Cochon 555 LA Recap, Coming to SF 4/27

 

Earlier this year the traveling food festival, Cochon 555, swept into LA (well, Santa Monica) and left a trail of porky goodness. It heads up to San Francisco this Saturday, April 27.

Cochon 555 focuses on heritage pigs and taps 5 chefs to showcase their skills in each city. Held this year at the Fairmont Miramar in Santa Monica, the hotel’s restaurant Fig and chef Ray Garcia hosted chefs from Comme Ca (Las Vegas), B&B (Las Vegas), Short Order and Craft. Guest chefs also participated. Local butchers Lindy and Grundy showcased some of their pork cuts for sale.

 

Chef Ray Garcia of Fig served up chilaquiles, tamales, coctel, huraches, paletas and horchata. Yes, even the “coctel” which usually is seafood was pork.

 

I loved the chilaquiles and friends enjoyed the hurache. It’s probably the most gourmet hurache I’ve ever seen.

One of the Minty Hot Bartenders John Paul Romeo works at the bar at Fig. For Cochon 555 he competed with four others for the title of Punch King.

 

 

Each of the 5 punches featured Breckenridge bourbon. Another Minty Hot Bartender Paul Sanguinetti of the Patina Group won the competition.

 

Ah, now I know what shaving pork jowl looks like…

 

 

Besides mezcal tastings and punches, Goose Island craft beer was in the house. I got to taste all five offerings they brought to Cochon 555 including their Honker’s Ale, 312 and India Pale Ale. I was also very excited to try Matilda and Sofie. The beer really helped cut the richness of some of pork offerings of the day. Actually, it was best to go beer first then follow up with punches with the sweets and desserts.

 

Chef Ray England from Craft brought some amazing tasty bites as well. His deviled ham served with pork rind chips were my favorite.

 

B&B Ristorante in Vegas brought not only charcuterie but a myriad of dishes. Every time I turned around, there was something new to eat. You might think a food fest with only 5 chefs would be a small event but in actuality, there’s better quality food and more than enough to eat.

 

Local chef Christian Page from Short Order also followed the “aha, I got something else for you now” rule. We kept swinging by for tidbits including pork macarons!

 

Comme Ca’s Chef Brian Howard (Las Vegas) served a cute plate that included a hot toddy, tagine, “face bacon” rillettes as well as a pork sausage done “Coney Island” style. It was incredible the thought that went into this plate.

 

Throughout the food fest, special guest chefs arrived with a signature dish. I caught Chef Walter Manzke from Republique doing pork tartare with uni. It you know where your pork is coming from, it is safe to consume raw pork. But just to be on the safe side, more mezcal shots?

 

Cochon 555

buy tickets for Cochon 555 in SF

 

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