Multi Top Chefs and other events coming up

Our calendar is full of "Top Chefs" and other things. Consider these:

• Season 2 "Top Chef" finalist, New York chef and Charlottean Sam Talbot will be at Park Road Books in the Park Road Shopping Center (Park Road and Woodlawn) at 11 a.m. Saturday to sign copies of "The Sweet Life," his cookbook about life with diabetes. Actually, you can make that ex-New York chef. The New York magazine blog Grub Street recently reported that Talbot is leaving Surf Lodge on Montauk and says his next project will be in the Caribbean.

• May 17 will bring "Top Chef: The Tour" to Charlotte. Contestants (Bravo calls them chef'testants but that doesn't mean I have to) Hector Santiago (season 6) and Nikki Cascone (season 4) will hold an interactive cookoff (meaning you might get asked to sit down and be a judge) across from the 7th Street Public Market at 225 E. 7th St. You also get to play games, vie for prizes and buy "Top Chef" gear. Shows are at 10:30 a.m., noon and 1:30 p.m. Charlotte is the first stop for this year's 15-city tour.

• The annual Letter Carriers Stamp Out Hunger food drive has to be the easiest way to feed the needy there is. All you do is fill a paper bag with nonperishable food (canned meat, canned fruit, canned vegetables or cereal) and put it by your mailbox this Saturday. Your postal person will get the food to Loaves & Fishes and Second Harvest Food Bank of Metrolina. AARP delivered specially printed paper bags to many homes in Charlotte, but if you don't have one, you can use a regular paper grocery bag. Don't forget - this Saturday, your front door. Easy.

Sam Talbot plans Charlotte book signing

Several weeks ago, I wrote about the journey of Charlottean Sam Talbot, who started out working in local restaurants when he was 14 and was an early finalist on "Top Chef."

These days, he's not only a celebrity chef in New York, he has a book, "The Sweet Life: Diabetes Without Boundaries," that's part cookbook and part lifestyle book on how he lives the high-profile life while managing Type 1, insulin-dependent diabetes.

Talbot will be in Charlotte at 11 a.m. May 12 to sign copies of his books at Park Road Books.

He doesn't come back to Charlotte all that often, so make sure you stop by and say hello.

Top Chef: Gone too soon

So we don't post a spoiler on the Food page, let's make a change: Humming.

Hum. Humhum. Humhumhum. Wonder if there was news from "Top Chef" last night that might be of interest to people in North Carolina?

I wonder. Hmmm. Have I pushed the spoiler down far enough?

OK, let's return to today's blog post, already in progress:

Keith, we hardly knew you. But when you bought those already-cooked shrimp, I knew you were cooked.

If you haven't been watching the new season of "Top Chef" on Bravo, you may have missed North Carolina's Keith Rhodes, chef of Catch in Wilmington. It's hard to miss him anywhere, actually: Rhodes is a big guy. (The blogosphere nicknamed him Rick Ross, after the rapper).

When Rhodes made it through that interminable sorting-hat of hundreds of contestants (OK, it was just under 50, but I stand by "interminable") to make the final 16, I was delighted. I'm a fan of Catch, which is on my current list of favorite NC restaurants. I've eaten there twice, once when it was still a tiny counter-service place in downtown Wilmington and once in the newer, larger place on Market Street. Both times, the food was fun and impressive.

Rhodes has a way with clever seafood dishes, and he definitely handles fish with respect. The last time we ate there, the waitress not only told us how and where the softshell crabs were raised, she volunteered the name of the fish farmer and told us exactly when that night's catch had shed their shells. It was obvious Rhodes makes sure his staff knows what
s what.

So I was mystified when Rhodes made the rookie error Wednesday night of buying pre-cooked shrimp for a challenge. It was like watching a train wreck: I was waving my arms, yelling, "No, chef! No! Step away from the seafood case, baby!"

Yes, Rhodes also got bounced for using flour tortillas instead of corn in enchiladas in Texas. But that one is easier to understand. Texans might think it's obvious, but the rest of the country doesn't cut its teeth on the "which tortilla when" code.

But pre-cooked shrimp when your restaurant is called "Catch"? So sad. And Keith Rhodes is so much better than that.

Speculation this morning is that Rhodes isn't really gone. He's doing an online Bravo.com bit, and "Top Chef" is wily about bringing promising chefs back. Even if he doesn't return, we can drive to Wilmington for more of Keith Rhodes. And we should.

Photo: Bravo.com.

"Top Chef" product line goes cold

Maybe the ad slogan will be "Pack your knives and microwave":

ConAgra has announced a deal to produce a line of "Top Chef" frozen entrees, according to the publication Broadcast & Cable. The report by reporter Jon Lafayette says the line will be a part of the Healthy Choice Cafe Steamers brand. The marketing includes a Web series, Top Chef Healthy Showdown, which appears on bravotv.com. The products are expected to start showing up in supermarkets later in September.

Paula Deen Edition: Give her a break

What a coincidence: Paula Deen was the guest of honor on "Top Chef" last night (fellow Georgian Richard Blais greeted her with deep-fried mayonnaise, which I think should become a tradition in my native state).

And I made a Paula Deen recipe this week. The reason: Bake sales.

The bake sale obligation does not end when your child leaves elementary school. When you are a known cook, you will be asked to cough up a few dozen of something on quick notice. It's wise to always have a few easy, crowd-pleasing recipes that people will pay for like it's gold coated with crack. And is there a better description for a Paula Deen recipe?

I had an office bake sale coming up (a good cause, raising money for the very fund-worthy Arts & Science Council) when I spotted Paula Deen's Homemade Kit-Kat Bars making the rounds on a couple of Web sites. Club crackers coated with boiled sugar and melted chocolate goop? I am so there.

Paula Deen's Homemade Kit-Kat Bars

75 Club crackers (about 1 1/2 sleeves)

1/2 pound (2 sticks) butter

2 cups graham cracker crumbs

1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar

1/2 cup milk

1/3 cup granulated sugar

2/3 cup creamy peanut butter

1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1/2 butterscotch chips

Line a 13-by-9-inch rectangular baking pan with crackers. (The original recipe called for breaking crackers to fill in the edges. But I later realized it wasn't necessary. I'll explain later.)

Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the graham cracker crumbs, dark brown sugar, milk and granulated sugar. Bring to a boil. (Because the graham cracker crumbs make the mixture sort of thick, I never saw it actually boiling. It was more a question of listening for bubbly boiling noises. Just keep stirring so it doesn't burn.) Boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat.

Pour half of the sugar mixture over the crackers and spread out with a flat or offset spatula. (This is the one place I had trouble. The sticky sugar goop made the crackers shift around like cracked sidewalk pavers. It would have helped to have a little room to push the first cracker layer back into place, and broken pieces of cracker made that more difficult.)

Arrange another layer of crackers over the sugar layer. Top with the other half of the hot sugar mixture. Top with a third layer of crackers.

Combine the peanut butter, chocolate chips and butterscotch chips in a small saucepan. Melt, stirring, over medium-low heat. Spread evenly over the top cracker layer, scooching a little melted chocolate into any open edges.

Let stand two hours (I cheated and went for one hour, which worked fine). Refrigerate at least two hours or overnight. Cut into long pieces. (A good tip for protecting your baking pan: Use a bench knife, a long, straight-edged cutter, to press down through bars cookies without sliding a knife and scratching your pan. In this case, I cut straight down through the middle long-wise, then cut each half into thin sticks about 1 1/2 inches wide.) Package 2 bars in sandwich bags or wrap in plastic and seal to strangers or your closest co-workers.

Food news roundup: Top Chefs, food camp and meat

Earthworms are easy, kids: Christy Shi's Know Your Farms group, the people who started the local-farms buying club, are adding local food summer camps for kids ages 8-12 in Davidson. The one-week camps include organic vegetable gardening, community service, arts and crafts from recyled items, local food production and field trips on foot. Sessions are June 21-26, June 28-July 2, July 19-24, July 26-30 and Aug. 9-14, and run from 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Suggested rate is $325 per child, although Shi says that's negotiable. E-mail Shi at christy.shi@knowyourfarms.com.

Top Chef-testants Jennifer Carroll (Season 6; left) and Ariane Duarte (Season 5) will be the chefibrities when the "Top Chef" hits Charlotte Thursday (yes, tomorrow) at East 3rd and Tryon Street. The Top Chef truck is part of the season debut of the Center City Green Market, which usually is at the Square, but will move for a week to accomodate the big truck. Top Chef show times are 10:30 a.m., noon and 1:30 p.m. Ticketed spots for seats at the show are already filled, but there may be some free tickets at the door. Show up 30 minutes early for those. Details: http://www.bravotv.com/

Welcome to The Meat House, which has opened at The Village at Robinson Road, 8410 Rea Road. It stocks high-quality meats and gourmet foods. It's part of a national franchise with locations in six states. The other N.C. location opened in Cary in January. Details: http://www.themeathouse.com/ or 704-542-4530.

'Top Chef' Night: Separated at birth?

I'm finding it hard to watch "Top Chef" this season. I get distracted by the frantic Twittering by my fellow food writers (follow the Twitter tag #topchef and you'll see what I mean -- Joe Yonan of the Washington Post and Jeff Houck of the Tampa Tribune almost came undone over Nigella last week.)

But I also get distracted wondering why Michael Voltaggio looks so familiar. Hmmm. Backwards ball cap, big ears, wideset eyes? Wait! I've got it: He's a ringer for Dwier Brown of "Field of Dreams"! C'mon, Mike - ask your bro Bryan if he wants to have a catch. With sharp knives.

Meanwhile, what has happened 'Top Chef' Jen? She's lost both her cooking chops and her personality. She's started out calm and cool, but now she's RoboChef. Wake up, Jen! No one who works for Eric Ripert ought to get that scattered.

Finally, I'm pulling for the best chef on the show so far: Kevin Gillespie of Atlanta. (No, not Eli. Please, not Eli. He's an Atlantan in name only. Robin might have been annoying, but calling her "grandma" was just so uncool.)

If Kevin wins, it won't only be a victory for manners and cuddleness, it will be vengeance for last year, when Atlanta's Richard Blais was robbed. Do it for the Big Peach, Kevin.