12 Mile Meal Announces Celebrity Chefs for Battle at Northampton Jazz Fest 2012

We have our contestants for the 12 Mile Meal Celebrity Chef Throw Down at Northampton Jazz Festival on Saturday September 15th 2012 at the ready. Our defending champs from Eclipse Restaurant will be battling the chefs from Jake’s Restaurant and the chefs from Bistro Les Gras.

Zach Gorman and Kevin Doubleday are our defending champions from Eclipse Restaurant as they won the best appetizer, best entree and over all champion awards in 2011. Even though Kevin is no longer working at Eclipse we are hopeful that the team will reunite to defend their title. Please go to our post on this blog which shows a wonderful video about Eclipse winning last year’s event by film maker Molly Koch.

Alex Washut and Chris Ware have revamped Jake’s Restaurant with bright food that is fresh, fun and fabulous. These guys put the local in local food and local economy as they both are home spun boys who grew up together here in Northampton and have been best buds since they started kindergarten up at Ryan Road School. They are using locally produced foods in their delightful cuisine and are hoping to grow more relationships with local farmers and wild food gatherers as they just opened this past winter.

Daniel and Elizabeth Martinez from Bistro Les Gras, the French gourmet restaurant on West Street in Northampton across from Forbes Library, has at its core philosophy the tenets of 12 Mile Meal’s vision and purpose. This husband and wife team has been serving wonderful locally produced French fine dining with much of their cuisine coming from within a 12 mile radius, keeping dollars in the local economy. And, those foods that are coming in from longer distances aren’t far beyond as you would be hard pressed to find an ingredient produced more than 100 miles from their West Street kitchen. They have also recently opened a lovely sandwich shop on Pleasant street in Northampton called Grub to glowing reviews.

Obviously we have an exciting match-up this year that will match the talent and power of our first 12 Mile Meal Chef Battle at Jazz Fest 2011 when Eclipse, Fitzwilly’s and Spoleto Restaurants went head to head in a great display of skill. We thank our last year’s contestants for their participation and sponsorship. We look forward to their continued support and to the Chef Battle this September 15th at Jazz Fest between Eclipse, Jake’s and Bistro Les Gras. Mark your calendars and we will see you there.