Buy Your Tickets Today for Taste of Atlanta October 25-27

No need to list your credentials, Taste of Atlanta. We know all about the legendary festival featuring over 90 restaurants and four live cooking stages. We dream about the VIP food-wine-cocktail experience all year long, so we're eagerly awaiting the culinary sprawl to take over Tech Square Friday, October 25 through Sunday, October 27. We're looking forward to the barcraft competition, the Big Green Egg Grilling Experience, the Family Food Zone, workshops, cookbook signings, silent auction and so much more. We'll be on the lookout for some of our favorite chefs and mixologists from participating restaurants such as Alma Cocina, Article 14, Der Biergarten, Glenn's Kitchen, Gunshow, JCT. Kitchen & Bar, King + Duke, Lure, Milton's Cuisine & Cocktails, No. 246, The Optimist and Seven Lamps. A variety of ticket options are available online priced from $30 each on up. Buy now. Chances are there won't be leftovers.

The Attack is Back! Tickets Now on Sale!

The weather is warming up and pollen is in the air, so that means that JCT. Kitchen & Bar is anticipating a killer tomato harvest come Sunday, July 21 when Chef Ford Fry hosts the 5^th Annual JCT. Kitchen Attack of the Killer Tomato Festival to benefit Georgia Organics. Local farmers and 33 featured chefs pair up to create tomato dishes, 14 mixologists shake up vine-tingling tomato cocktails, and high-profile judges choose favorites while about 1,400 guests nosh and drink up all of that fruit-of-the-vine goodness. Live entertainment comes by way of the Spazmatics and local chef band Five Bone Rack. Purchase your tickets now for the 1-5 p.m. festival then relax until July's bountiful harvest. Tickets cost $55 per person and $50 for Georgia Organics members until June 30 and then increase to $70 per person on July 1.

Atlanta Magazine Stirs Up March Madness with Final Fork Voting

    

Before basketball brackets start making their way around the office, cast your vote for your favorite Atlanta restaurant in Atlanta magazine's Final Fork competition. The tournament started with 64 of Atlanta's top restaurants divided into four categories - "Gastropubs and Bars," "High Rollers," "Global Eats" and "Southern, Dressed Up or Down Home." Help your picks advance by voting for Round 2 contenders by 11 p.m. on Thursday, March 14. Our personal picks to go all the way include JCT. Kitchen & Bar, The Optimist and South City Kitchen.
Final round of voting concludes at 11 p.m. on Thursday, April 11. To vote, sign up to be an Atlanta magazine Insider. Each week you vote, you'll be entered to win one of four $100 gift certificates to the Final Fork restaurant of your choice. One grand-prize winner will score a Big Green Egg smoker and a bottle of Richland Rum.

Dine at JCT. Kitchen & Bar, No. 246 or The Optimist on Feb.9 to Benefit Team Hidi

On Saturday, February 9, JCT. Kitchen & Bar, No. 246 and The Optimist are hosting a Ryan Hidinger Benefit. That night, 5 percent of dinner service profits will be donated to Team Hidi to help cover medical expenses. 

The restaurants are unified in their quest to help one of Atlanta's own chefs, Ryan Hidinger, fight stage 4 gallbladder cancer. Ryan and wife Jen, both of Staplehouse, are grateful for the support they've received from all across the country. 

Read more about Team Hidi here.

Chef Ford Fry Hosts Lunch Break for Kids Fundraiser on October 18 for Childhood Nutrition Education

Chef Ford Fry is a firm believer that brain food begins with power-packed lunches. He's joining 75 chefs nationwide, the makers of Hidden Valley Original Ranch and the American Culinary Federation's Chef & Child Foundation in a national,weeklong effort to raise money for nutrition-based education materials for kids and families. Last year's Lunch Break for Kids effort was so successful, it's back for seconds. 

On Thursday, October 18 from 11 a.m.-2:30 p.m., dine in or grab lunch to go at JCT. Kitchen & Bar, and your lunch money will help generate nutrition education resources for schools and community centers. The goal is to encourage families to eat healthier, include more vegetables on their menus and build healthy family ties over the table. More national event information and recipes are online. Tweet with your mouth full at #LunchBreakForKids.

Southern Food Tour Features JCT. Kitchen & Bar, The Optimist and American Spirit Whiskey

On Thursday, October 11, four of Atlanta's best chefs will pour on their Southern culinary charm for the Southern Food Tour, a guided walking tour aimed at building awareness and community around Southern food heritage. 

Ford Fry of JCT. Kitchen & Bar, Adam Evans of The Optimist, Anne Quatrano of Bacchanalia and Linton Hopkins of Restaurant Eugene are all participating. Each chef will prepare one of their restaurant's most iconic Southern dishes and will share their unique stories of what Southern food means to them. 

The chefs also will pair their dish with a whiskey cocktail from American Spirit Whiskey. Space is limited to 30 guests; tickets are $200 per person and are available online. More info on Facebook.

Enjoy All the Tastes of Atlanta This Weekend

Streetwise advice for the October 5-7 weekend is to move your mojo to Midtown for Taste of Atlanta surrounding Tech Square. Bantam + Biddy, Ecco, Kaleidoscope Bistro & Pub, JCT. Kitchen & Bar, No. 246, The Optimist and Ray's Restaurants are a few of the more than 80 restaurants participating in the big foodie and sampling festival. Chill out with chefs, cocktails and grills gone wild at "The Big Grill" Friday night party at Tech Square. American Spirit Whiskey will shake up cocktails, beer and wine will flow and more than 20 restaurants will be represented at the kick-off event, including Ecco, JCT. Kitchen & Bar, No. 246 and The Optimist.

There's excitement brewing on the Home Plate Main Stage Saturday and Sunday as chefs go spoon to spoon. See Ecco's Craig Richards at 1:45 p.m. and No. 246's Drew Belline at 3 p.m. Saturday. JCT. Kitchen & Bar's Ford Fry will hit the stage Sunday at 12:30 p.m. for "Food that Rocks." The Optimist's Adam Evans will be in The Kitchen Workshop on Saturday at 1:15 p.m. followed by The Cook's Warehouse's Mary Moore at 4 p.m.  Will Harris of White Oak Pastures and Lance Gummere of Bantam + Biddy will lead a poultry session on Sunday at 1:15 p.m. Kaleidoscope Bistro & Pub Chef Joey Riley tackles tailgating by building steak sandwiches at 1 p.m. Saturday in The Grill Dome. Some events are over-21 only, but most are family friendly, including the Family Food Zone, which sizzles with fun classes and activities for all ages. Purchase tickets here.

And the Top Tomato Honors Go To...

Photo By Gerlinda Grimes

This year's Attack of the Killer Tomato Festival, held on July 22 at JCT. Kitchen & Bar, was another smash hit! Creative juices flowed, and several chefs and mixologists were especially victorious in the quest for top tomato honors. Judges' Choice and Fan Favorite awards went to Donald Sargent of Morelli's Gourmet Ice Cream & Desserts for Best Dish. Paul Calvert of Pura Vida took home the Judges' Choice for Best Cocktail while Miles Macquarrie of Leon's Full Service won Fan Favorite for Best Cocktail. In a tough tie, Sprig and H&F Bottle Shop share recognition as Best Booth.

Don’t Miss Chef Ford Fry and Executive Sous Chef Tony Ballester Cookin’ It Up At The Farmer’s Markets

While you’re shopping for fresh farm food from this week’s farmers markets you’ll have the chance to see two of Atlanta’s tastiest chefs in action. Executive Sous Chef Tony Ballester of The Optimist and Ford Fry of JCT. Kitchen & Bar, No. 246 and The Optimist are stepping outside their kitchens for an extra hit of vitamin D. Ballester will be stepping into the show-me-how booth at the East Atlanta Village Farmers Market on Thursday, July 19. Across town, Fry will rise early Saturday morning, July 21, to get ready for his 10 a.m. demo at the Peachtree Road Farmers Market in Buckhead. Why choose? You don’t have to miss either -- shop both farmers markets this week!

The Plot Thickens This Week As JCT. Kitchen Attack Of The Killer Tomato Festival Strikes On July 22

Such a juicy storyline: bushels of real tomatoes give in to the hands of a united front of 37 star Southern chefs, 12 maniacal mixologists and 30+ farmers whose toiling enables the whole coup. The victors? Georgia Organics, beneficiary of the fourth annual JCT. Kitchen Attack of the Killer Tomato Festival, and tomato devotees. 

The event will spill out of headquarters at JCT. Kitchen & Bar and into the Westside Provisions District complex on Sunday, July 22 from 1-5 p.m. Purchase tickets online through Xorbia for $70 per person. 

Last year’s event raised almost $40,000 for Georgia Organics, and Ford Fry, owner/chef of JCT. Kitchen & Bar, No. 246 and The Optimist, hopes this year’s event will grow even more greens for the group. 

The festival is ripe for people watching as judges include Garden & Gun Deputy Editor Dave Mezz, Esquire Restaurant Features Writer John Mariani, Food & Wine Associate Food Editor Daniel Gritzer and actor David Miller, who played Mason Dixon in the original “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes” movie. Co-masters of ceremonies are Angie Mosier, food writer, stylist and photographer, and Carolyn O’Neil, registered dietician, author and food journalist. Jump to live entertainment from The Spazmatics and local chef band Five Bone Rack. 

Get more juice on participating chefs, etc. at www.killertomatofest.com!