CMH Gourmand – Eating in Columbus & Ohio

So what did I do when the lights went out last week? In case of emergency….eat.

Sunday

You may have noticed the the Beer Wench is now an out of town blog. Ashley’s Bon Voyage party was at Tip Top Kitchen and Cocktails. Tip Top was one of the few restaurants open for business that night and it was BUSY. Thanks to Tim Lessner for great hospitality and for creating the limited edition Beer Wench Shot. Luckily most of that concoction was gone before I arrived. Adios Ashley.

Monday

Gahanna Grill for a birthday bash for Roland – a prolific poster on Columbus Underground. Roland was defeated by the Double Beanie Burger. The restaurant was one of few open in the area so adding about 20 people as a group was nice (we had reservations). I was there from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM. Through the picture window in Gahanna Grill I watched the non- stop line of cars going through the Wendy’s drive thru the entire night.

Tuesday

Columbus State Community College still had power so the show was on for Taste The Future. Thanks to CSCC for tickets to the event – I took my friends Colleen and Bear from Slow Food along for the ride – and it was a good one. Restaurants represented at the event included: The Refectory, G. Michaels (great Shrimp and Grits), Cameron Mitchell Restaurants, and the like. The best desserts were cheesecake on a stick from Sanfillipo Produce – a local restaurant supplier and the best health conscious cookies ever from Cookie Cop (the baker used to be a police officer). You can buy his cookies at Soup Man, Raisin Rack, Luck Brothers Coffee, and some Kroger stores.

Columbus Foodie did a great post on the event so check it out.

Wednesday

Hurricane Party – to eat Bear and Colleen’s melting food.

The power came on late in the afternoon at Slow Food headquarters and we continued with our potluck dinner anyway. It was a perfect night of food, wine, whiskey, and conversation. Hungry Woolf posted about this night so you see some of the photos there.

Thursday

Another party – power came on an hour before we started – I was bummed. I was looking forward to candles and quiet. We thanked the workers that fixed the power lines – they drove 22 hours from Oklahoma to help.

Friday

My power came back. I took the day off, but did pop inside Northstar to sample their new fare for a very late lunch.

Saturday

Slow Food Shake the Hand that Feeds You Locavore Dinner at Flying J Ranch in Johnstown. We camped on the farm overnight, which was no big deal since I had been roughing it all week. There are posts about this night on the Hungry Woolf blog and the Slow Food Columbus blog. Kent and Tasi Rigsby were there. I had a great conversation with Kent about his efforts to source local produce and meat for Rigsby’s – he is doing a great job at this.

You can also listen to an interview with Dick Jensen from Flying J. Farm in Episode 20 of Columbus Foodcast – it should go live on September 25th.