In our second week featuring recipes from Fairfield County Chef's Table, we looked no further than Ridgefield to feature 109 Cheese & Wine's excellent grilled cheese sandwich with wild mushrooms. In addition to trying your hand at the recipe below, the shop also makes made-to-order grilled cheese sandwiches in their shop. 109 Cheese & Wine will be hosting a free event with Bernard's Restaurant and Southwest Café at 11 am on May 31 in their upstairs classroom, complete with food from all three restaurants, bubbly and beverages, as well as copies of Fairfield County Chef's Table. Stop by for a snack, and have the chefs and author sign your book!
109 Cheese & Wine 109 Danbury Road, Ridgefield, CT 06877 | (203) 438-5757 | 109cheeseandwine.com Owners: Monica and Todd Brown
Five years ago Laura Downey and Chris Palumbo combined their love for cheese and their entrepreneurial spirit and created Fairfield Cheese Company, a bustling cheese shop located in a food loving Connecticut suburb. To celebrate five years of artisanal and farmstead cheese, charcuterie and fine foods, and their popular cheese school, Fairfield Cheese Company will mark their anniversary with a calendar of special events during the month of May. View the complete list of events below:
Post opening tweaks are commonplace during the first few months after a restaurant's opening. With Mecha’s minor changes completed, it now firmly fills the belly rumbling void of Southeast Asian Noodles and street food, popularizing Ramen, Pho and South East Asian comfort food.
Owner Tony Pham, who also owns Pho Vietnam in Danbury, saw an opportunity in Fairfield, to capture the hearts and hungry stomachs of the Fairfield U student bodies by opening a Ramen noodle bar. This small, but cozy, space is an architecturally clean, eye pleasing mix of Modern Asian décor...with a long community table in the center and block style tables around its perimeter. There is some additional seating circling the "bar" with colorful Asian ceramic stools adding some pop and a touch of elegance to this casual space. Pham is committed to keeping his two restaurants a "family affair," and you may be seated, served, or cooked for, by one of his family members!
When I first visited with Tony in September, Ramen noodles were the main attraction on his menu. Several months later, Mecha’s menu is now representative of Japan’s different regional nuances with the current soup bases including Shoyu, Miso and Chicken.
On Wednesday September 18, 2013, I had the opportunity to attend a farm-to-table dinner presented by the Friends of Boulder Knoll, a group focused on educating the local community about agriculture and sustainability. I was invited by Tim Crakes of South End Wine and Spirits, a boutique wine store in Cheshire, CT, that would be providing the beverages for the event. I wasn’t sure what to expect; in fact, that is a part of the state I seldom frequent. While I take Metro North into New York City on a regular basis, I have never stepped onto it in the opposite direction. What I found was a gorgeous small town and vibrant farming community. Both Tim and the Friends of Boulder Knoll provided me with total access to an evening of purity, totally untouched by the pace of the city and daily life.
Usher in autumn with an elegant farm-to-table dinner featuring beautiful wines, craft brews, and delicious cuisine. On September 18 at 6pm, the Friends of Boulder Knoll will hold a multi-course meal prepared by Jason Sobocinski, host of The Cooking Channel’s “The Big Cheese.” The event will also feature wine pairings created by Southend Wine and Spirits of Cheshire, CT. They will pour “boutique” vino from the Halter Ranch line.Mikro Brew Bar will offer craft beers andPi Pies Bakery will provide a sweet ending to the evening with artisanal, freshly made baked-goods.
Guests will be entertained with music by On Call, “Connecticut’s premier musical duo.” They can also participate in a silent auction featuring items from local businesses
The event supports Friends of Boulder Knoll, a Connecticut-based organization dedicated to educating the community about sustainable agriculture and sustainable communities.
Ridgefield's best source for artisinal cheese and wine, 109 Cheese & Wine has recently expanded its footprint and education offerings. The shop, located at Ridgefield's Marketplace, has posted an impressive and fun line-up of events throughout the summer. Classes include: Red Bee Honey Pairing, Home Brewing and a Bar B Cue, The Champagne Diet, East Coast Craft Brews and Artisan Cheese & A BBQ Throw Down Wine vs. Beer. See complete listings below. Advance reservations are recommended as class size is limited, call 203-438-5757.
Ramen noodles are having "their moment," and restaurateur Tony Pham, owner of Pho Vietnam in Danbury has just opened a new venture in Fairfield that will have fans of Asian food slurping without pause. Welcome to MECHA.
Pham, a Vietnamese American who opened Pho Vietnam at the tender age of 21, again uses his raw talent drawing from his years of experience traveling around the world and working in numerous kitchens. His newest baby, Mecha, located on Post Road in Fairfield is a hip, cozy joint that serves up Ramenas well as Asian street food. Consulting with a master Ramen chef,Tony Pham is placing all bets on this age old Japanese noodle..and we hear Pho is on the way. For a new restaurant aiming directly at the college crowd around Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, it's a perfect match.
Read our interview with Tony Pham below to find out more about Tony's family, the history of Ramen, the meaning of "MECHA," and what inspires Tony Pham.
“You know how to eat that?” asked the kindly woman as she set a steaming bowl of soup before me at Pho Mai. Did I know how to eat pho? To handle the chopsticks and spoon? To lift the long noodles from the big bowl of broth without slapping myself in the face with a wet noodle? I’ve learned over the years. But Vietnamese food can be perplexing to the uninitiated. It’s hands-on.
Pho Mai makes the best Vietnamese food I’ve found in Fairfield County. It’s been open for about a year, and it’s worth a jaunt to Wood Avenue in Bridgeport (across from the Wood’s End Deli) to enjoy the fresh, herb-filled, sweet, sour, and fermented flavors of Vietnamese food.
Pho Mai’s red awnings strike a cheerful air on a bleak corner. Inside, the place is spic and span clean, with freshly painted yellow walls. Big orange fish swim back and forth in an aquarium that bubbles soothingly. The restaurant has been near empty every time I’ve been, and that’s a shame because the food here is seriously good, and it’s a great place for a weekend lunch with a group of friends.
Today is National Grilled Cheese Day, so what better time to interview the King of the Grilled Cheese, Jason Sobocinski of Caseus Fromagerie Bistro than today? Chef Sobocinski is the owner and founder of New Haven's innovative cheese-centric gastropub and cheese shop. A graduate of Providence College, Chef Sobocinki earned his master’s in gastronomy at Boston University and after working his way through the ranks at the Formaggio Kitchen in Cambridge, he opened Caseus.
1. If you had unexpected guests arriving at your home for dinner in 1 hour, what would you whip up? What is the last dish you cooked for yourself?
I'd probably put out a few hunks of cheese, surprise. I always have good bread on hand, jam, mustards, crackers...I like the idea of having a grilled cheese party where you lay out bread, different cheeses, and condiments and let guests make their own creation. Bust out a couple of bottles of wine and everyone is happy. I’m actually judging a grilled cheese recipe and wine pairing contest. Last dish I cooked for myself was left over Easter Ham, fried up in brown butter with two over easy eggs and a hunk of bread baked in the oven. I covered the entire plate with finely grated black diamond cheddar and then a drizzle of maple syrup. This was around 1am last night. I had a Cadbury Caramel Egg for desert with a glass of St. Francis Zinfandel.
Asher is an 8th grader at Fairfield Country Day School. He has a true passion for food and started his blog, AsherZeats, in September of 2012. Asher reviews everything from Michelin starred restaurants to great dives. This review originally ran on AsherZeats.
“Anyone who tells a lie has not a pure heart, and cannot make a good soup. “-- Ludwig Van Beethoven.
This Saturday we traveled to Vietnam Palace (a new restaurant, opened this past June) located at- 955 Ferry Boulevard, Stratford, CT in a very busy shopping center.
When we entered, we noticed two very cool statues of lions and a statue of a Buddha. The ceilings were filled with many upside down umbrellas and the restaurant was extremely clean. We also saw that it was a family run business (the best kind of business) with a very small number of people working there. When we were seated, we were greeted by an EXTREMELY friendly Husband/Wife pair who could not be any nicer.
Calling all cheese lovers! The Working Lands Alliance will proudly host the inaugural Nutmegger Cheese and Wine Festival, a fundraiser to protect Connecticut’s farmland and to support quality childhood nutrition. The Festival will be held on Sunday, September 23from noon-4 p.m. at the Jones Family Farms, located at 120 Beardsley Road in Shelton, CT. It will feature samples of Connecticut’s best cheeses and wines, vineyard tours, hayrides, cheesemaker talks and book signings, and include special guests who will talk about cheese. Participating Vendors Include:
Occasionally, we like to get a few opinions on a restaurant. Here are two shorts from Cathy Siroka and James Gribbon on Shanghai Bistro.
If you’re in South Norwalk and want a simple, easy place to go before a movie or out with the kids – try Shanghai Asian Bistro. They recently opened a second location at 124 Washington St., with their first one in Westport at 1715 Post Rd East. Owner, John Jiang, had been carefully looking for a second location for years, and has seen such a huge change in the traffic and excitement in downtown Norwalk, and finally felt that “now was the right time.”
While the menu has the Chinese classics like shrimp with duck sauce and General Tsao’s chicken, the restaurant also offers an array of other Asian inspired dishes and many ways to customize your order according to your tastes and dietary preferences. Jiang explains his menu as “all-Asian, not just Chinese, a sampling of the flavors of China, Thailand, Vietnam and Japan.”
From the coast of Maine, to the island of Nantucket, to the beaches of Long Island ... who doesn’t love a great summer road trip? As we downshift into the slower and warmer final weeks of summer, CTbites wants to know, what are some of your favorite road trip destinations?
Comment on this post sharing one or more of your favorite summer road trip destinations for a chance to win a picnic basket from 109 Cheese and Wine filled with cheese, wine and charcuterie from the Ridgefield wine shop.
Beer and cheese can make an ideal pair. Sipping a quality brew with the right cheese can elevate and complement the respective flavor profiles as any cheesemonger or brewer would tell you. But Beer IN cheese? Leave it to Sprout Creek Farms, Sixpoint Brewery and Whole Foods Market to create this perfect symbiosis in the ale-washed “Point of Origin” cheese.
Conceptualized by Chris Manca, Specialty Products Coordinator for Whole Foods Market's Northeast Region, "Point of Origin" is "grassy, with a whiff of malt that does not announce its presence too boldly," explains Manca, who also helped name the cheese "Point of Origin."
School is back in session, and I don't mean the kind that requires boarding a yellow school bus. I'm talking about an education involving terms like bloomy, soft-ripened, blue-vein, washed-rind, and brined or full bodied, flowery or peppery. Ridgefield's 109 Cheese & Wine Shop's Spring/Summer class schedule is out with a full offering for any level of wine, craft beer & cheese appreciation. These classes expertly led by owner, Monica Brown, a wine and cheese connoisseur who, along with her experienced team, is dedicated to bringing a curated selection of the best products from around the corner to around the world to 109.
If you’re a sucker for hand-baked bread and artisanal cheese and seasonal farm fare (and who isn’t?) you'll want to head over to Barnes & Noble in Westport this Sunday, May 6 at 11 a.m. for a book signing, foodie and children’s event in support of Westport's Wakeman Town Farm.
Jason Sobocinski of New Haven's Caseus restaurantand host of “The Big Cheese” will join SoNo Bakery's John Barricelli, host of "Everyday Baking," to offer tastes and sign copies of their beautiful cookbooks, Caseus Fromagerie Bistro Cookbook and the SoNo Baking Company Cookbook as part of a Bookfair Fundraiser for Wakeman Farm.
Not only will you get to meet the authors and peruse their new books, but Caseus is bringing its famed Cheese Truck to the event. The Cheese Truck is a mobile kitchen that drives the streets of New Haven selling to-die-for grilled cheese sandwiches, tomato soup, daily sausages, salads and more!
With a stellar location in Westport on the Saugatuck, and a Taiwanese chef, trained in Japanese cuisine with more than 20 years in the restaurant business, Westporters have something to be hopeful about in a new local take out and delivery place.
Bistro 88, a family run restaurant, is dishing up food from several Asian destinations including China, Japan, Korea, Thailand and even Indonesia, in the form of traditional Sambal. Lucky for us that points of political contention hasn’t gotten in the way of allowing us to choose freely from this flowing menu of Asian delights. Looming largely as a take out and delivery business, this tiny joint also has limited seating with service for those who prefer to eat there. Plus, the menu is so extensive (reading like a Bible for Asian food), there is surely something for everyone.
Love cheese? Want to know more about it? Want to taste some? Chef, TV personality, and cheese cookbook author Jason Sobocinski will talk about cheese, offer samples, and sign copies of his book, Caseus: Fromagerie Bistro Cookbook, on Friday, March 30, from 7-9 pm at a private home in Westport. Proceeds from the event, which costs $35 per person, will support Library programs.
Sobocinski is host of “The Big Cheese” on The Cooking Channel and owner of New Haven’s award-winning bistro and cheese shop Caseus. Wine will be provided by Black Bear Wines & Spirits of Westport. Register online. For more information, contact Cindy Clark, 203.291.4824, clark@westportlibrary.org, or westportlibrary.org.
Do you feel the need, the need for cheese? Introducing MELT Market and Cafe, the spectacularly gooey love child of former Westport-based Mirabelle Cheese Shop owners Andrea and Damon Itin. MELT, located in the up and coming section of Bridgeport at the corner of Lafayette Circle and Fairfield Ave is sleek and spacious with high tops as well as regular tables for seating and warm inviting color tones. The 2,200 square foot space seats plenty but if tables were pushed aside, this could be a fantastic place for a private function. But enough about things spatial, on to the celestial - this is a cheese lovers' nirvana -
What's for sale ? MELT is the purveyor of European as well as local cheeses
