On the road again: Cayman Cookout, day 4

Today's first event began at the sane hour of noon, so I was able to sleep late--a blissful treat--work, and still arrive on time.

This was the view from my balcony as I headed out.

 As always, click on an image to see a larger version.

The champagne and cook-off brunch lasted over two and a half hours, during which time the audience grazed from around twenty different food stations.  Made-to-order omelets, cheeses of many sorts, caviar and fresh-made blinis, custom-grilled mini steaks, a huge raw bar, a long table of pastries--whatever you might want, a local chef and his team would serve it to you.  Meanwhile, on stage two local chef teams, a lead and a sous chef, competed to produce the best locally sourced dish for the panel of four judges: Ritz-Carlton VP of corporate culinary, Rainer Zinngrebe and the three amigo celebrity chefs, Ripert, Bourdain, and Andrés.  Spike Mendelsohn acted as the emcee.  The food was tasty, the show fun, and all in all it was a pleasant time.

Immediately after it ended, a small artisan market opened around the hotel's second, smaller pool.  I browsed it but bought nothing.

I spent the next few hours of free time mostly working, with a little reading and some ocean-gazing thrown in when I couldn't stand to work any longer.

As evening washed slowly over the island, this was the view from my balcony.

Evening brought the last Cayman Cookout event, the Gala Dinner. We filled Blue by Eric Ripert and then enjoyed a long dinner in which the guest celebrity chefs each prepared a course.  (Bourdain was the sole exception; he sat at the table with the chef's spouses.)  So, we enjoyed food from Ripert, Andrés, Bartolotta, Humm, Kinch, MacKay, Mendelsohn, and Yard.

Sorry the menu is tough to read; this was the best shot I could get given the available light.  The meal itself was excellent, a genuine treat and a fine ending to the 2013 Cayman Cookout.


Tomorrow, I will fly home in the late afternoon.  With luck, I'll get in a final dip in the ocean before I leave.

I wish I could afford the time (and cost, which is not inconsiderable) to come here every year.  It is a lovely retreat from winter.  

On the road again: Cayman Cookout, day 3

Today the Cayman Cookout returned to form.

To attend my first event, Burgers in Paradise with Eric Ripert and Spike Mendelsohn, I had to get up at 7:45 a.m.  On a Saturday.  Anyone who knows me will understand that I do not get up early on Saturdays, but I did for this event.  The reason is that the event was so deeply cool that I could not miss it.

First, we piled into buses and rode a short way to a dock, where we boarded large catamarans, roughly 72 of us to a ship.  I rode up front, picking up a sunburned face along the way, out to Stingray City, a sandbar where stingrays have flocked for about thirty years because people come there and feed them squid.  The boat's crew lowered a ladder in the middle of the bow of the ship, and down we walked, into the water.  The waves were rougher than usual but still pleasant, and the deepest part of the water was only up to my neck.  We stood and splashed around as stingrays swam all around us.  The crew knew many of the rays on sight, with one woman having a particular favorite, Sophie, a roughly yard-wide female ray.  With the woman's help, I held Sophie, an odd but cool and, to my surprise, touching experience.  Staring into the ray's eyes, making sure to keep her eyes and gills under the water, gave me a sense of custodianship--of the sea, of the planet, of live--that sounds a bit grandiose and that I had not expected.  I wish I had pictures to show you, but I had left my phone and camera back in the room so I wouldn't accidentally lose or kill them in the sea. 

If you've read my first novel, One Jump Ahead, you may recall that one of its non-human characters was Bob the racing ray.  I've always been partial to Bob, and after today I am more likely than ever to bring him back at some point in the Jon & Lobo series.  Just sayin'; you heard it here first.

After a while in the water, we boarded the ship again, pulled up the ladder and the anchor, and sailed to Rum Point.  On the shaded, beautiful beach there--if there's a beach in Grand Cayman that's not beautiful, I've yet to see it--chefs Spike Mendelsohn and Eric Ripert joined half a dozen others in serving us a wide variety of mini burgers.  An equal number of bars provided any liquid refreshment you could want as two live bands played steel-drum music.  At one point, Ripert and three of his cooks joined a bongo and guitar duo on the last two minutes of a long version of Bob Marley's "No Woman, No Cry."  I sampled the lamb, beef, and all cheese burgers, ate a few bites of several desserts, and enjoyed a passion-fruit frozen drink.

It was wonderful.  I cannot think of a person who would not have found the setting lovely and the food good; I truly wish I could have given this experience to every single friend I have.  (No, that doesn't mean I'm buying you all tickets for next year's event; I'd need more jobs to be able to do that.  Sorry.)

For those who know me well and would ask, yes, I was stupid and didn't wear sunscreen, and, yes, I burned my face.

At least I was wearing sunglasses, as you can tell.

I sat under an overhang on the ride home so I wouldn't burn more.  I listened to the blend of the waves and rock music as I dozed off and on, my stomach full and my mind still processing everything.

Back at the hotel, I headed for Paul Bartolotta's "Fresh Catch" presentation on cooking whole fish Italian style.  I was surprised by how passionate he was and came away wanting to try to cook a fish or two.  I learned a lot and have a deeper respect for him and his cuisine than before.

After a short break, I caught a Cayman Cookout staple, the Eric and Tony show.  This time, Ripert and Bourdain demonstrated how to cook omelets and scrambled eggs as they talked about some basic dishes they felt every American should learn to make correctly:  those two egg dishes, a roasted chicken, a grilled steak, and pasta.  To my embarrassment, because I should already have known better, I learned a lot of tips that I hope to put into use.  Along the way, the two friends demonstrated the wit and passion and love of food and cooking that have helped make them famous.

After a couple of hours of work, I joined many others on the bus to the evening's entertainment: a book signing and dinner at your choice of three restaurants at Camana Bay. Based on some quick Googling, I had chosen Michael's Genuine Food and Drink, where the local staff worked with guest chef David Kinch, of Manresa, to create a four-course dinner.  The food was good but not great, which was in keeping with my experience at last year's similar dinner.  Of course, with all the great chefs at Cayman Cookout and with a dinner at Blue in my recent memory, I'm holding this dinner to a high standard. 

Tomorrow, I get to sleep late, because the first event is the big lunch at noon.  I am quite pleased about that. 

On the road again: Cayman Cookout, day 2

Today was the best of Cayman Cookout and the worst of Cayman Cookout.

The opening session featured Jose Andres and his team in a beach-side lesson on cooking paella.  Last year, he entered from the ocean in full scuba gear.  This year, he came roaring out of the sea in a jet pack.  Yes, a jet pack.  It was awesome.  Bourdain and Ripert joined a lot of attendees on the sand to get iPhone videos of Andres' entrance.  Once on land, Andres changed clothes as he talked, and for the next hour and ten minutes he was the whirlwind of activity he always is, entertaining and educational and funny and always watching the food.  He prepared a hard-liquor cocktail to start, and servers passed them among the crowd--at 10:15 a.m.  Wine followed, and then the paella, which was delicious.  Even though I'd seen last year's version of this show, I was never bored, and I learned several useful tips.

Next, many of us headed to lunch at Blue by Eric Ripert, where Chef Daniel Humm, of Eleven Madison Park, joined with the Blue team to show us the best way to cook a lobster and then to serve us a lovely, delicious, four-course lunch.  Here's the final lobster dish.

As always, click on an image to view a larger version.

Yes, those are black truffle slices.  Damn, that was tasty. 

So, the first part of the day ended in grand style, Cayman Cookout at its best.

The next session for me was The Art of the Pie with Spike Mendelsohn.  Mendelsohn is a young chef who's been on a few Food Network shows, is talented, personable, and into classic American dishes.  The pie in the session's title is pizza, and he is known for making great pizza.  He showed us how to make a mushroom pizza that, when we tasted it--yes, I had two very small slices--was easily the best mushroom pizza I've ever had.  The one problem was that his session ran only 40 minutes, well short of its scheduled hour.  I would have preferred he fill the hour with information.

Next up was Daniel Humm's "beach picnic."  He explained how to prepare a strawberry gazpacho that was brilliant and that I very much want to make--but he finished in 18 minutes.  I was very glad I hadn't paid the full fee for just that session.

Two chefs new to the event, two short sessions, two groups of quietly disgruntled foodies:  Cayman Cookout at its worst.

The evening was a mixture of the two.  On the one hand, we had Anthony Bourdain

making Texas-style brisket on white bread with beans and macaroni and cheese, Eric Ripert

preparing swordfish, and Jose Andres

making Catalan bread with buttered uni and cheese.  So, the big three were working hard--and working the crowds.

On the other hand, the other chef guests were either eating off on their own, away from the crowd, or nowhere in sight; last year, they'd also cooked.  Many folks had come for the chance to interact with and watch the chefs as they worked, and that was possible only with the big three.

To be fair, five or six other stations had lesser-known chefs preparing tasty small dishes, and there was a dessert assembly that looked good.  Sadly, the dessert quality was well below that of the savory dishes, a waste of calories.

The weather also presented challenges today, with big waves in the morning turning into bigger waves in the afternoon, so big they occasionally came all the way into the tents and soaked the feet of the attendees (I loved that, actually, but many did not).  The evening brought rain, but only for a bit; most of the barbecue was rain-free.  

On balance, I enjoyed the day quite a bit, but it could have been better with just a few changes. 

For what it's worth, I have to note that I'm talking here about how to make something great into something insanely great; it's still an amazing event.