Entries associated with the tag "Sam Calagione":

Thursday from 6-10 PM, Hart Davis Hart Wine Company and Dom Perignon host Hope Dream Live 2008, a charity wine dinner and auction at Tru to benefit YMCA Camp Independence. A five-course dinner with wine pairings (including a 1990 Chateau Latour and 1986 Chateau d’Yquem) will be followed by an auction of ten lots of rare wines. $1,500.

If you wanted to go to WhiskyFest Chicago you needed to buy a ticket weeks ago, but Thursday of Whisky Week sees lots of free prefest tastings with whiskey makers in town for the event. A few highlights: Julian Van Winkle of Old Rip Van Winkle bourbons will speak and sign bottles at a tasting at Lush Wine and Spirits in Roscoe Village (5:30-8 PM). From 4 to 5 PM Tom Bulleit of Bulleit bourbon and Gregor Cattanach of Johnnie Walker will be at an event at Warehouse Liquors (4-7 PM); they’ll then move on to a tasting at the South Loop Sam’s Wines & Spirits (5-8 PM), where they’ll appear from 6:30 to 7:30 PM. And the West Town location of Twisted Spoke hosts its annual “barrel extravaganza,” a whiskey festival featuring the distillers for Death’s Door Spirits (offering tastes from its first barrel of aged whiskey), Old Rip Van Winkle, Heaven Hill, and Kentucky Bourbon, plus Greg Hall of Goose Island, who’ll have a barrel of Bourbon County Stout on hand (8 PM-2 AM). 

Saturday from 10 AM to 4 PM at Kendall College (900 N. Branch), the Greater Midwest Foodways Alliance presents The Midwest: How Sweet It Is!, a program on regional dessert traditions. Among the topics: the role of the railroad and immigrants in introducing new recipes to the area and the local origins of candy and candy bars like Butterfinger, Baby Ruth, and the Heath Bar. Refreshments and lunch are included. $60 ($50 in advance).

Cooking Jewish With Judy, a Culinary Historians of Chicago lecture by author Judy Bart Kancigor, takes place at the Chicago History Museum on Saturday from 10 AM to noon. It's based on her recently published book, Cooking Jewish: 532 Great Recipes From the Rabinowitz Family, and includes samples; $5. And at 6 PM, ChicaGourmets (PDF) hosts a book signing and wine dinner with Kancigor at Ina's; $69.

"Rock star of the craft beer world" (and Dogfish Head Beer founder) Sam Calagione and master sommelier Marnie Old discuss their book, He Said Beer, She Said Wine, Tuesday at 7 PM at the Book Stall at Chestnut Court.

Ingrid Hoffmann, host of the Food Network's Simply Delicioso, signs Simply Delicioso: A Collection of Everyday Recipes with a Latin Twist Monday at 7:30 PM at the Evanston Borders.

Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head Brewery is all around town next Tuesday and Wednesday. From 7-9 PM Tuesday, he'll lead a tasting of "funky beer and stinky cheese" at Sheffield's along with cheese expert Dave Phillips. The $25 fee includes a sampling of 12 Dogfish Head brews, 8 of them on tap, and ten cheeses from The Cheese Stands Alone. Wednesday he'll be at Delilah's from 9 PM to midnight leading a vertical tasting of more than 20 of his company's craft beers; there's no cover.

Wednesday at 7 PM, the Chicago Foodways Roundtable hosts a lecture, Vermeer's Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World, served along with a family-style dinner (ordered off the menu) at Lao Sze Chuan. Historian Timothy Brook, an apparent polymath who holds the Shaw Chair in Chinese Studies at Oxford, will discuss the significance of details in Vermeer's paintings—such as why the officer in Officer and Laughing Girl is wearing a hat—and how they illuminate the "history framed within the painter's works." The lecture's free; the food’s not. Reservations requested. 847-432-8255 or chicago.foodways.roundtable@gmail.com.

Joey Tensley of Tensley Wines in Santa Barbara, California, leads a tasting of six of his syrahs Wednesday from 6-7:30 PM at Custom House. The wines will be paired with hors d'oeuvres including braised lamb shoulder with winter root vegetables and dark chocolate, fennel salumi with buffalo mozzarella and pickled eggplant, and house-cured steelhead with shaved fennel and blood orange vinaigrette. $40.

Also Wednesday, Vinci hosts an Umani Ronchi wine dinner, featuring wines and food from Marché. Three of the four courses include wine pairings (dessert doesn't); it's $45.

Ever had a meal you were making go horribly wrong? The folks at Fiddlehead Cafe want to hear about it, in 200 words or less. They also want your favorite original, unpublished ethnic recipe (presumably not the one that figures in your disaster story). First prize for both contests is dinner for two at the restaurant; runners-up get a wine flight for two. Amateur cooks only. Entries should be sent to hamid@fiddleheadcafe.com by February 29.