by Staff
Chefs from Northeast Florida and South Georgia have joined forces to create a cookbook, Greater Jacksonville’s Award Winning Recipes, featuring over 100 recipes from the region’s top chefs.
The idea for the cookbook originated with Herbert Burgin, cookbook co-chairman and executive chef at San Jose Country Club.
“I was, at the time, membership chair for local American Culinary Federation chapter and we wanted to do something to bring more members into our organization,” said Burgin. “One way is for us to have a project to reach out to other chefs who were not members and expose them to what we were doing.”
Each recipe is accompanied by a photo of the chef, a brief description of his or her history and a photo of the dish, giving readers an idea of how it should be presented. “A lot of the dishes are ones that we used in the past in competitions and that won an award at one competition or another,” said JayVee Viger of Café Athena, who has a recipe featured in the cookbook. “Also, it’s part of our brotherhood of chefs in the North Florida area and we all stick together. When we do a project like this, it is important that all of us get involved because that’s the only way we can keep things going.”
Burgin agreed: “It kind of appeals to their ego to be featured in a book, so we asked them to be in it and then brought them an application to join the group.”
Burgin said about 3,000 books were printed and about 1,200 have been sold.
“I understand that we ran out of the hardback copies early on and now we are selling the paperback,” he said, adding there is a possibility of either a revision of the same book or a new cookbook in a year or two.
“The first job is getting the cookbook done, the second is getting it sold,” said Burgin. “So now we are planning events where we can introduce the book to the public. We gave a copy to Mayor John Delaney, Gov. Jeb Bush and Edward Leonard, president of the National American Culinary Federation. We are going to try to give one to Oprah Winfrey to get national exposure.”
The cookbooks are available at B. Dalton Bookstores, Barnes & Noble Booksellers, the T-U Center and Café Athena for $37.50. Proceeds from the book are being donated to Kids Cafe, the I.M. Sulzbacher Center for the Homeless, Children’s Home Society and the Culinary Apprenticeship Program.
The book is divided into appetizers, soups, salads, entrees, desserts and other regional favorites.
Appetizers recipes include hirami by David Medure, who is chef de cuisine at Medure’s in Ponte Vedra Beach, and plantain crusted diver scallops by Timothy Turner, the sous chef at Terrace Restaurant at The Lodge.
Soup recipes include she crab soup by Kevin Phebus, who is the executive chef at The University Club.
Salad recipes include a roasted pepper with grilled portobello salad with pesto by Viger of Café Athena and Florida-style blackened wahoo spinach salad by Charles Stewart, the executive chef at Hidden Hills Country Club.
Entree recipes include cashew crusted grouper with lime beurre blanc by Robert Wilson of the Tree Steak House in Mandarin.