East Bay Food Fight

I'm loving the East bay food scene. We have Plum's late night dining menu, a bunch of local breweries, Bakesale Betty's fried chicken, Chez Panisse and many more. This event makes me fall in love with East Bay even more.

Line at Cocina Poblana for their Mole

Rudy's Can't fail cafe failed me with their salad. I'm hoping for some burgers since that's what they are good at.

East Bay Food Fight is a food event the showcase about 40 great restaurants around the east bay. They have tastings for each restaurants that should basically tell us what they're all about. I love the idea since I haven't eaten on most of the restaurants there and this kinda gives me an idea of what kind of food they serve and if they're good.

To make things more exciting there were 6 east bay chefs that fought Iron chef style. They cooked based on their given theme (Summer Picnic, Dinner date and Dessert Nostalgia). Another reason why I was excited is because Alice Waters, Anya Fernald and Gather's Sean Baker are part of the judges. I don't know what happened to Alice Waters but I didn't see her there so I was a bit disappointed.

The battleground

Judges tasting the food. "That's not Alice Waters" - line I kept on hearing from the audience.

Among the restaurants that I was looking forward to was Baywolf, Bocanova, Chop Bar, Flora, Pican, Five and Hibiscus. The food was good. I didn't find anything out of this world but they were good and satisfying food, nothing fancy. Home of Chicken and waffles were serving guess what? Chop Bar roasted a whole pig which is basically "lechon". Ozumo did a salmon salad. I wasn't expected Tay Ho's rice crepe dish but it was one of my favorite. I loved all the dishes from the Kitchen of Champions especially their bread pudding with rum sauce.

Here are the pics from the event:

Tay Ho - Rice crepe wrap with crispy shallots

Hibiscus - Fried plantains. I wish there's ice cream with this!

Hibiscus - Hibiscus drink

Chop Bar - roasted pig "Lechon". Crispy skin please!

Bocanova - Quinoa salad with summer squash and corn. I love this dish! fresh and tastes like summer

From the Kitchen of champions

Kitchen of Champions - N'Orleans Bread Puddin' with Rum sauce. This was very good!

Ozumo - salmon salad

with Edamame

Xolo - chile verde tostada

Kincaid's - Homemade corn bread with smoked tiger prawns.

The Grand Tavern - Duck pate with beet salad

Miss Pearl's Jamhouse - Jambalaya

Probably good. I didn't taste it. They ran out of Pork! :(

 
This was great event that benefits the Society of St. Vincent de Paul's Kitchen of champions culinary program. They help out people get out of poverty and pursue their culinary dreams. I hope they'll do this again next year with more exciting dishes and great restaurants involved!