Happy First Birthday, Alfie's!

Evening greetings, foodies and food-consumers alike! Despite the handful of other restaurant experiences I know I need to write about, I feel compelled to jump ahead and share with you my experience this evening back in Granville, as this is obviously freshest on my mind. Tonight's attention is being duly paid to Alfie's Wholesome Food, which held its first birthday party today. Perhaps you may remember my blog post of Alfie's opening day last year? Regardless if you ever read it, I expressed my hope then that Alfie's would be well established in Granville. By the looks of the crowd that descended upon East Broadway and behind the Robbins Hunter Museum, this locavore restaurant certainly has. In addition to the opening of neighbouring Wisp Knitting Shop, there was certainly much for Chef/Owner Sam Dodge and his team, as well as Granvillians and visitors, to celebrate.

Bringing Change to a Familiar Space: The Edit Room

Last week, I attended my first OEFFA conference, held annually at Granville High School and now in its 35th iteration. I went as an exhibitor, sitting at the Slow Food Columbus table and chatting with folks not only about the Slow Food movement and the work we're doing locally, but also about Columbus's diverse, growing food scene. In retrospect, it's the confluence of these types of lived experiences and dedication to the local, regional, and national food scenes that makes being a part of (and researching) Columbus so much fun. It's not all that often I get to catch up with Denison and Granville folks, let alone meet owners and producers of companies that I've known by association (e.g., Shagbark and Kombu-tea), as well as Facebook and blog followers I never knew I had (e.g., Local Food Coordinator Jeff Givens of Sanfillipo Produce). Among those I saw at the conference were Erin Harvey of The Kale Yard and The Going Green Store (who co-presented at one our Food and Culture Colloquium events) and Bryn Bird of Bird's Havens Farms, both of whom invited me to a "Cocktails and Community" happy hour hosted by the Licking County Local Foods Council. (As some context, I had been a part of the early stages of their work during my last year at Denison.) The site of the happy hour, and the principal focus of this post, was in a place which houses a catering business known as The Edit Room.

Music and Food: The Phillip Fox Band and Two Food Experiences in Central Ohio

What do the 2013 Ohio Food Truck Festival and The Granville Inn on every third Thursday of the month have in common? The Phillip Fox Band, of course (okay, technically two of the band members)! On Sunday, September 29th, I made my way over to the latter half of the Ohio Food Truck Festival which took place on the grounds of Ohio Village (the same location of the Country Living Fair I attended last month). It was there that I first heard the proclaimed "country-fried rock'n' roll" persona of the central Ohio-based group, led by native Detroiter Phillip Fox. Fast forward to the more recent present, and yesterday I went to Granville for a quick evening visit to the Inn's Acorn Pub to hear Phillip and Toledo native Jonathan Kampfe, together known as the Phillip Fox Acoustic Duo. Highlighted briefly then are my dining experiences, set to the tunes of local music.

Here, Eat This

It's about 4:30pm and as I make my way through the doorway of The Short Story, the wait staff gets ready near the bar area for the first customers to arrive and talk about who has already eaten some cake makes its way to me, at which point I'm given a healthy serving of moist chocolate cake and told "here, eat this." Eventually, I'm given a fork and Robert Harrison, executive chef of The Short Story, meets me at the entry way to a fairly small kitchen and asks me if I'd like to be introduced to the cook staff (which he forewarns me is a small one). In between bites of cake, I'm introduced to Dylan (a.k.a., the head dishwasher; a.k.a., the 16-year-old-who-cooks-like-he's-30; a.k.a., "the Prodigy") and then to Carly (the baker and plater of the chilled small plates and desserts). And as I finish my plate of cake, service begins.