark Forest Mushroom Salad at Farmhaus is a locavore’s dream. A bed of lightly dressed Crop Circle Farm winter greens, a generous helping of toasted Missouri pecans and dollops of goat cheese from Baetje Farms are the foundation for a gigantic pile of crispy shiitake and oyster mushrooms. The ‘shrooms are meaty with the charred, crunchy exterior of a steak and loaded with flavor, thanks to a bold bacon vinaigrette. Farmhaus is always changing dishes, but photo by greg rannells

there’s a reason that this one has stayed on the menu since day one. It is flawless – and timeless.

Farmhaus, 3257 Ivanhoe Ave., St. Louis, 314.647.3800, farmhausrestaurant.com

February 2014

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Fixations

Breadsmith Dolci Cello These sweet and salty snacks have the texture of puffy Cheetos and the taste of caramel corn. Beware: They are insanely addictive. $8.75 per 10-oz. bag. Breadsmith, 10031 Manchester Road, Kirkwood, 314.822.8200, breadsmith.com

aerolatte Keep the juvenile fun going after a day of sledding when you grab this handheld, battery-operated gadget and whip up a frothy cup of hot cocoa. $20. WilliamsSonoma, 227 Chesterfield Mall, Chesterfield, 636.536.4370, williams-sonoma.com

Emilia vinegar by George Paul Vinegar Made in a traditional balsamic style, this exquisite vinegar hails from – surprise!

– Nebraska. $90 per 100-ml. bottle. The Market at The Cheshire, 7036 Clayton Ave., St. Louis, 314.932.7840, market-stl.com

Naked Bacon No Sugar Added Bacon Handcrafted in Ste. Genevieve without nitrates, nitrites, chemicals, phosphates or water, Naked Bacon’s No Sugar Added variety will have you licking your fingers after polishing off the whole pound. $11.50. Local Harvest Grocery, 3108 Morgan Ford Road, St. Louis, 314.865.5260, localharvestgrocery.com

Ford’s Gin This new-to-The-Lou gin satisfies everyone from gin devotees to soon-to-be converts. Ford’s is flavorful, complex and perfect for mixing. $30. Parker’s Table, 7118 Oakland Ave., Richmond Heights, 314.645.2050, parkerstable.com

Mezzaluna This rounded knife imported from Italy is the perfect tool for chopping herbs or slicing a hot pizza pie. $11. DiGregorio’s Italian Foods, 5200 Daggett Ave., St. Louis, 314.776.1062, digregoriofoods.com

Coffee subscription at Blueprint Coffee What’s the best way to give the coffee lover in your life a continual buzz? Send him 12 ounces of single-origin coffee beans all year long. Choose between weekly, bimonthly and monthly subscriptions.

Prices vary. Blueprint Coffee, 6225 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314.266.6808, blueprintcoffee.com

Manzoni Moscato Dolce Come to the party with a bottle of these strawberry-sweet bubbles. Actually, you can afford to bring at least two. $7.

Fields Foods, 1500 Lafayette Ave., St. Louis, 314.241.3276, fieldsfoods.com

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moscato, dolce cello and mezzaluna photos by michelle volansky

From a super-affordable wine to a tricked-out snack, here are the products at the top of our shopping list right now.

February 2014

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hit list

6 new places to try this month

1

Small Batch 3001 Locust St., St. Louis, 314.380.2040, smallbatchstl.com Restaurateur Dave Bailey’s newest concept, Small Batch, pairs the liquor of the moment – whiskey – with 100-percent vegetarian fare in an elegant bistro setting marked by high ceilings, large windows, marble on the bar top and tables, large mirrors, original tile flooring, and ironwork supporting a newly built mezzanine. Order a flight to sample the extensive whiskey selection.

Among small plates, opt for the offbeat eggrolls stuffed with mushrooms and blue cheese, accompanied by a thick fig-port wine dipping sauce. Also nice for sharing is the gratin, which holds an unexpected combination of cipollini onions and white grapes. The light-as-a-feather gnocchi stands out among heartier fare.

SMALL BATCH PHOTO BY JULIE COHEN; CAKE AND PUNCH PHOTOS by michelle volansky

4

The Whiskey Ring The Whiskey Ring, 2651 Cherokee St., St. Louis, 314.769.7249, Facebook: The Whiskey Ring

The Whiskey Ring recently added its name to a growing list of local whiskey bars. This one has a rotating stash of nearly 50 labels. Not in the mood for Basil Hayden’s or 12-year-old Japanese Nikka?

The Whiskey Ring has other spirits – recognizable and lesser-known brands – plus eight local brews on tap, bottled beers and a small wine selection.

February 2014

5

Pairings Wine & Dessert Bar 1131 Colonnade Center, Des Peres, 314.821.5455, pairingswinebarstl.com While Pairings Wine & Dessert Bar offers starters and entrees, it’s the sweet stuff that impressed us. Peanut Butter Affair is layered with chocolate cake, peanut butter fudge and chocolate fudge. Layers of Love (pictured), which features Frangelico-hazelnut chocolate mousse layered between chocolate crepes and topped with dark chocolate ganache and candied hazelnuts, is light and mildly sweet. For a creamy, citrusy delight, try the deconstructed Key lime pie.

3

2

Taha’a Twisted Tiki 4199 Manchester Ave., St. Louis, 314.202.8300, tahaatiki.com

Fields Foods 1500 Lafayette Ave., St. Louis, 314.241.3276, fieldsfoods.com

Planter's Punch, a flaming Volcano Bowl

It’s rum all the time at the newest nightspot in The Grove. Cocktail offerings include usual suspects like mai tais and Hurricanes, as well as some lesser-known classics like the gin, brandy and ginger beer-laden Suffering Bastard or the frozen, mouth-puckering Missionary’s Downfall. Complement your umbrella drink with chicken wings, Polynesian beef skewers and fish tacos with Asian slaw, pico de gallo and chile lime crema. Forget about life in the city on the back patio where tiki torches, a fire pit and a bar will put you in an island state of mind.

It would be an understatement to call Fields Foods just a grocery store. The locallyowned and operated store in Lafayette Square is the newest option for consumers looking to support area farmers, growers and producers, yet it also carries brands that meet the price point of every patron. The prepared foods (all made on-site) section in the 37,000-square-foot store caters to on-the-go customers morning (coffee, eggs, baked goods), noon (wood-fired pizzas, deli sandwiches) and night (rotisserie chicken, smoked ribs). Kudos for its wine and local beer selection, and double-kudos for a wine bar where you can relax with a glass while you hand your shopping list to the concierge.

6

801 Chophouse 137 Carondelet Plaza, Clayton, 314.875.9900, 801restaurantgroup.com/st-louis

Everything about 801 Chophouse in Clayton is big: the massive bar, the towering wine racks, the wide tables and booths, and the portions. Order an 8-ounce filet mignon if you want to save room for a few of the 24 traditional steakhouse sides, the majority available as half-orders. Keep an eye on 801’s Fresh Sheet, a frequently changing menu of seasonal salads, sides, fish and featured wines. For dessert, try the deceptively light house-made Milk Chocolate Frangelico Bombe. saucemagazine.com I SAUCE MAGAZINE I 15

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reviews Zapp’s crusted catfish at Juniper

new and notable

juniper

by Michael Renner | Photos by Jonathan Gayman

I

recently thought about two unrelated restaurant events from 2008: the unfortunate closing of Juniper Grill in Soulard and the exciting launch of John Perkins’ dining club dubbed Entre: Underground. Back then, Perkins kept his identity a mystery, assuming the name The Clandestine Chef.

A year later, he revealed only his first name. When Chef John finally pulled back the shroud of secrecy, he was running shortterm pop-up restaurants from Entre’s North Boyle Avenue space in the Central West End. First, there was the chicken-focused Le Coq, followed by the Southern-inspired A Good Man is Hard to Find and, most recently, the vegetable-themed Agrarian.

new and notable juniper p. 17 / power lunch SOUTHWEST DINER p. 20 / nightlife GAMILIN WHISKEY HOUSE p. 23 February 2014

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straight-forward batter. The fish was hot, crunchy and succulent, but the bed of sweet potato purée must have been plated well before the fish, leaving me just as cold. While the chicken was fine and the accompanying mashed potatoes and gravy superb, the portion could have included a drumstick or breast in addition to the thigh and wing, especially given the $18 price point. A bowl of Brussels sprouts, white beans and apple butter had everything Guess which it needed – one of these texture, aroma, 1950s-style presentation – but refrigerators the dish suffered dispenses beer. from too much salt and the sprouts tasted as if they were grilled over a gas flame.

reviews new and notable p. 2 of 2

At this point, dessert might seem absurd. But then again, it’s hard to refrain from house-made salted-caramel buttermilk ice cream and doughnuts, especially when a Cointreau-spiked chocolate sauce was involved. haunting paintings by local artist Camden St. Claire grace the back wall. The largest vividly captures the Southern Gothic sentiment of Flannery O’Connor’s classic short story for which both the painting and Perkins’ Southern pop-up were named.

“I want to explore [Southern cooking] a little bit more,” Perkins told Sauce last September when asked about his next project postAgrarian. “I don’t see a lot of low-country Southern, Mississippi Delta Southern food.”

Now, like a bachelor who finally tied the knot, Perkins has settled on Juniper, his new venture that makes an honest (read: permanent) restaurant out of the A Good Man is Hard to Find Southern-dining concept.

When first seated, it would be easy to fill up on addictively delicious deviled eggs and bread from the Snackies portion of the menu. A basket of bread is $9 for five breads or $5 for a half-order, which entails a choice of three. And oh that bread! Buttermilk biscuits, angel biscuits made with lard, cornbread, hush puppies and popovers all vie for attention. I found it best to order a half-basket with dinner.

Also from the Snackies menu, there’s a tangy pimento grilled cheese made seductive with its bacon-and-Brussels sprouts jam.

I mention these two events from 2008 because I enjoy Juniper for many of the same reasons I miss Juniper Grill: a cozy neighborhood eatery serving unpretentious yet imaginative food; a place you can walk into and instantly feel at home. Juniper’s interior is fun and funky, rusticated by exposed brick walls; communal and two- and four-top tables made of reclaimed wood; and hanging lights tucked into birdcages. Three brightly painted, 1950s-style refrigerators stand behind the bar, like soldiers reporting for duty; one dispenses beer. Two beautifully

AT A GLANCE Juniper

Several favorites from A Good Man migrated to Juniper’s menu, including the humbly named entree, Pork-N-Beans.

But there was nothing humble about this

Where 360 N. Boyle Ave., St. Louis, 314.329.7696, junipereats.com

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Don’t Miss Dishes Pork-N-Beans, Zapp’s crusted catfish, pimento grilled cheese

small, satisfying portion of red wattle pork belly cooked with the sous-vide method for half a day before hitting the deep-fryer upon ordering. Where pork belly can be overwhelmingly unctuous, Juniper’s version was lusciously meaty and fatty with a crispy, bronzed exterior. The addition of smoky, boldly flavored red peas, collard greens, a drizzle of maple syrup and a soft-fried egg elevated the dish from low-country to highbrow. Chicken and waffles also made it to Juniper’s menu, but the newly added shrimp and grits looked far more enticing in its little iron skillet.

You’d expect the shrimp to be plump and perfectly cooked and the grits stone-ground and creamy – which they were, but the deep flavor and citrusy brightness of the gravy (made with shrimp shells) added a surprisingly delicious layer of complexity.

There was fried fish and chicken: the former, catfish breaded with Louisiana’s Zapp’s potato chips, the latter coated in a

Vibe Think hipster chic. On busy nights, be prepared for upper decibels and making friends at the communal table.

Wine is priced at $9 per glass and $36 per bottle. There’s nothing spectacular about the list (a mere four reds, four whites and two sparklings), but two of the whites – Spanish Arabako Txakolina Xarmant and French Larochette Manciat Mâcon Les Morizottes – were nice surprises. Of course, there is a Dixie lager among a couple of other bottle options, two Civil Life brews on tap and five beers in cans.

Cocktails are the focus here – mostly those made with rum, rye and bourbon. Sit at the bar, ask for something flaming, and get ready for a show.

With a menu as varied as Juniper’s – from snacks to charcuterie, entrees to sweets, and a section dedicated to vegetables, you could construct as many meal combinations as Meryl Streep has Oscar nominations. But it may take several visits to get a good sense of everything Perkins is exploring. And that’s OK; turns out, finding the good man is not that hard.

Entree Prices $17 to $19

When Lunch: Wed. to Fri. carryout and delivery only – 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Dinner: Wed. to Sat. – 5:30 to 10 p.m.

February 2014

February 2014

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reviews power lunch

Power Lunch

Southwest diner

by Byron Kerman | photos by Elizabeth Jochum

They serve Southwestern cuisine at Southwest Diner on Southwest Avenue.

The wordplay, like the diner itself, is cute. When you walk into Southwest Diner, you know you’re going to have fun because that’s what everyone is having. The interior of this breakfast and lunch spot is a riot of bright colors, and the house stereo might be pumping anything from Gene Autry to Michael Jackson. This is not a good place to brood. The servers are part of the fun, too. They are (usually) efficient, relaxed and smiling. On weekends, locals are lined up out the door, but the daunting procession generally moves briskly.

[1] SANDWICHES, EVEN The Companion marble rye holding the Reuben together was tasty with grill-butter.

The corned beef inside, though, was superlean, without any visible marbling, which was a bit disappointing. The side of fries was done to an excellent crisp.

PRICES ARE LOW, LOW, LOW Part of Southwest Diner’s allure is how far a dollar goes. Great mounds of food come at reasonable prices, like a $5 burrito that’s a massive, two-meal (or two-person) affair.

Nothing on the menu costs more than 11 bucks, and with a frequent diner card, every 11th entree is free.

[2 ]

BREAKFAST FOR LUNCH Breakfast dishes, also available at lunchtime, might be the eatery’s greatest strength.

Buttermilk-cornmeal pancakes [1]with buttery-brown edges are delicious. Ask for real maple syrup on the side for an extra buck; it’s worth it. The biscuits and gravy plate is one of the best around town; the biscuits aren’t light and airy, but dense and substantial, oven-browned and engulfed by a gravy that is chunky with bits of house-made sausage flecked with both red and cracked black pepper. Jonathan’s Famous Fiery Scramble [2], cheesy scrambled eggs with sambal oelek hot sauce and your choice of breakfast meat, is another standout. (Order it with house-made chorizo.) Sopaipillas, aka New Mexican hollow “doughnuts,” are fried, yeasty, square pillows served with honey on the side. Eating these warm, tender delights makes for a wonderfully sticky mess. Breakfast potatoes were crisp and brown, but the tomato jam, available a la carte, was saccharine-sweet, with the sugar masking the flavor of the tomatoes.

THE TAKEAWAY Southwest Diner’s owners Jonathan Jones and Anna Sidel parlayed a successful booth at the Tower Grove Farmers Market into a brick-and-mortar restaurant, which is no small achievement. For its next trick, Southwest Diner the diner – which is the only 6803 Southwest Ave., true New Mexican restaurant in St. Louis, 314.260.7244 the area and, thus, the standard southwestdinerstl.com bearer – might consider delving into the more subtle shadings of spicing technique. It can only enhance the restaurant’s already considerable charm.

Diner left this diner unable to grasp what the kitchen is trying to do here. The green sauce is mild – as green chile sauce often is – but here, it is so weak as to be negligible.

The red is hotter, but, similarly, lacks any recognizable flavor profile. These sauces are wet, and that’s about it. It’s just puzzling.

THE SAUCEs THAT SHOULD NOT BE At the heart of New Mexican cuisine are two sauces – red and green chile sauces, used in virtually every dish in that region (and when ordered together, known as “Christmas”). Repeated trips to Southwest

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STRAIGHT OUTTA ALBUQUERQUE The New Mexican and Tex-Mex menu items include carne adovada (not to be confused with the Avada Kedavra killing curse from Harry Potter), which is pork shoulder

braised for five hours in red chile sauce and seasonings. The resulting pulled pork has a mighty heat with a subtle spicing of coriander and cumin just beneath. Carne adovada can be added to various menu items such as the red chile enchiladas platter [3]. To add a nice yolky texture to the dish, top it with a fried egg. Posole, chile-cheese fries, huevos rancheros, a burger, an iceberg wedge salad with fried blue cheese, tostadas and tacos on sopapillas are on the menu, too. Be sure to check out weekend specials, such as crowd favorite Grits on Fire, meaning cheesy grits and carne adovada.

[3] February 2014

February 2014

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reviews

nightlife

nightlife

Gamlin whiskey house

by Matt berkley | Photos by jonathan gayman

Ghost, a tall, white whiskey-infused bloody mary that smacks every other bloody I’ve sampled hard across the jaw. This and the Gamlin Manhattan alone are worth a return visit. Side note: Resist the urge to Gamlin Whiskey try any of Gamlin’s House cocktails on tap.

236 N. Euclid Ave., St. Each is a wateredLouis, 314.875.9500, down waste of time.

order it: Gamlin Whiskey House

gamlinwhiskeyhouse.com

R

ich, bold and uncomplicated by sweet mixers, the Gamlin Manhattan at Gamlin Whiskey House is the way all whiskey cocktails should taste. This classic drink pairs Knob Creek Single Barrel bourbon with a gentle splash of Carpano Antica Formula vermouth poured over a pair of thick, seemingly hand-chipped ice cubes. It might not be perfection in a glass, but it’s pretty close.

This high-end saloon, created by Sub Zero Vodka Bar and Taha’a Twisted Tiki owners Derek and Lucas Gamlin, sits on the enviable corner of Maryland and Euclid avenues in the Central West End. The joint and its clientele are dressed to impress: On a crowded Friday night, well-heeled diners and drinkers vie for space in the slick front bar stacked high with every type of bourbon, scotch and whiskey imaginable (250 labels, to be exact). The whiskey theme is played throughout the rear dining room – a casual, cool and decidedly masculine space with rich wood furnishings and rustic little touches like an entire wall of jarred preserves.

Each table is adorned with a box holding a trio of leather-bound drink menus – wine, February 2014

whiskey and cocktails. The second seems tailored for the casual but not entirely uninformed whiskey drinker. The whiskey list is broken down into countries – America, Canada, Scotland, Ireland – and further into region and style like Kentucky’s Bourbon County or single malt versus blended. A number of mix-and-match whiskey flights are available and make for nice tableside decor on their long serving boards, but scotch aficionados be warned: This is definitely a North American-centric whiskey establishment. Lots of bourbon, lots of ryes, lots of small-batch fun stuff to warm your palate and singe your throat, but only twodozen well-known distilleries are represented from the old country (i.e., The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Balvenie).

The phenomenal cocktails are enough to keep anyone content. Gamlin’s bartenders have a lot of fun with their little masterpieces like the Smoked Manhattan that is infused on-the-spot with actual cherry wood smoke and served up in a spiffy little glass whiskey pipe. Smokier still is the Queen Jane, a nicely conceived cocktail, which features a robust 18-year Laphroaig Islay single malt Scotch whisky poured over honey-laced ice. But the granddaddy of all the cocktails is the Bloody

Executive chef Ivy Magruder’s dinner menu is similarly fashioned with a rustic masculine edge – a lot of red meat and hearty fare, appropriate and tempting on a cold night. Small plates such as the steak tartare are a success. Savory bits of tenderloin arrived topped with a golden egg, accompanied by a crispy baguette to scoop up the delightful mess. A Bird in the Hand, likewise, performed well with simple bourbon-brined chicken drums in a metal pot swimming with seared pieces of apple and onion. These little birds proved especially satisfying paired with the Bloody Ghost. The rich, almost buttery crabcake appetizer bathed in a thick rémoulade was also a standout.

Less satisfying, unfortunately, were entrees such as the rib-eye and the patio steak, whose presentation trumped the flavor and quality of the meat. Paired with forgettable sides, plain-tasting potato gratin with the former and a small pile of frumpy bourbon-spiced fries with the latter, these steaks simply didn’t have the oomph factor you’d expect from meals attached with price tags of $35 and $26, respectively. A better option is Gamlin’s late-night menu, which offers smaller-sized entrees for half the price.

Not to be missed, any time of night, is the Sticky Toffee Pudding from the dessert menu. Crafted by Gamlin’s in-house pastry chef, Lisa Fernandez-Cruz, this soft little treat – smothered in a light bourbon sauce and topped with dates and a dollop of creme fraiche – rivals any bread pudding outside of New Orleans. Order it with a slug of bourbon or a scoop of house-made ice cream.

Overall, Gamlin Whiskey House is a great place to drink, but simply not worth it for a full dinner. Hopefully this will improve with age. Until then, the whiskey-fueled bar has a hell of a lot of good things going for it. No doubt the Gamlins will continue to pack them in.

Bloody Ghost is a tall, white whiskey-infused bloody mary that smacks every other bloody hard across the jaw.

A Bird in the Hand features bourbon-brined chicken drums swimming with seared pieces of apple and onion.

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wine& dine See Cory King's top picks for malty beers

A Seat at the Bar

ILLUSTRATIONS BY VIDHYA NAGARAJAN

Four experts tell us what to sip, stir and shake

Malty beers are perfect for sipping on the couch, pairing with food and using in cooking due to their richness, softness and gentle nature. When properly fermented, malt offers a cory king rounded palate of caramel, Certified Cicerone, head bread crust and toffee, not brewer at Perennial Artisan a sugary sweetness people Ales and founder of Side might expect. As a general Project Brewing rule, if you like a maltier beer, don’t look further than Left Hand Brewing Co.’s Milk Stout, G. Schneider & Sohn’s weizenbock Aventinus and Ska Brewing Co.’s Buster Nut Brown Ale. February 2014

February puts us in the mood for a little Hanky Panky … the cocktail, of course! Ada “Coley” Coleman, one of history’s first well-known female bartenders, created this tasty sipper in the early 20th century. In 1903, Coley landed a ted and jamie job in London’s prestigious Savoy kilgore Hotel, which, undoubtedly, forged USBG, B.A.R. Ready, BarSmart a path for female bartenders and co-owners/bartenders at to come. We love to honor this Planter’s House amazing woman by toasting her with one of her own creations. Stir together with ice: 1½ oz. gin, 1½ oz. sweet vermouth and 2 dashes Fernet Branca. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass, garnish with an orange twist and indulge in a little Hanky Panky.

After recently watching the movie My Week with Marilyn, it occurred to me that I had spent 24 hours this fall with a different superstar: winemaker Merry Edwards. Edwards’ first trip to St. Louis included glenn bardgett two major wine dinners and Member of the Missouri Wine a lunch tasting. While she is and Grape Board and wine renowned for her pinot noirs director at Annie Gunn’s from the Russian River Valley, which start at about $55, you should also try her Merry Edwards 2012 Russian River Valley Sauvignon Blanc, priced around $40. Edwards has decades of wine successes, and we were certainly honored to have her in town, if only for 24 hours. saucemagazine.com I SAUCE MAGAZINE I 25

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Best House Reds

best house reds

By Glenn Bardgett

The challenge: Find the best “house” red wine for $9 a glass. The reality: You rarely hear someone ask for a glass of “house” wine. Moreover, locating interesting reds on restaurant and bar menus at $9 is becoming difficult; that $10 note seems to have become the tipping point if you want to go beyond what is easy to find, pronounce and sip. Luckily, I discovered a trio of well-made wines that were unique, pleasurable and so affordable, I wouldn’t think twice about a refill.

For $9, you can get a delicious Domaine Chatelus de la Roche 2011 Beaujolais from Burgundy, France, at The Restaurant at The Cheshire. Beverage director Patricia Wamhoff selected this lovely, fruity and juicy Gamay because it’s so drinkable with or without food.

Beaujolais is often overlooked, but I’m always reminded when I taste one how much I enjoy it.

At Olio, for $8, you can get a glass of Kavaklidere 2011, a blend of öküzgözü and bogazkere from Turkey. Olio’s general manager and beverage director Andrey Ivanov has pushed all previously known limits of wines by the glass with this earthy yet fruit-driven pick.

If you simply ask for the “house red,” you won’t have to try to pronounce it.

The Restaurant at The Cheshire, 7036 Clayton Ave., St. Louis, 314.932.7818, restaurant-stl.com

Olio, 1634 Tower Grove Ave., St. Louis, 314.932.1088, oliostl.com

My most amazing revelation was at Five Star Burgers, where I found “House Pinot Noir” printed on the menu, aggressively priced at $5 a glass. My first question to the server was, “May I see the label, please?” It was Backhouse 2011 Pinot Noir from Cecchetti Wine Co., on California’s central coast. I’ve had Cecchetti wines, but I hadn’t seen this one before or imagined that it would taste so good – or that I could pay in quarters during happy hour (daily from 4 to 6 p.m.), when the price on by-the-glass house wines (all four varieties) drops to a mere $3.50.

Five Star Burgers, 8125 Maryland Ave., Clayton, 314.720.4350; 312 S. Kirkwood Road, Kirkwood, 314.394.2250, 5starburgersstl.com

Photo by laura miller

Backhouse 2011 Pinot Noir at Five Star Burgers

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sherry

Sherry is so very …

By Daniels and Lauren Blake-Parseliti Sherry is seeing a resurgence of late – for good reason. These Spanish fortified wines are of great complexity and, given the amount of aging involved, often sell for a song. We’ll never fully understand why sherry was out of fashion for so long, though we suspect a misunderstanding of its myriad intricacies may be part of the problem.

Sherry is so very often dry. Nonsherry drinkers may think most sherries taste like Grandma’s Harveys Bristol Cream. Nope. The majority of sherry, most of it made from the palomino grape, is bone dry, at times even slightly bitter. Sweet sherry tends to be made from Pedro Ximénez (PX) and moscatel grapes.

Sherry is so very good at history.

Sherry is aged in a solera system, which is a series of barrels, each containing wine of a different age.

Over time, younger wine is moved into barrels containing older wine where it continues to age. Wine makes its way through the solera and eventually is bottled from the last barrel. Given that no barrel in a solera is completely drained and that some soleras are very (100 years!) old, drinkers may have a fraction of wine older than them in their very affordable copita of oloroso.

Sherry is so very elementary. Looking to take your first dip into the world of sherry? Try the manzanilla sherry La Cigarrera. Manzanilla, made only in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, is the lightest style of sherry. This wine is briny and nutty with a refreshing, ocean-breeze snap. It’s perfect to pair with Marcona almonds, oysters and sushi of all kinds.

Sherry is so very versatile: Tongue & Cheek Courtesy of Lauren Blake-Parseliti 1 serving 2 oz. fino sherry ½ oz. Benedictine ½ tsp. cherry jam 2½ oz. Baron de Bréban brut rosé Lemon twist for garnish • Shake the first three ingredients with ice. Double strain into a Champagne flute. Top with the brut rosé. Garnish with the lemon twist.

Sherry is so very good at getting you flor-ed. Fino sherry is aged under a cap of protective, naturally occurring, indigenous yeast called flor that imparts distinctive bread-y notes and slows the aging process by restricting oxygen exposure.

Amontillado and palo cortado sherries also can spend time under flor during their maturation. Conditions in the Sherry Triangle, in southern Spain, are particularly conducive to the formation of flor, making the wine exclusive to that region of the world.

Tongue & Cheek cocktail made with sherry

Photo by elizabeth jochum

Sherry is so very aromatically complex. However, don’t look for fresh fruit aromas. Instead, expect brine, yeast and citrus peel in finos; more nut, dried fruit and mushroom in Amontillados; even more dried fruit, nut and mushroom plus toffee in olorosos; and date, prune and iron in PX.

Thirsty to learn more about the world of wine, beer and spirits? Head to samg.bz/sauceDTWE every Friday and read Drink This Weekend Edition. You’ll stay abreast of newly released beers, not-to-be-missed wines and delicious cocktails to order around town or mix up at home.

February 2014

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vegetize it

Vegans tackle the Super Bowl BY kellie hynes | Photos by carmen troesser

S

uper Bowl Sunday is the hardest holiday for a vegetarian. While the guys on the big screen are passing the pigskin, the folks at the party are passing the pork rinds. And the buffalo chicken wings. And the barbequed meatballs with those festive fringed toothpicks.

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I feel like the odd girl out when someone offers me a slab of smoked tenderloin. I’m like, “No thanks.

Crudité?” And they’re like, “At least try the meatballs. They’ve got these cool toothpicks.” I defensively blab about cholesterol and processed food, and no one cares because there’s a really funny beer commercial on.

This year I’m grabbing the carrot by the cojones and bringing a macho meatless appetizer to the game. I was inspired by a Facebook post from The No Meat Athlete, Matt Frazier. He’s a vegetarian ultra-marathoner who helps you achieve Herculean feats of athleticism while eating a plant-based diet. In fact, just following him on Facebook makes people think you achieve Herculean feats of athleticism while eating a plant-based diet, which is why I do it. Frazier shared a link for a Buffalo Cauliflower Bites recipe, i.e., cauliflower florets smothered in hot sauce.

The accompanying photo showed cauliflower nuggets that were the same gorgeous orange color of harvest sunsets – and Doritos. I had to make it.

The original recipe calls for dipping cauliflower in a batter of gluten-free flour, almond milk, some spices and water. I used all-purpose flour and soy milk since that was what I had handy, and added 2 tablespoons of smoked paprika for, well, smoke. The smoked paprika turned the batter a shade of buffalo-wing red before I even added the hot sauce. Unfortunately, it also made it a bazillion times spicier than any human – macho or not – can eat.

Once my tears cleared and I stopped wheezing, I tried again with just ¼ teaspoon of the smoky spice. Perfect.

As long as I was layering heat sensations, I wanted to tweak the hot sauce. Frazier’s go-to recipe suggests Frank’s Red Hot

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Sauce, which, in its original flavor, is both vegan and easily available. I added a bit of Sriracha for a sweet-spicy kick, and some water to cut the saltiness of the hot sauce. My cauliflower now packed a Super Bowl-worthy punch. It was time to cool it off with a dip.

In the original recipe, cashews and almond milk are blended together. It made a delicious cashew schmear – good on bread but really weird with hot sauce. Another research recipe used fewer cashews and added tahini. That tasted like a cashew butter-hummus smoothie, only nastier. I gave up on the cashews, thinking a homemade vegan mayonnaise would make a more neutral base. When I added garlic and cilantro, it whipped up into a yummy, fluffy ranch-ish dip – which separated into an oily mess after an hour. As a last resort, I kept the garlic and cilantro, and swapped the mayo with puréed cannellini beans. Perfect. This hearty dip looks good all day long, and takes the edge, but not the taste, off the spicy cauliflower. These poppers and dip are so tasty, they’ve earned a place front and center on my snack table. In fact, I’ll arm wrestle you for the last bite.

1 tsp. Huy Fong Sriracha sauce* 1 cup all-purpose flour 1 Tbsp. dry mustard 2 tsp. garlic powder 2 tsp. onion powder ¼ tsp. smoked paprika 1 cup plus 3 Tbsp. soy milk 1 15-oz. can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed 3 oz. silken tofu 2 Tbsp. coarsely chopped fresh cilantro 3 tsp. fresh lemon juice 2 tsp. white wine vinegar ½ tsp. minced garlic 1 ∕8 tsp. Kosher salt 1 ∕8 tsp. white pepper • Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

• Cut the cauliflower into bite-sized florets. Set aside.

• In a small pot, mix together the hot sauce, ¼ cup water, olive oil and Sriracha. Bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally. Keep warm over low heat.

• Combine the flour, mustard, garlic powder, onion powder and smoked paprika in a large bowl.

• Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients. Pour in the soy milk, whisking until there are no lumps.

Add the cauliflower to the bowl and toss, using your hands, until the

pieces are evenly coated with the batter.

• Place the cauliflower pieces in a single layer on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for 10 minutes. Use a fork to flip the cauliflower pieces. Bake another 10 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and brush the hot sauce mixture over the cauliflower, flipping the pieces with a fork so that all sides can be coated. Bake another 8 to 10 minutes, until the cauliflower roasts and begins to brown.

• Meanwhile, make the dip. Using a food processor, purée the beans.

Add the tofu and blend until the tofu is completely incorporated into the beans. Add the cilantro, lemon juice, vinegar, garlic, salt and pepper, and pulse until the ingredients are well blended. For a thinner dip, add water 1 teaspoon at a time and blend until it reaches the desired consistency. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Serve with the warm cauliflower poppers. * Some brands of Sriracha may contain shrimp paste or fish sauce.

If using another brand, check the label.

Macho Vegan Cauliflower Poppers & Dip Inspired by a recipe from Nutritionstripped.com 4 to 6 servings 1 large head cauliflower 1 cup Frank’s Red Hot Sauce or other vegan hot sauce 2 Tbsp. olive oil

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SAVORY OATMEAL active time: 5 minutes

Serving breakfast for dinner is one thing, but Savory Oatmeal turns a classic morning staple on its Quaker-hatted head. In a large bowl, whisk together: A 14-ounce can coconut milk, 1 cup chicken stock, ½ cup chunky peanut butter, 1 tablespoon soy sauce, 1 tablespoon minced ginger, 1 teaspoon fish sauce, 1 teaspoon lime juice and ½ teaspoon hot sauce. Stir in 2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats, 1 teaspoon Chinese five spice and ½ teaspoon baking powder. Pour into a greased 8-inch casserole dish.

Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes. Divide among four bowls. Top each serving with a generous amount of chopped Thai basil, cilantro and green onion, and drizzle with sesame oil and additional hot sauce. Serve hot. – Dee Ryan

Everyone loves quick recipes, but when you’ve got the time, we’ve got The Weekend Project. Go to samg.bz/sauceweekendproject where we’ll show you how to make Andouille sausage step-by-step, and then how to use it in a hearty pot of hot gumbo.

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photo by carmen troesser

MAKE THIS

make this

February 2014

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THE SHORT AND SWEET VERSION [1] Business is booming for St. Louis chocolatiers. [2] Making chocolates is a labor of love. [3] Chocolate is misunderstood.

[4] Don’t buy chocolate at the gas station.

big kids in a

candy shop How St. Louis chocolatiers are raising the bar by ligaya figueras | photos by greg rannells 34 I SAUCE MAGAZINE I saucemagazine.com

February 2014

From left to right: Ganache and caramels from Rick Jordan Chocolatier; cocoa beans inside a cocoa pod; Conor VanBuskirk of VB Chocolate Bar makes caramel.

I

t was a Saturday at Kakao Chocolate during the height of the Christmas shopping season. The little bell on the door of the Maplewood shop tinkled incessantly, a sign that yet another person was on the hunt for sweets. Shoppers browsed the retail area, picking up little bags of chocolate bark and ornament-shaped chocolates. They lingered at a display case, torn between truffles and caramels, more often than not indulging in each. Cashiers couldn’t ring up sales fast enough to keep the line less than five deep. Beyond the counter, the scene was just as bustling.

I tried to stay out of the way as five women cooked caramel a gallon at a time, cut each batch with hand-held rollers, dipped pieces in chocolate and sprinkled them with a few coarse grains of sea salt.

Yet, despite the urgency of keeping Kakao’s bestselling product – sea salt caramels – on the shelves, they enthusiastically explained why they worked there. “It’s neat that Brian [Pelletier] lets us play,” remarked Jenny Bazzetta, production manager at the shop, about Kakao’s owner. This playfulness starts with ingredients, and the number of locally made foods and beverages making their way into Kakao’s confections reads as long as a farmers market vendor list: Park Avenue Coffee, Stringbean Coffee, Naked Bacon, Grandma’s Nuts, Traveling Tea, The Big O ginger liqueur, and beer from a handful of area breweries. As I eyed sheet pans of Mexican chocolate bark with cinnamon and chile peppers, Bazzetta’s co-workers echoed agreement about their freedom to experiment and the creativity it inspired. They proudly shared how two former Kakao employees had gone on to work at Mast Brothers Chocolate in Brooklyn,

February 2014

N.Y., one of the most progressive bean-to-bar craft chocolate companies in the U.S. In the industry, bean-to-bar is a bigger deal than you might think. While chocolate manufacturers produce a broad range of chocolate from fermented and dried cocoa beans that they sell wholesale, chocolatiers buy chocolate to melt for use as coating or molding for chocolate confectionary.

Bean-to-bar chocolate companies like Mast Brothers do it all, from processing to cooking, which enables them to have more control and a more sustainable production. Although chocolatiers and craft chocolate lovers alike have their fingers firmly pressed to Mast Brothers’ pulse, don’t discount what’s made in Missouri.

SWEET DEVELOPMENTS FROM THE SHOW-ME-STATE

This year, Bissinger’s Handcrafted Chocolatier is moving its headquarters and manufacturing operations from Gratiot Street to a 220,000-squarefoot building in North St. Louis city to keep up with the national demand for its chocolates. Another locally based chocolatier growing its national reach is family-owned Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Co. Founded in 1981, it relocated its operations to a bigger facility on The Hill in 2012. Now, it’s working on another production line to accommodate the demand for its dark chocolate products.

Business is similarly brisk for smaller chocolatiers around town. Pelletier is in negotiations to open a Kakao storefront in the Centene Building in Clayton, which would mark the third location for the company he founded only six years ago. Little Dipper Chocolate owner Beth Prindable may not

have a storefront, but since her 2013 sales doubled from the previous year, this Clayton Farmers Market vendor hopes to open a brick-and-mortar shop within the year. The big news – at least for fans of bean-to-bar craft chocolate – comes from Rick Jordan Chocolatier. Owner Rick Jordan will vastly increase the quantity of bean-to-bar chocolates that he makes at his boutique shop in Town & Country when a new winnower designed by Missouri S&T engineering students arrives this month. Having a high-tech winnower will enable Jordan to separate cacao beans from their shells more efficiently.

What’s more, if the 40 cacao trees Jordan is growing at his home in West County remain healthy, in two years’ time, he’ll become the first local cocoa grower.

With the rapidly growing local chocolate scene, it should come as no surprise that Retail Confections International is holding its annual convention in the Gateway City this summer. “It’s really cool that, for Missouri, you have these few chocolate makers and a bunch of chocolatiers that are making national and international accolades,” said Jordan, citing beanto-bar chocolate companies Askinosie in Springfield and Patric in Columbia, as well as chocolatier Christopher Elbow in Kansas City. “The chocolate scene is New York and San Francisco and Vegas, and then this weird little place on the map – Missouri – boom! Just pops up.”

WHEN CREATIVITY CALLS

“Today is an experiment,” said Conor VanBuskirk as he led me past jewelry-esque display cases filled with inventive truffles like raspberry wasabi, blood orange pistachio, pomegranate and rosemary, and candied pear and goat cheese. Downstairs in the kitchen of VB Chocolate Bar, he pulled out three saucemagazine.com I SAUCE MAGAZINE I 35

65% Chocolat Noir, The Ritz-Carlton St. Louis, ritzcarlton.com

Local chocolates we love

All-natural cherry cordial, Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Co., chocolatechocolate.com

From left: fleur de sel truffle, cherry-bourbon truffle, and caramelized pear and goat cheese truffle, VB Chocolate Bar, vbchocolatebar.com

Almond and orange zest rocher, Little Dipper Chocolate, littledipperchocolate.com

From top: ghost-chile and lime ganache, passion fruit ganache, and honeyginger caramel, Rick Jordan Chocolatier, rjchocolatier.com

Salted caramel chocolate sauce, Bittersweet Artisan Truffles, bittersweettruffles.com

Chocolate-peanut butter truffle, Bittersweet Artisan Truffles, bittersweettruffles.com

Chocolate-covered wine grape, Bissinger’s Handcrafted Chocolatier, bissingers.com

Sea salt caramel, Kakao Chocolate, kakaochocolate.com

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different wines from Cedar Lake Cellars, explaining how the winery in Wright City, Mo., wanted its product used in chocolates that it could offer in its tasting room. VanBuskirk pointed to three order tickets scrawled with notes: truffle recipes in development. Today, we would find out whether his ideas on paper actually worked.

“We make everything. By hand.

In small batches. There are no Lucille Ball machines here.”

Truffles are essentially balls of ganache – a mix of chocolate, cream, sugar and butter – that also can be used as a filling for chocolates. The original truffle was a round of ganache rolled in chocolate and cocoa powder, named after the black truffle fungus that it resembled. But we had quite a way to go before we could bite into a truffle and hope for melt-in-your-mouth goodness.

- Brian Pelletier, owner of Kakao Chocolate

First, we had to make the ganache. In one bowl, he mixed together water and sugar. In a separate bowl, he mixed cream, honey and salt. There is no stove in VanBuskirk’s chocolate production area, so we marched upstairs to the cafe where he caramelized the water and sugar over heat, then added the cream mixture and brought it to a boil.

Down the stairs we went to repeat the process for truffle batch No. 2, which would feature a dark chocolate ganache with Cedar Lake’s port.

Upstairs. Downstairs. Time to mix the ganache for truffle No. 3 that would highlight the flavors of norton and cherries. Soon enough, my thighs were burning. “It’s how I get my exercise,” said the burly VanBuskirk, who listens to sports talk radio while making fine chocolates and considers the baristas at VB to be “so artsy they wouldn’t know it if Michael Jordan walked into the room.”

When the ganache had cooled to 88 degrees, VanBuskirk added butter and wine and then placed the three bowls of ganache in the walk-in cooler to chill further. Next, he sprayed polycarbonate molds with tempered cocoa butter using a spray gun called a pistole. The oval- and circular-shaped shells of the molds were then cast with the chocolates VanBuskirk had selected for the test recipes – one would have 75 percent Tanzanian, the other two would see 55 percent chocolate by Belgian chocolate company Barry Callebaut. Once the chocolate cooled and set, he piped ganache on top.

After 2½ hours of recipe testing, it was time to get the chocolate moving, literally. VanBuskirk relies on a Hilliard coating machine that enables tempered chocolate to continuously stream down a shoot and enrobe whatever is passing through the conveyor belt underneath. For VanBuskirk’s one-man operation, the machine is a huge timesaver, but he still has to be ready to grab the chocolates when they reach the end of the line, lest they fall to the ground. Three hours after we began, the truffles were finished. Each batch held just 125 truffles. That’s small-batch.

From a basement kitchen in Cottleville, Mo., to 21-employee Kakao to tiny businesses like Little February 2014

Dipper Chocolate and Bittersweet Artisan Truffles that work out of a commercial kitchen and don’t even have a storefront, a love for experimentation is everywhere. “The experiments – that’s what keeps me going,” said Prindable of Little Dipper Chocolate. Developing a winning basil truffle and making smoked chocolates are just two of the many to-dos on a checklist that also includes accounting, purchasing, packaging and selling. “It’s hard because sometimes I give this business more attention than my son. But this is a baby, too,” she said. And how sweet it is when an awesome recipe nets a big account? Such is the case with Bittersweet Artisan Truffles owner Audrey Scherrer, whose decadent micro-batches of salted caramel chocolate sauce now sit on the shelves at newly opened Fields Foods in Lafayette Square.

THERE’S A LOT WRAPPED UP IN A PIECE OF CHOCOLATE

When I began researching this story, I quickly realized I would never cut it in the choco biz.

That’s because no matter what funky, new flavor

combination these chocolatiers concoct, making chocolates is an exact science. “You have about 2 degrees of forgiveness,” said Jordan on the temperature of tempered chocolate, as well as ambient temperature and humidity. Dan Abel Jr., vice president of operations at Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Co., offered physical evidence of just how critical temperature is during a tour of the factory. He pointed out an alarm system on the wall that sounds if the temperature of the room changes more than 2 degrees. For Abel, that has meant phone calls from the alarm company and emergency trips to the factory in the dead of night.

Another less-appreciated aspect about chocolate is that, since it comes from cocoa beans, the harvest is different every season. Pelletier likened chocolate to wine. Nuances in cocoa exist on a micro scale – from farm to neighboring farm, not just from country to country. Those distinctions in flavor are exciting for bean-to-bar craft chocolate enthusiasts, but for big chocolatiers like Bissinger’s, they also pose a challenge. One of Dave Owens’ jobs as the company’s chief chocolatier is to ensure product saucemagazine.com I SAUCE MAGAZINE I 37

caramelized

pear & g oat c h e e s e

truffle VB Chocolate Bar vbchocolatebar.com

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consistency. The chocolate enrobing its soft-centered crèmes, for example, has to taste the same every time. “I have to know the science,” he said. Owens admitted that his job is “not as spontaneous” as his former restaurant life as chef-partner of Cardwell’s at the Plaza and Terrene, but he enjoys the challenge of “making things that are repeatable” and figuring out how to give products a long enough shelf-life through formulation instead of artificial ingredients or preservatives.

The biggest misunderstanding surrounding chocolate is the price tag.

“The price of cocoa is now the highest in history,” Abel said. Factor in the cost of materials, labor (It takes four days to make an average batch of candy at Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Co.) and packaging, and you’re looking at $20 for a 15-piece assorted box of its platinum collection, with profit margin still razor thin – and we’re not even talking single-origin chocolates.

So let’s talk single origin. The $8 you’re paying for a 100-gram bar of chocolate at Rick Jordan Chocolatier is a really fair price. “Making chocolate from scratch – bean-to-bar – is very rare and very expensive to do,” Jordan said.

He sources single-origin beans from countries like Ghana, Tanzania, Haiti and Costa Rica, but for him to make a chocolate bar from scratch, the beans first have to be fermented and dried (which happens before they arrive at his shop), then roasted, ground and refined into chocolate. “To do that can be more than $25 a bar,” he said. So, while Jordan currently sells seven types of single-origin bars, he gets more mileage out of certain premium chocolates by using them to make small-sized confections.

you can’t get from a convenience store.

“We see people who come into the store who are excited about chocolate. They can smell it. They see people making it,” said Pelletier. “It’s the whole experience.

People have a connection to it.”

The busloads of visitors coming through Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Co.’s factory are able to form that connection, and the same will be true when Bissinger’s opens its new facility to public tours, which are not currently offered. For a live artistic performance, the best place to go is Rick Jordan Chocolatier, where you can stand behind the glass wall and watch Jordan: his tattooed arms moving with the rythmic, fluid motion of a dancer, his shaved head bent down in concentration.

Nope. You can’t get that at a gas station.

Rarely will you find chocolate percentages printed on the packaging of gas station chocolates. The longer I spent with these chocolatiers, the more I found myself caught up with percentage details and flavor profiles: like the jammy, red fruit notes in single-origin Peruvian bars that executive pastry chef Nathaniel Reid makes at The Ritz-Carlton St. Louis, or the bizarre banana notes in Jordan’s favorite, a Peruvian cocoa variety called Alto del Sol that costs around $250 a kilo. But knowing the percentage of cocoa or having someone describe tasting notes to me isn’t what stopped me in my tracks time and again when I bit into so many luscious chocolates over the last six weeks. It’s because the pieces of candy tasted really good.

THERE ARE GOOD AND BETTER WAYS TO ENJOY CHOCOLATE

It was Pelletier who reminded me why eating craft chocolates will be special every time we bite into them.

He pointed to three bars of Askinosie chocolate sold at Kakao. “Neither is better, but you have to taste all three to notice the difference. Pay attention to what’s in it, where it comes from, how it tastes. You’ll notice a difference.”

Aside from real ingredients, there’s a whole other aspect to chocolate that

Join Sauce Magazine and 90.7 KWMU St. Louis Public Radio Wednesday, Feb. 19 from 7 to 9:30 p.m. at Grand Center when we present Chocolate Uncorked: Pairing Local Chocolates with Regional Wines. Meet area chocolatiers from Bissinger’s, Kakao, Rick Jordan Chocolatier and VB Chocolate Bar, plus sample local chocolates paired with wines from Augusta and Montelle wineries. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit stlpublicradio.org/events.

What Pelletier dubbed “gas station chocolate” is certainly cheaper than what you’ll pay at a boutique chocolate shop.

But what’s really inside that 75-cent package? “There are artificial colors in there that are illegal in Europe but legal here,” said Pelletier. He continued to run down the list of fake ingredients: “Artificial flavorings ... like imitation vanilla. It’s made from wood pulp.”

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the changing face of

farming M

y 10-year-old daughter wants to be a farmer. When I hear my kids talk about what they want to be when they grow up, I put on my supportive face and say, “If that’s what you want, I’m sure you’ll make the best one ever,” … knowing they will change their minds many times before they really have to take a direction in life. By then, reality will set in, and society will make its mark on my kids’ barometers of what is possible and what is not.

My daughter’s desire to be a farmer may not seem extraordinary to most people, but to someone who grew up in a farming community where almost every man I knew was a farmer, and every farmer’s wife’s job was to support her husband, it’s extraordinary.

Among my girlfriends – from elementary school, high school, even college – I never heard one of them utter those words. Every mother’s words of advice to her daughter was, “Never marry a farmer.” We never heard, “Never become a farmer.” It wasn’t even on our radars. And why would it be? Sitting around the television at night, we were inundated with commercials for seed corn and pickup trucks where rugged men in plaid shirts lifted heavy bags or stood in a field of crops; women were nowhere to be seen.

We watched our fathers come home, long after dark,

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Story and photos by Carmen Troesser

with dried blood on their hands from fixing a barbed wire fence or the smell of pigs covering their clothes.

Then, we listened from the top of the stairs while our parents had a heated conversation over an 11 p.m. dinner of cold leftovers about how next month’s bills were going to be paid.

Even though our mothers’ warnings were said with a chuckle, we could see the sincerity on their worn faces. The lines around their eyes were a testament to the endless job of supporting someone who is a slave to the weather, who doesn’t ever get a day off, and who is always on call.

When I was young, the constant question for farming families was which son would take over the farm, yet times have changed. Even though the amount of farms has decreased nationwide, the number of women-operated farms has doubled between 1982 and 2007. In fact, women currently make up about 30 percent of U.S. farmers. In these portraits, I explore what motivates five female farmers. While their reasons vary as much as the farmers themselves, I’ve witnessed some common denominators: toughness, gentleness, commitment to the people who support them, and commitment to the creatures and the land.

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sandy binder

Binder’s Hilltop Apple and Berry Farm and Mid Missouri Alpacas

In 1993, I read this article about this retired couple in Texas who put in a dwarf apple orchard. And I thought, I’ll try it. We put in 900 trees, and it took us three years. I didn’t start farming until I retired, and now I work harder than I ever have.

We’ve been on this property for 26 years. My husband passed away July 1. It gets hectic at times, but it’s good for a person to work. I grew up on a farm in Illinois, and we learned to work as kids. My dad also had a full-time job, and he never missed work. Even if he was sick.

The alpacas ... it’s nice to see a healthy baby born and running around the first day. They jump and kick their legs. Sometimes the older ones start loping. All four of their feet come up, and they follow one another, and there’s this sort of procession. Somebody February 2014

runs and takes off and the other ones just follow. And you stop, and you’ve got to watch because they’re loping! They’re having such a good time. You just have to watch them.

Binder’s Hilltop Apple and Berry Farm and Mid Missouri Alpacas: Blackberries, peaches, pick-your-own apples, alpaca and farm tours, farm store, 24688 Audrain Road 820, Mexico, Mo., 573.721.1415, applesandalpacas.com Find Binder’s goods at Columbia Farmers Market and Mexico Farmers Market.

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Elizabeth Parker Kuhs Estate & Farm

My great-grandfather bought the land in 1915. Without telling his wife or his two kids, he bought the land, designed it, built the house, decorated and furnished it, then drove them up one weekend to surprise them. When he passed away, he bequeathed different shares of stock to the family. When my mom passed away, I was 57 percent stockholder.

One of the things my mom said to me as she was sort of saying goodbye and getting ready was, “You won’t be able to take this on. This is gonna take a huge life shift for you.” I was director of City Museum for three years and sales and marketing for Alive [Magazine] and living a very fast-paced life – very much a city girl. And when she died, everything in me just shifted. This is a legacy, and there is an implied sense of stewardship. This is what I want to do; this is what I have to do. This is my anchor, my home.

I want to make it a sustainable farm again. I want it to be a place of happiness and refuge and a sanctuary where people can come to rediscover their souls in the quiet time between cell phones and texting – to just go sit under a big tree in complete quiet or look at the confluence and let it speak to you. And it has become that.

It’s been a struggle. I think of it sort of like empire-building. I don’t expect it to be complete overnight, but it has a magic and a magnetism that draws people to it who share the same love and appreciation. I have friends who will come out and spend the night, so they can get up and be on a horse at dawn. Or people that drive from St. Louis to get fresh eggs, and then in the break rooms at work, they try to convert their co-workers by breaking open a store-bought egg versus a farm-fresh egg. That it means something to other people it’s not even convenient for – it’s really empowering and validating.

Anything worth having is hard, but it’s wonderful. And I’ve never been happier. My high heels are in a closet, and I’m in here with a pig.

Kuhs Estate & Farm: Duck and chicken eggs, produce, licensed animal rescue, weddings and events, 13061 Spanish Pond Road, Spanish Lake, Mo., 314.226.0709, kuhsfarm.com

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Liz Graznak Happy Hollow Farm

I was in graduate school at Cornell when I joined a CSA [communitysupported agriculture]. I loved helping on the farm, and I didn’t know people did that for a living.

I had no idea. I was so highly intrigued.

There is a very well-known woman, Elizabeth Henderson, in the CSA movement. She came to speak at Cornell, and she encouraged me to go to a farming conference. She told me to not even think about buying a farm because I probably wouldn’t make it. You have to learn a career in farming like you have to learn any other career. I mean, you can’t

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just decide you’re going to start farming and start farming. She was so right. I was pretty headstrong.

You need lots of common sense.

How do you get common sense?

By experience. Everybody at the conference was saying to at least take a season and be an intern on a farm. So, OK, did that, then moved back here to be closer to my family, and I managed a farm for a year. And that was when I realized that yes, I really did want to farm. I worked at a nursery for 5½ years, bought the farm, kept working at the nursery for two years, then I started farming full time.

I am very driven. My grandfather raised me that way. I have a very direct brain connection between how hard I work and my personal worth. It’s physically difficult; it’s mentally challenging; it’s stressful.

I do it because it’s fun and I love it, but I’m also trying to make a living.

I love my CSA members. It’s that community of people that have been so supportive of me and the farm – and knowing how much they appreciate the fact that they’re eating fabulous food. Doing a CSA is a lot of pressure because I take very personally the quality of the product I’m putting out there,

and I take very seriously that my members have paid me in advance.

I want to make sure that I overexceed their expectations every week in the vegetables I send out.

Happy Hollow Farm: Communitysupported agriculture, produce, chicken eggs 17199 Happy Hollow Road, Jamestown, Mo., 660.849.2430, happyhollowfarm-mo.com Find Happy Hollow Farm’s produce at Columbia Farmers Market.

February 2014

Connie Cunningham Sassafras Valley Farm

I’ve been here eight years. [My mom] needed help here at the farm, and she kept getting pneumonia. She was really tough, but she couldn’t keep doing all the work herself. She loved this farm. She wanted to die here. So I put everything in storage and came down.

I had an organic landscaping company in Chicago.

I was there 30 years. I came down thinking it was going to be maybe a year, and, instead, all hell broke loose. The economy collapsed, and I had to close the business up there.

My mom ... they gave her six to eight months, but she had no intention of going anywhere.

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They diagnosed her with lung cancer, and she lasted five years. She just kept getting healthier.

So when I was caring for my mom, I started applying for grants. People [who] want to go into agriculture ... well, don’t go into it without a couple hundred thousand dollars in your pocket.

To try to start from scratch – it’s impossible. If you don’t know how to repair things, and you’re not sure about equipment ... the fact that I can’t repair my tractor annoys me to death.

It’s been a baptism by fire, but I love it. This is what you have every day when you walk outside: wind chimes and sweet animals who depend on you. It’s beautiful. When there are hundreds of

geese in the field and the Pyrenees are out, it’s very idyllic. Especially after 30 years in Chicago.

That’s a long time to be in a concrete jungle.

Sassafras Valley Farm: Free-range geese, bed and breakfast coming soon 1590 Highway N, Morrison, Mo., 866.684.2188, sassafrasvalleyfarm.com Find Sassafras Valley Farm’s geese at Local Harvest Grocery and Maude’s Market.

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Jamie Bryant Blue Bell Farm

My husband’s grandmother, who was living at the farm, passed away in 2009. I think he always had it in the back of his mind to do something with the farm because his mother was an only child, and he was an only child, and he knew that it would be up to him at some point. So we started thinking about what it could be. We started a garden in the backyard in Glendale, and it grew and grew. I just loved being able to go out and pick fresh vegetables and herbs for dinner. It suddenly clicked that that made me really happy.

I started an apprenticeship at EarthDance in 2010. It was really validating that yes, I do want to do this and I can do this ... to go from a backyard gardener to thinking about things in terms of crops. We decided that I would move up first and get things going. [My husband] Derek was still working in St. Louis, and he would come up on the weekends. The whole kitchen had grow lights hanging down with tables throughout. That’s how we started our seeds that first year because we didn’t have any knowledge of growing outside at that point. It drove Derek crazy because there was dirt on the floors. Thankfully, he wasn’t living here then because I think he would have really lost it.

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I want to be in the dirt, growing and harvesting things. It’s not something that I see as labor or a chore. It brings me peace, and it’s meditative. I think it would have been really hard if we hadn’t found a group of young farmers that are like-minded in the area when we moved because it can be kind of lonely at times. In Chicago and St. Louis, I went out a lot. This is sort of an alternative life to that. I never would have imagined it, but I’m glad it happened. I have to remind myself of the beauty of it. When I was first here, I was in awe. I think you get in a routine where you lose that ability to stop and be in the moment for a little bit. Ultimately, raising a family here ... in the air and just the freshness of everything ... that’s what keeps me going.

Blue Bell Farm: Produce, weddings, events 3030 Highway 240, Fayette, Mo., 314.220.7120, bluebellfarm.org Find Blue Bell Farm’s produce at Fayette Farmers Market and Columbia Farmers Market.

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stuff to do:

this month

by Byron Kerman

National Ice Cream for Breakfast Day Feb. 1 – 8 a.m. to 10 p.m., Serendipity Homemade Ice Cream, 8130 Big Bend Blvd., Webster Groves, 314.962.2700, serendipity-icecream.com If it’s the first Saturday in February, then it must be National Ice Cream for Breakfast Day, celebrated with all kinds of fun doings at Serendipity. The Webster Groves parlor opens at 8 a.m. with a one-day breakfast menu including maple-pecan-bacon waffle sundaes, and ice cream and sorbet in breakfast flavors. La Cosecha roasters provides the coffee, and a collaboration with Strange Donuts yields doughnut ice cream sandwiches. Customers who wear pajamas and order coffee, tea or hot chocolate get a free take-home mug while supplies last.

Culinary Book Discussion Group: Pasta Feb. 5 – noon to 1 p.m., St. Louis Public Library – Central Branch, 1301 Olive St., St. Louis, 314.539.0390, slpl.org People, can we talk honestly about carbohydrates? We can at the city library’s Culinary Book Discussion Group this month, when noodles lovers discuss everyone’s favorite potboiler: pasta. The Central Branch’s free monthly discussion offers fodder for foodies to chat about culinary triumphs and trade notes. Bring those cookbooks and recipes to the first-floor Book Club Room.

Fresh 102.5 Wine and Chocolate Event Feb. 12 – 5 to 9 p.m., Foundry Art Centre, 520 N. Main Center, St. Charles, 314.444.3294, fresh1025.com The annual Fresh 102.5 Wine and Chocolate Event is a celebration of hearthealthy antioxidants – not! Oh sure, they say this stuff is good for you in moderation, but

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this event is not about moderation. Zettie’s Confections and VB Chocolate Bar offer chocolate samples, and wine samples are available from the likes of St. James Winery, Noboleis Winery and Cedar Lake Cellars.

Guests also can enjoy shopping, art displays and a silent auction. The fun benefits the American Heart Association.

Mardi Gras in Historic Soulard Feb. 14 and 15, Soulard Market Park, 8th Street at Lafayette Avenue, St. Louis, 314.771.5100, mardigrasinc.com It’s Mardi Gras, which means it’s time to party as though you’ll never party again. Kick things off at the Wine, Beer & Whiskey Taste Feb. 14 from 7 to 11 p.m. Inside a warm tent, revelers toss back A-B InBev products, wines by local and far-flung vintners, and liquor and cocktail samples. The next day, the same location plays host to the Lumière Cajun Cook-Off and Tony Chachere’s Crawfish Boil from noon to 4 p.m. Tickets net you crawfish, jambalaya, beer, Southern Comfort Hurricanes and soft drinks. The live Cajun and Creole cooking competition is considered one of the most prestigious cooking contests in the area.

Winter Escape in New Haven: Building the Bridge from Farm to Table Feb. 15 – New Haven, Mo., 573.437.2699, missourirhinevalley.com The good gourmands of New Haven, Mo., want you to know how much fun can be had in their neck of the woods. The Missouri Rhine Valley Association has arranged for a trainand-bus trip from St. Louis to New Haven with a slew of food-and-drink-centric activities at your destination. The all-day affair features New Haven-area artisans plus foods, wines and spirits created in the region. The tastings happen at the Pinckney Bend Distillery, Röbller Winery, 2nd Shift Brewery and many February 2014

other charming stops (including a ukulele company). Don’t forget the art walk, winter farmers market and climactic farm-to-table dinner at the New Haven Grille and Levee Bar.

Centennial Beer Festival Feb. 20 to 22 – Moulin Events and Meetings, 2017 Chouteau Ave., St. Louis, 314.241.4949, centennialbeerfestival.com At the annual Centennial Beer Festival, more than 200 beers from St. Louis and parts beyond are available for tasting. Local craft breweries represented at the three-day festival include 4 Hands, Alpha, Civil Life, Perennial, Schlafly, Six Row and Urban Chestnut. Related fun includes a Brewmaster Dinner Feb. 20 at 6 p.m., featuring 4 Hands beers and VIP options.

sponsored events Opera Theatre of Saint Louis’ Wine and Beer Tasting

Feb. 8 – 6 to 8 p.m., Sally S. Levy Opera Center, 210 Hazel Ave., Webster Groves, 314.963.4223, opera-stl.org/wine-and-beer-tasting Gather in the Opera Center’s unique rehearsal halls for exquisite wines, imports and microbrews; an array of hors d’oeuvres provided by Saint Louis Originals restaurants; and a silent auction. Tickets available online.

Chocolate Uncorked: Pairing Local Chocolates with Regional Wines Feb. 19 – 7 to 9:30 p.m., UMSL at Grand Center, 3651 Olive St., St. Louis, 314.516.5968, stlpublicradio.org/events

In this newest installment of the Kitchen Sink Series, learn about the latest in the world of chocolate and meet area chocolatiers from Bissinger’s, Kakao, Rick Jordan Chocolatier and VB Chocolate Bar, plus sample local chocolates paired with wines from Augusta and Montelle wineries. Tickets available online and at the door.

Soiree pour la Vue: An Evening for Sight Feb. 21 – 6 p.m., Beyond Broadway, 112 Sidney St., St. Louis, mindseyeradio.org/soiree

Celebrate Mardi Gras at the 11th annual Soiree pour La Vue. Enjoy a Cajun-inspired buffet dinner; beer, wine and cocktails; live music by the Funky Butt Brass Band; and silent and live auctions. The event benefits MindsEye, a radio reading service for the blind. Tickets available online.

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“It was love at first sip,” said Stephen Hale, recalling the day in 1991 when The Tap Room opened, and he handed a brunette named Sara her first Schlafly beer. The couple eventually married, and Schlafly’s former utility girl – she’s worked as a brewer, hostess and manager of the brewery’s art department and design group – now operates Fair Shares, a community-supported agriculture (CSA) she started in 2008.

Meanwhile, her utility kilt-wearing husband recently transitioned from his job as chief brewer at The Tap Room to Schlafly’s ambassador brewer. Here, the Hales share tales from careers rich in beer, food and curious clothing.

How did you get hired at Schlafly?

Stephen: I moved here from Maine.

I got a phone call from [Schlafly cofounder] Dan Kopman asking if I’d like to work as assistant brewer. I drove down here sight unseen in October of ’91 – fortunately, after the major heat wave.

I looked with increasing horror at the weather and said, “What am I doing?”

Now that you’re an ambassador brewer, how much do you brew these days?

Stephen: I am not hands-on brewing.

Why did you start Fair Shares?

Sara: My sister Jamie Choler, who is my co-partner in Fair Shares, and Stephen and I shared a CSA. We loved it. The CSA ends and we’re like, “What are we going to eat?” I’d gotten to know a number of the farmers. I knew a lot of them had food. [A farmer] once came in December and sold me a bunch of food. He came to my house, and I felt like I was doing a drug deal: “Give me some food. I know you’ve got it.” We started thinking we could do something that lasts longer. We could include meat and cheese and eggs, and all that other stuff we go to the market for.

It’s a Fair Shares exclusive. Companion made bread using Richard Knapp’s wheat flour for our bread.

Stephen: It’s all about relationships.

The same thing is happening with beer.

Stephen: The most recent example is the Chestnut Mild that we brewed in collaboration with Gerard and Suzie Craft. Gerard and his team took 200 pounds of chestnuts. They were roasted at Niche, brought to The Tap Room, run through a grinder and added to the mash.

have created their wedding beers.

Ours was Vienna, and Sara did it all.

Sara: That’s where the term “bridal” comes from. It’s the “bride’s ale.”

Women were the brewsters. The Vienna, that’s my favorite beer style.

Stephen: It’s the Vienna that’s at Gringo now.

Do you wear a kilt every day?

Stephen: Effectively, yes. Do you want to see the sarongs?

– Ligaya Figueras

How many Schlafly beer recipes are yours?

Stephen: I have a handful. Sara has a handful. It’s a team effort. Many of the brewers

Give me the Fair Shares sales pitch.

Sara: We’re a combined CSA. We source locally produced foods from small producers and farmers for families in St. Louis.

Stephen: Bring a farmers market to me every week for 46 weeks.

How many employees are there?

Stephen: Six. I’m the only involunteer. The reason I’m with Fair Shares is because I sleep with the president, I like to eat, and I have a pickup truck.

Has Fair Shares encouraged producers to use more local ingredients?

Sara: That’s a huge goal for us. We’ve got Midwest Pasta using local eggs and local flour now.

Photo by ashley gieseking

What I Do Stephen and Sara Hale

Basically, I get a beer in my hand, and I go shoot my mouth off about Schlafly beer and hope everybody likes it and buys more beer.

Sara: How did they ever think of you for that job?

Fair Shares, fairshares.org Schlafly, schlafly.com

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