Michelle Gayer, the award winning pastry chef who co-authored Charlie Trotter’s Desserts has her own shop in Mpls’s Midtown Global Market called The Salty Tart. Her products are the best in the Twin Cities and she recently made this cake for Noah’s 4th bday. Italian butter cream, vanilla bean genoise, and all encased in a serious rocket ship. Holy crap…amazing.

And for the adults she made sandwiches with prosciutto, roasted tomatoes and mozz, brioche-olive-tomato pies, brie and orange turnovers,  blue cheese and caramelized garlic croissants and last but not least, Rice Krispy Sushi:

Peg, Rita, and the rest of the staff did an awesome job, but Michelle is the queen of the rolling pin in my book. Homemade caramels alone are worth the trip, and you can learn more at www.saltytart.com.

First there was the amazingly boring book and web effort detailing the life and aspirations of the young lady who cooked her way through the Julia Child book, and ever since then it seems that someone in the blogosphere cooks ALL the recipes in a cook book every time a good one comes out. To me it smacks of copyright infringement…well maybe I am exaggerating a bit, but at its core the blogger is just using the free pub to further their own ends using someone else’s groovy ideas. What’s next? Will some PYT don a blond wig and re-review all the restaurants in Ruth Reichl’s trilogy?

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Enter  Courtney Scott who chronicles her adventure in www.abroadrview.blogspot.com.  She created a Free Eats in NYC campaign.  Since Monday 2/16,  she has been living off free samples from gourmet shops and supermarkets in Manhattan and Long Island.  The adventure has been unfolding on her blog with videos, photos and tips on the tastiest and most indulgent freebies in the city. I LOVE THIS. Why? Because it’s a fun idea, a cool thing for an aspiring culinista to write about and, most importantly, pokes just enough fun at all the cookbook copycats to be a hard bullseye in my snark-target-ometer.

Check out her coverage on:

NBC
Eater
Buzzfeed
Mediabom
Gothamist
Midtown Lunch

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Check out www.foodandwine.com/classic for info on this years ASPEN Classic. Giada and Bobby and Mario and Daniel and all the rest will be there…and so will Hosea Rosenberg, the winner of Top Chef NYC. Oy vey. He won the thing fair and square but the judges were in a bind. Contestants who had a real personal style and cooked food you could taste through the TV were eliminated in the final 3 episodes when one flub can really cost you (Jamie, Carla etc) and Hosea played it safe ‘til the final and then dressed up his ordinary mediocre seafood restaurant cookery with Richard Blais’ deft touches (foie foam…toasted corn shoots…etc) in the season ending  finale.  I felt so bad for Carla, what was she thinking doing sous vide and souffle as part of her last meal? Had she done one of her killer simple tarts and rolled out a piece of roasted or grilled meat on her main course, she would have won hands down over Hosea and Stefan.

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Dishola is sponsoring a killer day of BBQ eating and adventure in Austin Texas on March 16th, check it out Dishola or email info@bbbcrashcourse.com for details.

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What are the 12 words you never, ever want to say out loud…EVER?  How about, “Sorry Hef, I can't make it to the party at the Mansion.” Bridget Marquardt’s premiere party for her new Travel Channel show, Bridget’s Sexiest Beaches, is in mid March at Hef’s Holmby Hills party palace and I am working that night.  The series airs Thursdays, beginning March 12th…check out www.travelchannel.com for details.

I met Bridget last week in Malibu shooting some spots with her for the network and she is NOTHING at all like she came across on The Girls Next Door. She is prepared, adventurous, immersive and knows what she is doing in front of the camera…and she looks great in a bathing suit which is why she is doing that show and not Adam, Tony or myself. Although Dhani could do a sexy beach show …for sure. He works out.