Tag: Kelly English

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Hats Off: Kelly English Named Ole Miss’s 2014 Outstanding Young Alum

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It’s been a banner year for chef Kelly English. His Grizzlies-inspired “Beat Yo Ass” Shrimp were featured in ESPN Magazine, and he was invited to do cooking demonstrations as a part of the Sports Illustrated Tailgate Tour. As if that weren’t enough, now English is winning an award from his alma mater, Ole Miss.

At Saturday night’s homecoming game against the University of Tennessee, English will receive the University of Mississippi’s 2014 Outstanding Young Alumnus Award. Each year, the award is given to a recent graduate who has shown exemplary leadership in both his career and his service to the University.

The Flyer recently caught up with English to talk about home ec, hangovers, and the science of good tailgating.

Flyer: Congratulations, Kelly! How’d you feel when you found out about the award?
Kelly: I was pretty floored. I was like, you know that I put salt on food, right? There’s a lot more important stuff than what I do. But no, it was a huge honor.

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When you applied to Ole Miss, did you know you were gonna be a chef?
I started as a pre-law major. But I was paying my way by working in kitchens, and eventually I figured out that I liked that work a whole lot more than the idea of going to law school. Once I figured that out, I changed my major to Hospitality Management.

Except back then it was called Family and Consumer Sciences—so I basically have a degree in Home Ec.

What do you remember about college?
Oh gosh. I love where I went to school. My friends who went to other schools used to call it day camp; it was just such a serene and perfect place. And safe! I lived there for five years, and I never kept a key to my apartment.

So you were a pretty studious guy?
Let’s be brutally honest here. If you ask me about my college experience, studying would not be the first thing that came to mind. If I had to describe my college experience in one word, that word is “hung-over.”

Let’s talk about the Sports Illustrated gig.
It’s pretty sweet. It’s in conjunction with Sports Illustrated and Go RVing, where we go to different college campuses and do demos before games. I did one at Ohio State, the University of Iowa, and the University of Nebraska. I’m doing one at the UT-Alabama game next weekend. But I definitely took into account Ole Miss’ schedule, so I wouldn’t have to miss any home games.

What food tips do you have for tailgating?
When you think about tailgating, you’ve gotta think about a couple things. First, you’ve gotta think about how long the food can last. It’s gotta be something that tastes good from 11am until 3pm, and it’s sitting out the whole time. Second, you’ve gotta make it as easy as you can on yourself. Because the worst thing you can do, as the host, is stand in the kitchen all day.

What are you bringing to the game on Saturday?
I still have to figure that out. Grits with pork grillades we’ve done a couple times. Composed salads are always great. We did a pumpkin and carrot salad with country ham. Things that people can pick up with their fingers. You don’t want things that people need a fork for. That’s what’s so beautiful about crackers and dip.

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

On the Scene at the AFJ Food Journalists’ Conference

Kat Kinsman (left) of CNNs Eatocracy and Kim Severson of the New York Times address food journalists from around the country at the 2014 AFJ Conference.

  • Kat Kinsman (left) of CNN’s Eatocracy and Kim Severson of the New York Times address food journalists from around the country at the 2014 AFJ Conference.

The Association of Food Journalists (AFJ) is an elite society about which little is known. Much like the Illuminati or the Freemasons, they gather in secret, donning strange robes and reading from arcane manuscripts. The extent of their holdings has only been guessed at.

Until now. This year, the AFJ is holding its [annual conference] in Memphis, and the Flyer has been able to secure unprecedented (OK, somewhat precedented) access to its secret meetings. Be advised: the following content may not be suitable for young children.

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Big Barton performing at the food truck rodeo

  • Big Barton performing at the food truck rodeo

The conference began on Wednesday with a food truck rodeo in Court Square. Attendees were treated to some of Memphis’s finest street food, including kebabs from Stickem and pizza from Rock’n Dough Pizza Co. Meanwhile, Big Barton provided the entertainment, performing classic country hits like “Ring of Fire” and “Mammas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys.”

After lunch, AFJ members retired to the Peabody Hotel for a series of staged talks. One of the first was a conversation between Kim Severson of the New York Times and Kat Kinsman of CNN, who discussed the problem of getting readers to pay for food journalism in the age of Buzzfeed and Reddit.

“My friend David Carr likes to say, you gotta open up the kimono a little bit,” said Severson. “Although if I’m being honest, you probably don’t want David to open his kimono.”

By “opening the kimono,” Carr and Severson meant going behind the scenes and revealing more of the writer’s craft: how a story was discovered, how it was reported. For her part, Kinsman seemed to agree.

“The kimono,” she said, “is back at home, in the closet. At this point we’re walking around naked.”

The day wrapped up with a Smokin’ Taste of Memphis at the Stax Museum. Here, journalists were treated to a series of small plates that showcased Memphis’s culinary talent—everything from charcuterie to barbecue pizza to bread pudding. Participating chefs included Kelly English, Erling Jensen, and Michael Hudman.

The 2014 AFJ Conference continues today and tomorrow, with talks by Melissa Peterson of Edible Memphis and Justin Fox-Burks of the Chubby Vegetarian.

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Nashville’s Kelly English

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Uverse needs to get its sh*t together straight away … unless they know something we don’t know???

Anyway, Kelly English is going to be on Esquire TV’s Knife Fight tomorrow.

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Memphis Gaydar News

Chef John Currence’s Big Gay Mississippi Protest Dinner

John Currence

  • John Currence

Buzzfeed posted a lengthy article by Wyatt Williams yesterday chronicling Oxford, Mississippi chef John Currence’s recent Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table dinner in New York City.

You can read the full article here, but here’s a little background. Last month, the James Beard Award-winning chef from Oxford’s acclaimed City Grocery restaurant was invited by Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant to cook in New York City for a lunch meeting between the Mississippi Development Agency (MDA) and site selectors for major corporations. The goal of the luncheon was to woo these corporations to move some or all of their operations to Mississippi.

But Bryant had recently signed into law Mississippi’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which went into effect on July 1st and provides “that state action shall not substantially burden a person’s right to the exercise of religion.” Critics of the bill fear it will be used to protect business owners who choose to discriminate against LGBT customers by claiming that serving those customers would violate their religious freedom.

Currence has been outspoken about the bill. In a New York Times article, Currence was quoted as saying, “The law sends a terrible message about the state of consciousness in the state of Mississippi. We are not going to sit idly by and watch Jim Crow get revived in our state.”

But rather than turn down Bryant’s invitation to cook for the MDA dinner in New York City, Currence went through with lunch. But he, Memphis chef Kelly English, and a handful of other celebrity chefs scheduled a protest dinner called the Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table the next day in New York City. The Buzzfeed story recounts that affair (hint: Morgan Freeman made an appearance) in splendid detail.

According to Williams’ story, when Bryant got word of Currence’s Big Gay Welcome Table, he wasn’t pleased. Here’s an excerpt:

The response from the governor’s office was swift. The morning the news broke about the Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table, Currence said, “I got a phone call, a dressing down by the governor’s office — they wanted to know why I would embarrass the governor like this. And then it fucking dawned on me: You assholes don’t fucking talk to me like a sixth-grader in the principal’s office, I’m a 50-year-old man. More to the point, I’m on the right fucking side of this thing. All you assholes have to do is come to dinner.”

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Memphis Gaydar News

Cocktails for Equality

Restaurant Iris

  • Restaurant Iris

Chef Kelly English is hosting a cocktail party at Restaurant Iris to raise money for the Tennessee Equality Project’s Political Action Committee on Sunday, May 18th from 5 to 7 p.m.

English will prepare hors d’oeuvres, and the bartenders will create special cocktails for the event. Funds raised will go to help TEP support candidates who support LGBT equality and safe school legislation to prevent bullying of LGBT students.

Tickets are $50 per person or $90 per couple and may be purchased at the door.

Kelly has been an outspoken supporter of LGBT equality. He’s also headlining at the Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table Dinner in New York City on June 13th, along with chefs John Currence of Oxford’s City Grocery and Art Smith, who owns restaurants from Chicago to Atlanta. The chefs are joining forces to oppose Mississippi’s version of the “Turn the Gays Away” bill, which would enable businesses and individuals to refuse services to LGBT citizens on the grounds of religious freedom. Read more about that dinner on Hungry Memphis.

A similar bill was killed in committee in Tennessee earlier this year. Senator Brian Kelsey introduced the bill (and later withdrew his sponsorship), and at the time, English made headlines when he put a message on Facebook offering to host a fund-raiser dinner for anyone who would run against Kelsey in the next election.

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News The Fly-By

Public Goes Private

CREDIT: Toby Sells

Residents around Overton Square may soon get a special permit that would allow them to park in public, on-street parking spaces designated just for them.

The revitalization of the Square has brought thousands of new people and their cars to the area in the past year. Many of those new visitors are parking their cars on the streets around the entertainment district, despite the October opening of the new $16 million parking garage.

This has riled residents around Overton Square who have reported visitors’ cars blocking their driveways and alleyways and some even parked in their yards.  

Toby Sells

“At all times of day and in the evenings, residents are surrounded with people,” said Memphis City Council member Jim Strickland. “Some residents only have access to their [houses] through an alley, and they’ll be blocked. Sometimes it’s in their yards. It’s just a free-for-all.”

Strickland and council member Shea Flinn have been meeting with residents and business owners in the neighborhood to solve the parking problem. Those talks have included the need for crosswalks, better signage for the parking garage, and better lighting in the area overall.

But much of the conversation has centered around establishing a parking permit district for residents around Overton Square.

If approved by the city council, the district would designate some on-street parking spaces just for residents. Residents would have to display special permits to park on certain parts of the streets in the district. Each household could get two permits for residents and up to four permits for visitors. Anyone parking illegally in the district would be ticketed and then towed.  

The permits and special parking zones would be a test case, Strickland said, and would only be for a limited time and for a limited area. Petitions will go out to Overton Square residents in the coming months to determine the boundaries of the district.

The city law establishing the parking district will take at least six weeks to move through the city council’s legislative process.

Chef Kelly English said a crosswalk leading from the parking garage across Cooper to his restaurants, Iris and Second Line, is needed before the parking district is established. Without one, he says he won’t have an “artery to business.” 

“[Customers] are not going to cross that street at 8 o’ clock,” English said. “That’s not going to happen.”

City officials are also looking closely at improvements needed for the area’s sidewalks, said Memphis city engineer John Cameron, especially between the parking garage and Cooper.

“We’re trying to make that corridor more pedestrian-friendly so folks would be more likely to walk from the garage to the businesses over there,” Cameron said. 

Strickland is expected to bring the proposal to the city council next week.

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Memphis Gaydar News

Restaurant Owner Makes Offer To Help Un-seat Brian Kelsey

This morning, Restaurant Iris and Second Line owner/chef Kelly English made an offer that anyone with political ambitions in District 31 might not be able to refuse. English posted that he’ll host a political fund-raiser for whoever opposes Senator Brian Kelsey of Germantown in the next election.

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Kelly’s offer was a response to Kelsey’s bill (SB2566) that would protect religious organizations (both for-profit and non-profit) that choose to deny services or goods in conjunction with a civil union, domestic partnership, or gay marriage. The Tennessee Equality Project has dubbed the bill the “Turn Away the Gays” bill, while Kelsey calls it the “Religious Freedom Act.”

When contacted by the Flyer for a comment on why he’s offering to support Kelsey’s opponent, English said the following: “This is past politics. This is more a point of decency and rights as a human. I can not fathom someone who thinks this is okay to represent myself or our community. I will proudly support any good person opposing this way of thinking.”

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

What a Site

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

From the outside, the building that once housed La Tourelle looks the same. The inside, however, is very different.

Kelly English‘s highly anticipated Restaurant Iris began serving earlier this month, and it might be the most elegant restaurant to open in Memphis in a while. If La Tourelle was a trip to a cozy restaurant in a province of France, Restaurant Iris is a piece of New Orleans dining in Memphis.

English, a New Orleans native and John Besh protégé (Restaurant August, N’awlins, Lüke), didn’t expect to have to bring in forklifts, but what he and designer Jackie Glisson accomplished sans forklifts is an amazing overhaul.

Warm chocolate tones dominate the revamped interior. The front dining rooms have a traditional feel with chairs covered in rich brown fabric embellished with a gold fleur-de-lis, a stylized design of an iris flower. The two back rooms, intended for groups of eight or more, are slightly more casual with light-colored cottage-style chairs. Glisson added some brickwork to the floors, which complements the natural hardwood. English currently lives in the space above the restaurant but plans on renovating the tower room at one point, turning it into a private dining room.

Surprisingly, despite all this elegance, the restaurant doesn’t feel pretentious or stiff. The atmosphere is relaxed, diners can have lively conversations, and waiters don’t speak with a whisper.

The food reflects English’s training and hometown, where you are likely to find grillades with grits and poached eggs on the Sunday brunch menu, pork belly in your omelet, and bread pudding with brown butter and pecans as dessert. While connoisseurs of New Orleans cuisine won’t be disappointed, the restaurant’s menu goes beyond Crescent City favorites. Salads of Brussels sprouts, roasted beets, or organic field greens with grapefruit and horseradish are on the dinner menu, along with American Kobe beef short ribs with celery root, scallops with cauliflower, and rack of venison with shitake and a ragout of baby vegetables.

“Our menu will evolve constantly and change with the seasons,” English says. “I don’t want to be tied down by a certain dish but rather cook with what’s available at the farmers’ market.”

The restaurant is open for dinner only, Wednesday through Sunday from 5 to 10 p.m., and for Sunday brunch from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Restaurant Iris, 2146 Monroe (590-2828)

After Cumberland Presbyterian Church announced plans to move its headquarters from Midtown to Cordova earlier this year, the Atlanta-based fast-food company Chick-Fil-A expressed interest in buying the site to put up a restaurant.

News of the potential demolition of the Gothic Revival building, located at 1978 Union, has caused an outcry in the community, and an effort to save it is being led by Memphis Heritage.

“We are not against Chick-Fil-A and would love to have one of its restaurants in Midtown,” says June West, executive director of Memphis Heritage. “We just don’t want it at the expense of tearing down the historic building.”

West said that until recently Memphis Heritage, together with other concerned members of the community, had a “dialogue” with the company. Memphis Heritage proposed the company look into adaptive reuse of the historic building or possibly find another, less-controversial site in Midtown. About three weeks ago, Chick-Fil-A said it was no longer able to discuss the issue.

“They essentially sent a standardized e-mail that said that once the restaurant is in place, they knew the community would love them and that they have a reputation for being good neighbors,” West says. “That might all be the case, but it doesn’t really have anything to do with wanting to tear down the Cumberland building.”

Representatives from Chick-Fil-A did not respond to requests for comment.

West is urging Memphians to contact the company to protest the decision. More information on the issue can be found at memphisheritage.org.