Salt Lake City chef beats Bobby Flay with chile relleno win
Why it matters: It's a notable victory that could put Salt Lake City's fast-growing culinary scene on the map.
Driving the news: The "Beat Bobby Flay" episode — "Is It Getting Chile in Here?" — aired last Thursday.
Catch up quick: Zocco, a two-time James Beard Award nominee, told Axios the toughest part was inventing standout dishes under the clock — and ignoring noisy judges.
Zocco said a show recruiter contacted him in January. He filmed in New York soon after, giving him less than a week to prep.
The morning of the show's taping, Zocco said he confidently turned to his wife and said: "I'm winning this competition."
Spoiler alert: Zocco won the competition's first round against Austin-based cook Stefanie Torres with his pork albondigas.
In the end, Zocco blew away judges with his signature dish — lump crab chile relleno with black bean and New Mexico red chile sauce — defeating Flay's chorizo version.
Flashback: It wasn't Zocco's first interaction with Flay. Zocco formerly worked as a sous chef for Flay's Mesa Grill in Las Vegas, which gave him an advantage.
"I came up with something that wasn't necessarily traditional, but I know the flavor profiles were there and I didn't follow suit to what Bobby's style was," he noted on what tipped the scales to his victory.
Zocco noted the show's competitive nature reflected the constant demands he faces in the kitchen.
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Chicago Tribune
an hour ago
- Chicago Tribune
Review: A delicious weekend at Ravinia brings together music and fine dining
'A good program,' chief conductor Marin Alsop told a crowd in Ravinia's Tree Top Lounge, 'is like a meal.' She wasn't just reaching for a fanciful metaphor. Each year, Breaking Barriers, the festival-within-a-festival she devised around gender equity at Ravinia, spotlights a different profession. This year's focus on the culinary arts invited women chefs to devise dishes inspired by Alsop's Chicago Symphony programs. Alsop picked the music, while her co-curator, 'Food Network' star Molly Yeh, matchmade the pieces with specific chefs. At this ticketed, add-on event in the Tree Top Lounge, a Ravinia audience sampled the results. The chefs themselves assembled and handed out the hors d'oeuvres at a long table: 'Chopped' judge Maneet Chauhan, New York City baker Jacqueline Eng, Florida chef Mika Leon, and Monteverde and Pastificio chef/co-owner Sarah Grueneberg. For some of the chefs, thinking deeply about music is already second nature. Yeh is the daughter of CSO clarinetist John Bruce Yeh and a Juilliard-trained percussionist; she designed a bite and performed at Saturday's chamber concert. And Eng is also a percussionist with a Juilliard credential. (Those department dinner parties must have been elite.) Despite the crush of more than 250 attendees — about the most Tree Top can fit comfortably — the preconcert tasting went off smoothly. When the line got long, a quick-thinking Chauhan started offering her dish to those waiting, scoopable from a Fritos bag. I'm a pale excuse for a food critic. But after sampling the bites first, then attending the concert in the Pavilion, I found that the chefs' dishes uncannily forecasted the performance to come. Here's how this musical feast went on Friday: Accompanying Reena Esmail's 'Re|Member' By seeking an Indian spin on Midwestern comfort food, Chauhan set a challenge for herself. Any Frito pie, even a cheffed-up one, has to contend with the overwhelming saltiness of the chips themselves. Chauhan might not have been able to surmount that totally, but I can't imagine it being done much better. Her answer was to introduce several tastes: fruity pops of pomegranate seed and mango koochumbar, sweet-and-sour tamarind chutney and briny-creamy queso fresco. In a clever stroke, Chauhan made the vindaloo with ground lamb, rather than the usual hunks, to nod to the more traditional chili topping. Your aunt in Cedar Rapids would surely approve. The Midwest/Indian mashup was apropos for Esmail, who was born in Chicago. In her 'Re|Member,' premiered in 2021, an oboist prerecords their solo, to be shown on a video screen at the top of the piece. Later, the video returns, with the same oboist duetting with their past self live onstage. Of all the pandemic-era commissions out there, Esmail's 'Re|Member' stands out for its poignancy — and I loved that Chauhan, by riffing on a familiar, lovable dish, managed to nod to that nostalgia. So, I was extra disappointed that Ravinia opted to go a different direction for this performance. Instead of the video duet, CSO oboists Lora and Will Welter played a spatialized duet— Schaefer playing in the Pavilion aisle, Welter onstage. Even with its profundity curbed, this was a fine, stirring performance. That's a credit to guest conductor Alexandra Arrieche, a participant in Alsop's fellowship program for female conductors. Accompanying Tim Corpus's 'Great Lake Concerto,' Movement III When you think 'percussion,' you probably think big, bold, maybe a little aggro. It's no surprise Eng's perspective as a former percussionist led her to temper those stereotypes. Instead of going for the obvious associations, she focused on that other, unseen aspect of being a musician: long sessions in the practice room. As she explained in the introductory video played in the Pavilion, she selected rye for its resilience in many different climates. (That grain selection had the added benefit of a slightly sour edge, brightening the dish.) And the bean-and-vegetable it rested upon had the rich, layered flavor one can only achieve by stewing high-quality ingredients patiently for hours on end. Decadent, a little cheesy, and oh-so-umami, it was the most flavor-packed bite of the evening. With its focus on Lakes-region vegetables and grains, Eng also drew inspiration from the piece's title. Corpus, a Chicago-based composer, composed the work specifically for CSO percussionist Vadim Karpinos and Lyric percussionist Ed Harrison; it was premiered by Roosevelt University's student orchestra last year. The third movement, marked 'Explosive,' throws us into a fast-paced repartee between Karpinos and Harrison from opposite sides of the stage — Karpinos on xylophone, Harrison on tom-toms. Corpus's writing is consistently inventive: It's never quite clear whether the soloists are teasing one another or casually trying to one-up each other, and you'll never hear a xylophone sound more mournful than it does at the middle of the movement. I's always a high endorsement, to both performer and composer, when people start hooting in the middle of a classical music piece like they're at a stadium show. Harrison's moment was his minute-long maraca solo (yes, really), and Karpinos' his stunt of tossing, then catching, a shekere 10 feet in the air during a cadenza. I'll be thinking about that performance for a long time—just like those beans. Accompanying George Gershwin's 'Cuban Overture' Of the four, León's dish was the most conventional, which is no slight. The texture of the ropa vieja was just right — not too soupy, but also not getting caught in your teeth for perpetuity, like some ropier ropas viejas. I could see a world in which the tostón weighs down the dish. Instead, it was just dense enough to support the generous mound of meat on top. I might have wanted some more acidity to brighten the dish. Then again, at this point in the meal, some unabashed heartiness was welcome. Without León's dish, I don't know that I would have left the Tree Top Lounge fully satiated. Alsop and the CSO's 'Cuban Overture' stuck to one's ribs, too. Maybe a little too much, actually — the overall spirit seemed transplanted from Gershwin's blustery, big-city tone poems, like 'American in Paris' or 'Rhapsody in Blue.' For a work that references son and rumba so deeply over its short duration, this overture didn't dance much as possible, I tried to isolate each dish's composite parts before taking them in together. The lamb vindaloo in the Frito pie. The cultured butter off Eng's rye toast. Even the tostón, alone, in León's creation. When I did the same for this 'pasta tale' — a chilled orzo, with a tomato saffron sauce pooling at its side — I admit, I was skeptical. Between the freshness of the lump crab and its vegetal crunch, the orzo had all the makings of a great summer pasta salad, if on the mild-mannered side. Meanwhile, the sauce was not at all what I expected, leading with the tomato's acidity. The saffron, for all its potency, arrives only on the back end of the bite, albeit mild enough to be overpowered by the taste of Ravinia's wooden utensils. I swapped to plastic before mixing it all together and digging in. Then: total magic. It's as though Grueneberg had carefully plotted a run-of-show for each bite. First, the salinity of the crab, now amplified. Then, that tomato zing, rounded off pleasantly to become more mere aroma than star. The fresh veggies complete the garden, but no longer dominate. And then: the saffron, asserting itself more bravely than before. If this ends up on Monteverde's menu, catch me there tomorrow, a Road-Runner puff of dust pluming behind. What kismet that the most nuanced dish got the most nuanced performance. If programs are like meals, 'Scheherazade' would be the equivalent of a weekly special at Chez Ravinia: Like Copland's Clarinet Concerto, appearing later in the weekend, Alsop conducted the work earlier in her Ravinia tenure, in 2022. But the flavor profile of this meeting between CSO, Alsop and associate concertmaster Stephanie Jeong — who, then and now, played the expansive solos representing Scheherazade — has only deepened in those three years. Conducting scoreless, as is her wont in big repertoire works, Alsop had a specific and inspiring vision for the piece: an end-to-end lyricism, episodes that elicited delicious contrasts, slowdowns that were just right. But don't mistake specificity for micromanagement. Just as exhilarating was the sheer freedom and creativity the CSO seized in their solos. Stephen Williamson's runs in the third movement slowed at their peak, like the suspended, heartstopping moment before a roller coaster's big drop. Keith Buncke's bassoon solo was punctuated by pauses, a sage carefully choosing his words. And Jeong — where to begin? It was really her Scheherazade, a masterclass in taking time and, when called for, freezing it altogether. I can't think of a better 'Scheherazade' I've heard live, anywhere, even including Grant Park's noble account last summer. If only we could come back for seconds. The Breaking Barriers Festival continues 5 p.m. Sunday with Felix Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 4, 'Italian,' and Chicago Symphony clarinetist Stephen Williamson playing Aaron Copland's Clarinet Concerto. Tickets $35–$95 Pavilion, $15 lawn. More information at
Time Magazine
3 hours ago
- Time Magazine
We Are Drinking So Much Matcha That Supplies Are Running Out
Matcha tea, a powdered Japanese green tea, has become a cultural phenomenon in the West, so much so that its popularity has resulted in a global supply problem. Western consumers have thirsted for the health option in recent years, a trend skyrocketed by social media—especially through Tik Tok. At the same time, Japan has experienced a mass tourism rise in the post-pandemic years—in 2024, Japan welcomed a record-breaking 36.9 million international visitors, surpassing the previous record of 31.9 million in 2019 — leading to many mass tea companies and local vendors to report shortages of supply. Back in October 2024, two well-known matcha companies—Ippodo and Marukyu Koyamaen—limited and/or stopped selling certain kinds of matcha, citing short supplies. 'Dear customers, We have been receiving an unexpected high volume of orders during the past few months. Taking production scale and capacity into consideration, we regrettably announce that availability for all Matcha products, regardless size and packaging type, will be limited from now on,' Marukyu Koyamaen's website still reads. Matcha comes from the same plant that many different teas come from— the camellia sinensis. The camella sinensis leaves can be made into green tea, oolong tea, and black tea. Though matcha originates from China, it has become closely associated and rooted in Japanese culture. Matcha is a type of green tea, but the processing, form and taste differs significantly, and is made specifically from tencha, a shaded green leaf tea. Matcha also only makes up a small amount of Japanese tea production—just 6%—according to the Global Japanese Tea Association. Yet, the demand has skyrocketed. And as a result, prices have also soared. According to Forbes, the matcha market is expected to hit about $5 billion by 2028, an expected growth of more than 10% since 2023. Further, the Japanese agriculture ministry has reported that the 2024 tencha output was over 2.5 times higher than 2014. The question is whether increased demand, small farmers trying to meet this demand, and a crop that is heavily dependent on weather patterns can keep up, even as the spring matcha harvest attempts to make up for the shortages of the past year. This year, though, the Kyoto region of Japan, which accounts for a large percentage of tencha harvest, was hit with a hot and dry harvest season, say farmers in the area. In 2025, Zach Mangan, founder of Kettl Tea, a Brooklyn-based company specializing in high-quality teas imported directly from farms in Japan, called this year's harvest a 'high-quality but lower-yielding harvest' in a blog post in May of this year—the kind of harvest that will boost demand and lower availability, potentially raising prices even further. Read More: The Surprising Reason Your Groceries Are More Expensive According to the Global Japanese Tea Association, the average price for tencha in late April reached 8,235 yen per kilogram, which is 1.7 times higher than last year's average. And according to producers, that can only be expected to continue. 'Over the past year, demand for matcha has grown beyond all expectations,' Ippodo updates customers on July 18. 'Unfortunately, supply constraints are likely to continue.'
Hamilton Spectator
4 hours ago
- Hamilton Spectator
Astronomer recruits Gwyneth Paltrow as ‘temporary spokesperson' amid fallout over viral Coldplay kiss cam clip
Astronomer has a surprising new face as the company navigates a social media firestorm. Actress and businesswoman Gwyneth Paltrow appeared in a cheeky Q&A video posted by the IT company on social media Friday night after two of its top staffers resigned in the wake of an extremely public 'cheating' scandal . Astronomer's CEO, Andy Byron, and the executive in charge of human resources, Kristin Cabot, both resigned after the pair was caught by surprise cuddling and smiling on the Jumbotron at a Coldplay concert in Massachusetts last week. Their smiles fell when they realized they were on camera, as Cabot covered her face and spun away from the camera, and Byron ducked out of the frame. 'Either they're having an affair or they're just very shy,' lead singer Chris Martin joked in the clip. Paltrow, who is also Martin's ex-wife, has been hired 'on a very temporary basis to speak on behalf of the 300-plus employees at Astronomer,' she said in the video. 'Astronomer has gotten a lot of questions over the last few days, and they wanted me to answer some of the most common ones,' Paltrow continued in the video. As text reading 'OMG! What the actual …' appears on screen, Paltrow reassures viewers that 'Astronomer is the best place to run Apache Airflow.' 'We've been thrilled so many people have a new-found interest in data workflow automation.' As a question about the social media team appears on screen, Paltrow jumps in again: 'Yes! There is still room available at our Beyond Analytics event in September.' 'We will now be returning to what we do best: delivering game-changing results for our customers,' she said, thanking viewers for their interest in the company. The New York-based company, which provides big companies with a platform that helps them organize their data, was previously relatively obscure. With files from the Associated Press
