Why RJ Melman, N9Ne Steakhouse, and Chefs Brian Runge, Joseph Heppe Share Their Strength

We asked some of our participants to tell us why they share their strength. Here are some highlights:

Having a five month old boy and seeing all the care we give him, it's hard for me to think of any child going without the basic need for food. Hunger should be a pain never felt by any child. Support this cause because it's a great one. 

Chef Brian Runge, Premise

I cook everyday for a purpose. To share my passion for food with new guests and the regulars that recently have come visit me night after night at Untitled. But it's not often I cook for a cause such as that of Share Your Strength and am honored to even have a small role in helping feed the hundreds and thousands of children that are left hungry everyday. Participating at these events put things in perspctive. The restaurant bubble that we work in at times can skew what is, and isn't important. A plate breaking... not important, a child skipping a meal... very important. I am honored and humbled to be part of this year's Share Your Strength! 

Chef Joseph Heppe, Untitled

N9NE Steakhouse looks forward to supporting Share our Strength’s Taste of the Nation every year. It is the least we can do to combat childhood hunger in Chicago and in America. With 1 in 5 children at risk of hunger in America, it’s our duty to help. No child should ever be left hungry.

N9NE Steakhouse 

And a word from our event chair, RJ Melman:

As event chair for the last three years, RJ Melman is proud to have all of his restaurants involved in this great event. Childhood hunger is a serious issue in Chicago and across our country, and one that we all feel very passionate about. At HUB 51, we are honored to once again be a part of Taste of the Nation which celebrates what we love most—food—while at the same time raising money for a very deserving cause.

RJ Melman, Lettuce Entertain You 

Taste of the Nation Kickoff Party at Studio Paris

Consider it the first choice morsel before feasting on the full entrée. Taste of the Nation Chicago is throwing a kickoff party next Wednesday, June 27 and you’re invited. Yes, you.

Studio Paris 

Mix and mingle with fellow No Kid Hungry supporters on the stunning Studio Paris rooftop, just above the Paris Club. There will be a bevy of signature Paris Club dishes to taste, as well as fancy cocktails to drink. Chicago’s own DJ Kwest_on will provide the ambience, spinning grooves under the setting sun. And if it rains, never fear – Studio Paris features a retractable roof. 

So what else is in it for you, besides a great night out? Well a lucky few will receive door prizes upon entry, including the chance to win FREE Advocate tickets to the Taste of the Nation Chicago gala event on August 8^th. Advocate tickets include early entrance to the party and VIP lounge access, among other things. And if you’ve already purchased an Advocate ticket you can win a FREE upgrade to our Benefactor ticket level, earning yourself complimentary valet parking on August 8^th, access to the VIP lounges and reserved seating in the Lakeside Luxe Lounge. Voila! 

More important than enjoying the view on Wednesday night is that you’ll also have the chance to be part of a truly memorable campaign towards combating childhood hunger. Perhaps you’ve already seen the photos of well-known Chicago chefs posing with their No Kid Hungry pledges, and now you have the opportunity to join them. Take the pledge while you’re there, and we’ll take your picture. Every new signature gets us just a little bit closer to reaching our goal of ending childhood hunger in this country by 2015.

Purchase your ticket to the event here.  We hope to see you at Studio Paris on Wednesday, mes amies!

Event Details:

Taste of the Nation – Chicago Pre-Event Kickoff Party June 27 at Studio Paris, 6:00 pm-8:00 pm

Ticket price is $25.00 with all proceeds going towards Share Our Strength’s Taste of the Nation Chicago

Taste of the Nation Kicks Off With Food Network Documentary "Hunger Hits Home"

The Taste of the Nation Chicago team is back, and more ready than ever to take on Share Our Strength’s goal of ending childhood hunger by 2015. A big part of that – in addition to planning our annual gala benefit – is working to educate the public on the realities of childhood hunger here in the United States.

Our message got across in a major way last week when The Food Network aired a documentary co-produced with Share Our Strength called "Hunger Hits Home." Narrated by Hollywood actor Jeff Bridges, the film profiles three American families who have unexpectedly found themselves struggling to put food on the table.

Their stories are startling. "I've gone about three days without eating," says one bespectacled boy from Norfolk, Virginia. "I've been able to do that," he says, adding, "sometimes." The children featured here all come from hard-working, loving homes and the desperation their parents feel at not being able to provide for them is palpable.

Sadly, they’re not alone. Childhood hunger affects as many as 16 million children in this country – that’s 1 in 5 kids you see on the street. It's become such a growing problem that current Agricultural Secretary Tom Vilsack has labeled it an issue of national security.

What’s encouraging is seeing how both private citizens and politicians have become energized around this issue. On the local level, food pantries like Minnie’s in Plano, Texas, help make the choice between cooking dinner and going without a little easier for families in the community. Share Our Strength has also successfully partnered with governors in Maryland and Virginia to help make ending hunger a priority in their states.

The message here is simple. Whether it’s donating to your local food pantry, writing your state legislator, or simply taking the pledge to end childhood hunger, this is a goal we can all get behind.

We hope to do our part here in Chicago. Join us, and buy your ticket to the 2012 Taste of the Nation event today.

Hot Chocolate: The 666 Dinner

Whatever you're planning on doing on February 28th, if it's not sitting snug at a Hot Chocolate table, you might want to reconsider—and if that's too far out to think about, well think about it now. For months Mindy Segal has been putting together the pieces for Hot Chocolate's 6th anniversary dinner, and now those beans have been spilled. Now it's time to put a little No Kid Hungry spin on this bad boy, Segal style.

Mindy's calling it her 666 dinner. And the poster at the top of this post? That was made up specifically for the dinner, and she's selling them that night at $100 a pop, which really isn't so bad when you consider the poster is gonna be printed on high quality paper and autographed by all six of the chefs cooking with Mindy that night—and oh yeah, the proceeds from not only the poster, but also the dinner, are benefitting Share Our Strength. And if $100 is too big a splurge? She'll be selling them them without the chefs' ink, too.

And those six chefs that'll be signing the poster? They're all women. 6 years. 6 chefs. 6 courses.

Plating at last year's dinner via Stephanie Bassos.

Here's the lineup:

Host: Mindy Segal, Hot Chocolate

Koren Grieveson, Avec (Chicago)

Stephanie Izard, Girl & the Goat (Chicago)

Naomi Pomeroy, Beast (Portland)

Missy Robins, A Voce (New York)

Celina Tio, JULIAN (Kansas City)

What you need to do is call Hot Chocolate today and grab however many seats you need. Every time I talk to Mindy, the guest list gets longer and longer. They're at (773) 489-1747.

The dinner is selling quick, and a seat costs $200, a portion of which is tax deductible since proceeds benefit Share Our Strength. New Belgium is stepping up with the brews and each course will have its own pairing.

And if for whatever reason all of this isn't enough to plant a X on your calendar that night, here's a look back at last year's anniversary dinner (also via Stephanie Bassos) with Rick Bayless, Ben Caulfield, Paul Kahan, Bill Kim, Michael Kornick, Nick Lessins and Paul Virant—which also benefitted Share Our Strength.

Win Dinner for 4 at Alinea

Earl Grey, lemon, pine nut, caramelized white chocolate
or,  as they say at Alinea, dessert, via Penelope's Loom's stream.

There's the foodie community, and then there's those who blog about it. And those who blog about it hold one blogger in fairly high esteem—for most of us, her blog attempts to accomplish the impossible. That blogger is Carol Blymire, and her blog is Alinea at Home. You heard of it? Thought so. Her mission is pretty simple, "I'm cooking my way through the Alinea cookbook. Because I can. I think."

And when one thinks they can pull this off, and blogs about it? Yeah, they start turning a head or two. And she has a loyal following, it's pretty safe to say.

Which is why she's teamed up with Share Our Strength to help raise money to fight childhood hunger through the holiday season. And in her own signature way, she's built milestone incentives to keep the gifting momentum on the up:

$2,500 -- I will cook something from the Noma cookbook. [Sourcing the ingredients for this has been FUN.

$5,000 -- I will go Christmas caroling at The White House. [I hope I don't set off the Dork Alarm.

$7,500 -- I will do a row of somersaults in front of the Capitol Building. [Wonder if I can get one of my favorite Senators to join me?

$10,000 (our goal, by January 16) -- I will dance along with the Wii videogame The Michael Jackson Experience.

And then there's the last milestone, if the drive raises over $10k... Alinea.

Just watch that video, no matter how much you know or don't know about Alinea, and you'll understand how out of this world the place is—unless you're on of the few who have actually experienced it. There's nothing like it. Period.

And Grant Achatz and Nick Kokanas of Alinea have stepped up and are allowing Carol to give away dinner for four at Alinea, for any of us, as long as we've donated at through the drive, at any amount. Are you letting that sink in? Donate any amount through this drive, and you'll have the chance to eat the dinner of a lifetime—for free.

Now Carol is writing from D.C., and her readers are following her from all over the world, and that's great news for the fundraising potential of this drive for Share Our Strength—but it's us living here in Chicago who should truly appreciate the magnitude of this potential prize. We live here and hear about the place non-stop. We live here, and short of a Christmas miracle, just can't afford the place. And those of us who live here and can afford the place? Well, then there's the reservation problem. They're next to impossible to come by. So, Chicago, here's your chance.

Let's throw some weight behind this and win one for the home team, huh? There isn't a person I know who can't afford even $1 to fight childhood hunger, especially at the prospect of eating dinner at Alinea with three of his or her friends.

Here's Carol's original post, announcing the fundraiser. And here's the official donation page—remember, only donations made here will be eligible for the Alinea dinner, and the dozens of other prizes Carol is giving away.

Best of luck to everyone, and let us know how if you've given so we can give your due props via twitter!

Fighting Hunger with Three Days To Go

(In a grocery store, this table of food would cost $63.

If obtained through the Greater Chicago Food Depository programs? $5.41)

So here's the thing. In all of the hooplah of throwing together such a large event with an overwhelming cast of chefs, it's easy to loose sight of what this event is all about. Who are the recipients of the money raised? How much food does your ticket buy for a family? How many kids are impacted by this one event? Internally at Taste of the Nation we call the answers that reveal what's beneath the surface of these questions, Hunger Messaging—and our own Chuck Sudo is the Bruce Wayne of Hunger Messaging. Next Thursday night, you'll see Hunger Messaging all around you.

But we're not talking decorations and fancy words that might convince you to throw in some extra money because that's what you're supposed to do—we're talking serious issues that just aren't forward enough on our consciousness. Take a look:

• In Chicago, 1 in 4 children are food insecure.
• 82 percent of Chicago Public School Students qualify for free or reduced lunches.
• The Greater Chicago Food Depository distributed 62 million pounds of food to pantries and shelters throughout the Chicago area last year.
• 780,000 Illinois families received food stamps in June 2010, an 11.9 percent increase over June 2009.
• Over 200,000 children in Chicago live in "food deserts."

And this is barely a fraction of the messaging Chuck has put together for us. But I'm treading a fine line here when I group these messages together and use phrases like "barely a fraction." I remove the reality, the weight of what's being said in each message.

Think about it. In Chicago, 1 in 4 children are food insecure.

How many kids are on a youth baseball team? A ballet class? 1 in 4 is a dangerous ratio that hits far too close to home for all of us, and yet I think we don't see it. Did you have any idea that nearly 800,000 families received food stamps this June? Let alone that it's an almost 12% increase from the year before? What a painful blow to the goals of Share Our Strength—which is to wipe out childhood hunger by 2015.

2015. That's pretty darn soon.

And yet, we're not backing down from this goal. That top photo to this post is pretty staggering when you take in how much those groceries cost you and I when we shop at the super market. Because, for us, $63 makes a lot of sense. That's not staggering. It's the impact that organizations like the Greater Chicago Food Depository have on communities that have my jaw continually dropping the more involved I get with Share Our Strength. To think that those groceries could cost a family just $5.41—well, there's some difference making going on there. Big time.

And then there's Near North Health Services, another beneficiary of Taste of the Nation. Their Operation Frontline participants are taught how to shop for groceries on a budget, utilizing the most with minimal resources—the Chicagoist's Megan Tempest wrote a great feature on this program last May. 

And the Illinois Hunger Coalition, too.

(A common site in Chicago of an abandoned market via Chuck Sudo)

And as markets continue to close in Chicago, the food stamps that are given out to help families through this tough time become less and less helpful. In his research leading up to Taste, Chuck's unearthed this problem. It increases the need and demand for the $5.41 assistance that the Greater Chicago Food Depository provides, which increases the need for further assistance from donors and events by the surrounding community. Hence, Taste of the Nation is as important as ever this year.

Because what Chuck's seen is that as the grocery stores close, families turn to corner convenience stores for their food—where they can buy liquor, cigarettes, and whatever processed foods are available at these stores as their nutrition, and in that order. They're using their food stamps to buy junk food.

(A main grocery source for much of Chicago via Chuck Sudo)

Taste of the Nation is as big as it is because the battle we're fighting requires it. These organizations won't continue to make an impact without our support.

Sure. There are still free tickets to be had as the days tick away leading up to the event—but if you've just been waiting for the right moment, unsure to buy or to wait for another shot at a give away, well don't you think that right moment is now?

Come next Thursday in this little town of ours, for those few hours, there won't be a greater gathering of food and drink in the world. Think about that—which, my friends, is saying something.

Buy your tickets. Write them off. And get your tushy over to what might just be one of the most unforgettable moments of your life. And help us start hitting the delete button on our Hunger Messaging, bit by bit, in the process, yeah?

There are 800,000 families waiting to thank you.

Updates From the Land of Taste

(The Aragon Ballroom won't look anything like this next Thursday...)

Tickets. We're giving them away and you want them. Here's how:

Steve Dolinsky. Steve will be our auctioneer next week—and oh man are there some insane items this year... Paul Kahan and Mindy Segal as your private chefs while you talk music with the guys from Sound Opinions, for one—and all week he's been holding contests on his blog. That ends today. But, your chances to win the tickets aren't up just yet if you can convince him you're the most deserving.

He's asking you a simple question. What would you order off of Stephanie Izard's menu at Girl and the Goat and why, in fifty words or less. That's it. So get to his site, read today's entry, and win those tickets, yeah?

(Via Steph's twitter, this 5 lb. veal belly roast debuted earlier this week)

Gaztro-Wagon. As you must know by now, chefs have been teaming up with naanwich maestro Matt Maroni all week as we quickly approach August 12—less than a week away, mind you—and we're not letting up on bit.

As of right now, we have four more scheduled ride-alongs through next week, starting with Chef Michael Fiorello of Mercat a la Planxa hopping aboard midday tomorrow. Following Michael will be our own Elissa Narrow later that night, and David Carrier from Kith and Kin plus Todd Stein (cibo matto) and Kristine Subido (Wave) will join in early next week. So yeah. We're not letting up—just ask Phil Vettel. He's noticed.

(At the wagon this week for Taste ticket give-aways 

w/ Chef Marianne Sundquist of In Fine Spirits)

Foodie the App. I love this thing. What started as an iPhone exclusive has become, for this Verizon loyalist, an interwebz staple. Building a web site so that any and every one could jump on board with Foodie was plain and simple brilliance—if for no other reason than I get to choose my own prix fixe from Piccolo Sogno while you're forced to stick with the regular menu. That, and I booked a reservation at The Bristol while you had to wait an hour. You know, things like that.

And now they've partnered with us—and I don't think this could be any more painless. All it takes is a reservation. A simple, easy, special laden reservation booked through their system. That. Is. It. Do that, and you're giving yourself a shot at one of two pairs of tickets they'll give away at random next Thursday. You're going out to dinner at some point between now and next Thursday anyway, so why the heck aren't you booking that reservation through Foodie? For more, check out their blog.

See—we like making this easy on you. Happy Friday, and good luck!

Or just buy your tickets, too...