Arrow-right Camera
Subscribe now

Spokane native not named top chef

Lynette Pflueger, Spokane native and former pastry chef at Santé Restaurant & Charcuterie, did not win the title of People’s Best New Pastry Chef in a Food & Wine magazine competition last week.

Magazine readers were asked to choose the winner from 50 pastry chefs nominated from across the country. The magazine has named the country’s best new chef for the past 25 years and invited readers to choose a top pastry chef this year.

The winner of the promotion was Jodi Elliot, pastry chef at Foreign & Domestic in Austin, Texas. The western region winner was Laura Pyles of Revel in Seattle, formerly of Joule, Book Bindery, Bastille and Dahlia Bakery Workshop. The winners were announced last week after the deadline for the Food section.

Pflueger is the pastry chef at Chef Mavro in Honolulu. She went to culinary school at the Art Institute of California – Los Angeles and worked in Florida and Connecticut before returning to Spokane to work for Santé from July 2009 to February 2011.

There are more details about Pflueger on The Spokesman-Review’s Too Many Cooks blog, www.spokesman.com/ blogs/too-many-cooks. The link to the Food & Wine magazine coverage is at www.foodandwine.com/ the-peoples-pastry.

‘Coffee Unites Us’ wins competition

Kaiti Blom is the winner of the Barista Guild of America’s photo contest.

Blom won an all-expense-paid trip to barista camp in June. She tends the coffee bar at Revel 77 Coffee, 3223 E. 57th Ave.

Organizers of the contest asked baristas to share pictures of what coffee means to them. Blom’s said she loves the way coffee brings people together and helps promote friendships and relationships. She took pictures of her friends and family, called together at the last minute to help. The photos are titled “Coffee Unites Us.”

After winning, she posted a note on her Facebook page, “I am so happy to have won the competition, but what I am more happy for, is how close it has brought me to my community,” she wrote. “I didn’t realize how many people cared enough about me and what I do to take time out of their lives to support something like this.”

The pictures are posted online at www.spokesman.com/ blogs/too-many-cooks, or find links on The Spokesman-Review Food page on Facebook.

UnCorked! fundraiser on Friday

The National Association of Women Business Owners will host the sixth annual wine tasting fundraising event, unCorked! from 5:30 to 9 p.m. on Friday at Chateau Rive in the Flour Mill, 621 W. Mallon Ave.

Tickets are $45 in advance or $55 at the door. Tickets for a private tasting that precedes the main event with John Allen of Vino! are an additional $15.

Ten percent of total proceeds raised by the event will go to Transitions, a local nonprofit that works to end poverty and homelessness for women and children in Spokane.

Wine, chocolate and heavy hors d’oeuvres from Red Rock Catering will be served. Silent and live auctions are planned. For more information about NAWBO and unCorked!, or to register for the event go to www.nawbonw.org or call (509) 731-3309.

Lincoln Center hosts charcuterie gala

Guest chefs from Food Services of America will present three courses of imported meats, cheeses and more during the Charcuterie Gala, 6-10 p.m. on Thursday, April 25.

The first course will feature specialty cheeses paired with 2010 Willow Crest Winery Lemberger Rose. For the second course, pickled and spiced vegetables, olives and other crudités will be served with 2011 Willow Crest Winery Pinot Gris.

Pate, truffles and cured meats will be served with 2010 Willow Crest Winery Cabernet Franc for the third course.

Lincoln Center executive chef Brad Emery and his team will serve specialty small bites. Dessert is a build-your-own dessert bar.

The dinner is $30 per person, plus a service fee and taxes. More information and reservations are available from The Lincoln Center, (509) 327-8000.