Last Sunday, I had the awesome opportunity to volunteer at Cochon 555 - 5 Chefs, 5 Pigs, 5 Winemakers. The event took place at the Mandarin Oriental, and it was A WHOLE LOTTA PIG! I got to meet the Cochon 555 Team and all the great chefs, but most importantly, I got to eat some really delicious food!
So what is Cochon 555?
As the event title suggests, the competition invites 5 chefs to create interesting dishes using 5 pigs (one pig per chef) paired with 5 wines. Although the chefs are always a big deal, the purpose of the competition is to promote awareness around heritage breed pigs. Brady Lowe, the founder, believes that consumers should support local farmers and have the option to choose sustainable (and tasty) food. The chefs participate to support and join Brady in his cause, and of course, compete for a chance to win a spot in Grand Cochon, the ultimate pork showdown at the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen. (I posted a video in my previous post if you are interested in learning more!)
The 5 chefs invited from Boston were:
- Barry Maiden from Hungry Mother
- Barbara Lynch from Menton/No. 9 Park
- Jamie Bissonnette from Coppa/Toro
- Tim Cushman from O Ya
- Steve “Nookie” Postal from Fenway Park
If I couldn’t volunteer, I was still going to attend, even at $125 for general admission. Five power chefs at one location/one event? Uh, like, there was NO WAY I was missing that. Luckily, volunteering was a free ticket with some awesome perks!
The Rundown: Being “Super Volunteer”
Starting bright and early at 9am (on a Sunday), my job was to be Heather’s assistant. Here she is:
Heather Craig is one of the co-founders and Cochon’s designer. She created all the signage/shirt designs and does a lot of the branding & marketing for the event. So you get an idea, here are some cute signs she made for the after party:
I was in charge of her signage in terms of setup and placement, and assisted her whenever she needed anything. It was pretty awesome when she would give me downtime and encourage me to go eat, nom nom nom, which I did a lot of, of course.
The FOOOOOOD!
That ramekin pictured above, my friends, contains lard ice cream. Yes, LARD ice cream. Remember, the chefs use the whole pig. I can’t say I ate the whole portion (due to caloric disgust), but I enjoyed it very much - tasted a lot like clotted cream! I think the lunch plate, from Barry Maiden (Hungry Mother), was creatively designed and had some winning dishes to write home about, but the others were a bit subpar.
Jamie Bissonnette (Coppa/Toro) did a Vietnamese theme with Pork Belly Pho, Banh Mi, Vietnamese Sausage, etc., and took the trophy home for the night. Maybe it’s because I’m Asian and hail from Los Angeles, but I was not particularly impressed with the menu. It was definitely very tasty, but kind of hard for me to appreciate as much as the judges/everyone else did because… well, I’ve had better - the real Vietnamese stuff. Unfortunately, there aren’t too many Vietnamese places in Boston, so I understand if other people found it to be deliciously novel. But Jamie Biss deserved it - everything on the plate tasted great, and I can never get enough of Toro!
Sadly, Barbara Lynch ran out of food before I could visit her table, and Steve Postal’s dishes were classic “man food” meat dishes. Tim Cushman’s dishes were elegant (his menus were printed on dried pig skin!), but like Maiden, I didn’t think everything was stellar (especially the bland noodles…).
Besides the chef creations, there was SO MUCH CHEESE and never-ending/flowing alcohol of wine, beer, and bourbon. By the end of the night, there was a woman who was dancing candidly (and drunkenly) in the middle of the ballroom. One of my favorite activities of the event, though, was the Le Creuset “Guess Five Ingredient Challenge.” You were given a spoonful and had to guess the 5 main ingredients.
So there were some obvious ones like the beans, but boy was I off! Of course it’s definitely harder to guess what the ingredients were just from looking at the photo, but even a blind tasting was pretty difficult. Ingredients were the following:
- Pork belly
- Chicken
- Bone marrow
- Cannellini beans
- Stock/broth
I had guessed beans, pork, broth, butter, and chili pepper flakes. Apparently 3 entrants were dead on; they must have awesome palates or really good eyes (I didn’t notice the chicken bones in the pot).
Highlight of Connie’s Night
The best part of my night (over the food, the alcohol, the excitement) though, was meeting John Kessen again.
John is one of the owners of Hungry Mother and the coolest maitre d’ ever! Jonathan and I ate at Hungry Mother a while back, and we sat in the bar area near the entrance. I got there early to get seats and take advantage of the dinner & movie deal, so John conversed with me since Jonathan was running late. It’s also a bit hard to miss the little Asian couple at restaurants sometimes, so John came back to check on us, cracked some jokes, and recognized our faces at Cochon! The fact that he remembered us made us giddy since we LOVE Hungry Mother. And it never hurts to know someone who owns one of your favorite restaurants.
Closing Time: The End of the Night
The event ended at 8pm, but Jonathan and I stayed around to help clean up. Volunteers were also invited to the after party at KO Prime, but we had a long day, fun nonetheless, but ready to knock out. Heather enjoyed working with us so much that she generously sent us home with some parting gifts:
And we left with some cute matching “Mr./Ms. Delicious” shirts:
And, of course, some happy and full tummies.
Thinking about it more, I’m really really glad I got a chance to participate in something like this. It got me thinking, running a food event/festival would be equally just as satisfying as opening my own restaurant. I love running events, planning, organizing… and food - maybe this would be a great direction for my future interests. It would definitely be great to have an opportunity one day to jump on the food tour bandwagon, meet great chefs, and eat amazing food every weekend. Being a part of Cochon 555 has been such a great experience especially by opening my eyes to new ideas. If Cochon 555 is in your city, definitely go check it out - consider volunteering! The team is truly awesome to work with. For more information and tickets, check out the official Cochon 555 website. Until next year!
Jonathan volunteering at the merch table!
*Thanks Huge for the photos! You can find more Cochon photos on the official Cochon 555 Flickr page here.