Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 14, 1990 TAG: 9004250266
SECTION: AMERICAN WOMEN'S SHOW PAGE: AW2 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Imagine no longer. The American Women's Show's Celebrity Kitchen will have cooking demonstrations, featuring area chefs and culinary artists, starting Friday evening, March 16, and scheduled to run all weekend.
If you always wanted to know just how Charlie's restaurant fixes its fresh Italian pasta sauce with shrimp, queue up in time. Kitchen Manager Mark Wills, who has been with Charlie's for nine years, will demonstrate just such a dish. Olive oil-sauteed onions, green peppers and tomatoes, seasoned with basil and garlic, spiked with chicken stock, tossed with shrimp over fresh fettucine ... the Civic Center will be redolent with the cuisine of Roanoke's finestrestaurants.
"The purpose is to have different chefs in to cook a recipe right there," said Shirley Niday of the American Women's Show. Niday said that the new "Celebrity Cookbook," with recipes from folks like Dolly Parton, Senator John Warner and Bill Elliott, will also be available.
Marty Montano of Montano's International Gourmet will also choose something off its menu to demonstrate. He and chef Alfredo Tonete will present their Chicken Pires and Spaghetti a la Marino. The former dish is chicken breast stuffed with imported ham and American cheese, sauteed with lemon butter and served with fried bananas. The pasta is tossed with sea scallops, mussels and shrimp in a spicy marinara sauce.
This will be the chance to experience and benefit from Montano's cooking heritage. His father, Phillip Montano, opened their restaurant in 1969, and they serve Italian cuisine reminiscent of their background, as well as soups, sandwiches and salads. And it will be a chance to watch Tonete in action. "He's real versed in a lot of different foods," said Montano, mentioning that his chef has cooked at Restaurante Fiorentina and Cantina Napoli in Naples.
And if the Roanoke Valley History Museum's annual Colonial Candlelight Christmas Dinners wasn't on your holiday agenda, now's the time to experience chef Victoria Longley-Selbe's talent. In addition to this annual event, Longley-Selbe, a transplant from New York state and graduate of many distinguished cooking schools (The Cordon Bleu, La Varenne, Le Notre, and James Beard's), has catered the Roanoke Valley's Polo Match, the Fine Arts Museum's annual dinner, as well as specialty events for the Roanoke Symphony.
"I'm from a New York restaurant family," she said. Her grandparents started the Candlelight Cottage in Syracuse. "Food was a hobby, up until recently. I went to cooking schools for myself."
Longley-Selbe, who has a degree in English and broadcasting, is also a fashion designer, a talent she frequently calls upon for the total presentation of food. "Being in the fashion business, I try to coordinate flowers and linens. I like creative, beautiful food."
Mitchell Bowden of the History Museum said that Longley-Selbe researched and developed their colonial menus for the 1988 and 1989 dinners. These menus, derived from diaries, memoirs and accounts from Southwestern, Western and Southern Virginia, are very true to both the era and area. "This area is heavily influenced by Scots, Irish and Germans," said Bowden. Everything during the Colonial Candlelight dinner, from costumes to wassail to dialect, recalled the 1760-1775 traditions. "There were even times when I wanted a certain thing, and she said `Mitchell, they couldn't have had that. They would have had a hard time bringing it in from the coast,' speaking of a seafood dish. Victoria was very aesthetically aware," he said. "Someone sitting down to dinner needs all of their senses piqued."
The Celebrity Kitchen will try to pique not only the taste buds of its attendees, but the design interests of kitchen-lovers. Leo Scott Cabinets plans to contribute the cabinetry for the event, using a top-of-the-line cherry, according to Leo Scott. There will also be information regarding the newest in kitchen cabinets, from laminates to traditional designs.
And in front of the stove, area chefs will be chopping, stirring and whisking their way to notable dishes, whetting appetites along the way.
by CNB