Foodies were out in full force Wednesday when executive chef Michael Tuohy of Grange Restaurant & Bar kicked off his personalized farmers market tours for the season. Follow The Chef tours are led each week at the farmers market in downtown’s Cesar Chavez Plaza, across from the restaurant at 926 J St. The markets – and the tours – run from May through October. A wet winter has delayed some crops, including certain stone fruits. But Tuohy and Grange Executive Sous Chef Brad Cecchi found strawberries, asparagus, snap peas and more when they took 11 people there in the morning. Tuohy started the tours two years ago to inspire Sacramentans to buy locally at farmers markets and to help bring

The smell of fresh duck, fine wine and fruit-infused cocktails filled The Citizen Hotel’s Grange restaurant Thursday night at the second annual Fowl Mouth Dinner, where Grange Executive Chef Michael Tuohy and special guest/food writer Hank Shaw each presented his own version of duck in four different courses. 133 guests show up to participate in this event, and at $55 per plate, everyone got their money’s worth. Guest and governmental advocate Gary Conover said he enjoyed the ability to have a variety of different kinds of duck applications. For each course, two culinary creations came out side-by-side: one “A” and one “B,” which the guests were to vote on in a taste test, not knowing

Ever wonder if its possible to shop exclusively at farmers’ markets and eat nutritiously? Deliciously? The answer is yes, and Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny are making it easy for you. The duo spent every Monday night in 2009 hosting dinner parties where they treated guests to dishes prepared with local, seasonal ingredients purchased at farmers’ markets in Placer County. They recorded the menus they created and compiled them into a book with 360 recipes. "Placer County Real Food: Recipes and Menus for Every Week of the Year” is the finished product and Neft and Kenny were at Grange Restaurant and Bar Wednesday night signing copies, meeting readers and foodies, and eating. The $45, four-

They brought Sacramento the Citizen Hotel and its restaurant, Grange. Now that same team is proposing an even more ambitious downtown project. Calling themselves the Sacramento Alliance Team, the partners behind the Citizen Hotel are seeking Sacramento City Council approval to redevelop the 700 and 800 blocks of K Street Mall. Two weeks before a council vote on the matter, they held an open meeting on the plan's centerpiece: a 35,000-square-foot public market, tentatively called the California Boqueria, that would showcase the state's food and wine at the corner of Eighth and K streets. Two of the partners, Rubicon Partners co-founder Kipp Blewett and Grange Executive Chef Michael Tuohy

With more than 10 local farmer's markets open weekly starting this month, it's difficult to navigate all the options and choose something you can easily prepare. Enter Michael Tuohy, Grange Restaurant's executive chef and leading proponent of the Slow Food Movement, whose mission is to "understand the importance of caring where their food comes from, who makes it and how it’s made," according to its website. Tuohy holds a weekly "Follow the Chef" lunch at the Grange, located on the corner of 10th and J streets inside the Citizen Hotel. At 11 a.m. every Wednesday between May and October, he meets with a group of 15 people or less at the Grange and leads them through a tour of the farmer's

Sunday, approximately 75 hungry guests took over Grange Restaurant for Slow Food Sacramento's Celebration of Summer event. The luncheon was organized around a fruit whose flavors reach a peak in the summer season: the tomato. Event organizer and member of Slow Food Sacramento chapter member Jim Mills told the group that "a tomato is not always a tomato," and that the fruit should really only be enjoyed fresh during its season, which ranges from about June 15 through the end of October. Grange Restaurant's head chef Michael Tuohy reinforced that tomatoes are best consumed during those four and a half months. "You'll see tomatoes in the stores in January," Tuohy said, "and it's like 'Why

Mark Miller admitted being flattered when Life magazine named him one of America's most influential chefs of the 1980s alongside Alice Waters, Wolfgang Puck and Paul Prudhomme. But he isn't comfortable with his celebrity chef status. Miller is most famous for popularizing the southwest cooking style worldwide. He's written 10 cookbooks altogether, and seven of them deal with southwestern-style cooking, including The Great Chile Book and Coyote Café, named after his famous Santa Fe café. However, what Miller really wants is to inspire people to cook. "Sometimes we watch too much television, and we are preordaining what the [culinary] experience is," Miller said. "People should really de

Foodies and wine enthusiasts united Saturday at Cesar Chavez Park for Raley's and Seventh Annual Grape Escape, presented by Raley's and Bel Air for an evening of drinking and munching. For $40 in advance and $50 at the door, ticket-holders took part in a three-hour taste marathon, sampling cabs, chards and merlots from more than 50 top wineries from six counties in Northern California and gourmet appetizers from Sacramento’s favorite eateries. Award-winning wineries like San Joaquin’s Van Ruiten winery (voted Wall Street Journal’s Best Zin) and Calaveras County’s Twisted Oak winery (Gold Medal winner from the Riverside International Wine Competition) set up shop along with brewery favori