(STOCKBRIDGE, Mass.) – The ever-popular Berkshire Cure-All annual dinner at the James Beard Foundation, curated by executive chef Brian Alberg of The Red Lion Inn, is featured in a new TV series of performance-based half-hour programs entitled “Chefs of the James Beard House,” which began airing on Gusto TV in Canada on March 28. The series, produced by Tanners Beach Productions, will give viewers an exclusive, behind-the-scenes glimpse of chefs as they present their cooking styles at the prestigious James Beard Foundation in New York City.
The Berkshire Cure-All episode, filmed at the Beard House in 2013, will debut on April 18 and 19. This episode will feature executive chef Brian Alberg plus Stephen Browning, chef at Prairie Whale (Great Barrington); Terry Moore, chef-owner of The Old Mill (South Egremont); Jamie Paxton, chef at The Meat Market (Great Barrington); Daire Rooney, chef at Allium (Great Barrington); Dan Smith, chef-owner of John Andrews Farmhouse Restaurant (South Egremont); and Zee Vassos, chef at Firefly (Lenox).
To complement this foray into the Canadian television market, The Red Lion Inn has produced a 60-second commercial which will air on Gusto TV more than two dozen times throughout the series. ‘A New Berkshires Food Scene: The Red Lion Inn Chef’s Guide’ is part of a video series entitled ‘This is My Backyard. This is My Berkshires.,’ and features executive chef Brian Alberg and the Berkshires as his inspiration. The video series was produced in partnership with online travel guide Find.Eat.Drink. and can be viewed at “A New Berkshires Food Scene: The Red Lion Inn Chef’s Guide’ .
In addition, The Red Lion Inn is participating in a contest in association with Gusto TV to promote the series. Winners of “Win a Culinary Adventure” will receive a trip to New York City, where they will experience a dinner at The Greenwich Project and meet chef Carmine Di Giovanni from the episode La Vie en Rose. Winners will then travel to Stockbridge, Mass., where they will meet executive chef Brian Alberg, have dinner and stay at The Red Lion Inn overnight. iTravel2000 will provide the flights to NYC and the accommodations in NYC.
Gusto TV, Canada’s newest food and lifestyle specialty channel featuring some of the highest-rated shows from around the world, is currently in the homes of more than 2.5 million subscribers across Canada, the Massachusetts Office of Travel & Tourism’s (MOTT) number-one market for attracting visitors. The airing of the Berkshire Cure-All episode, one of 14 scheduled shows, will complement MOTT’s tourism-based efforts and help tell the story of food culture and the long history of farm-to-table commitments in the region.
Through successful marketing efforts, Berkshire Farm & Table, an organization working to promote the region as a source and destination for food, was instrumental in drawing media attention to the Berkshire Cure-All and in helping to coordinate the production crew for the episode.
The Berkshire Cure-All Dinner attracted the television production company because it features a collective of talented Berkshire chefs representing various seasonally inspired restaurants in the region. Each year, they set out to preserve foods during harvest season to present this dinner in the winter months. Most dinners at the James Beard Foundation focus on one chef or one restaurant.
“Chefs of the James Beard House” captures 14 vastly different performances spotlighting chefs showcasing their culinary skills. On Saturday, March 28 at 7 p.m., the Gusto TV series kicked off with a team of women chefs from Newfoundland lead by Chef Roary MacPherson from the Sheraton Hotel in St. John’s.
About The Red Lion Inn
The Red Lion Inn (c. 1773), a charter member of Historic Hotels of America, has been providing food and lodging to guests for over two centuries. With the addition of Maple Glen, its ninth Village Guest House, the Inn offers 125 antique-filled rooms and suites, four restaurants with traditional and casual dining with locally sourced food, a gift shop featuring locally made items, a pub with nightly entertainment and a full range of amenities including WiFi, a year-round heated outdoor pool, and in-room massage therapy. The Inn is recommended by Condé Nast Traveler, National Geographic Traveler, The New York Times, The Boston Globe and Trip Advisor. The Red Lion Inn is located at 30 Main Street, Stockbridge, Mass., and is part of the Main Street Hospitality Group family of hotels. For more information, contact 413.298.5545 or visit The Red Lion Inn.
About The James Beard Foundation
Founded in 1986, the James Beard Foundation‘s (JBF) mission is to celebrate, nurture and honor America’s diverse culinary heritage through programs that educate and inspire. A cookbook author and teacher with an encyclopedic knowledge about food, James Beard, who died in 1985, was a champion of American cuisine. He helped educate and mentor generations of professional chefs and food enthusiasts, instilling in them the value of wholesome, healthful and delicious food. Today JBF continues in the same spirit by administering a number of diverse programs that include educational initiatives, food industry awards, scholarships for culinary students, publications, chef advocacy training and thought-leader convening. The Foundation also maintains the historic James Beard House in New York City’s Greenwich Village as a “performance space” for chefs.
In September of 2012, JBF launched the Diplomatic Culinary Partnership with the U.S. Department of State’s Office of Protocol and helped create the American Chef Corps as a way to champion American chefs abroad, promote American food products and foster an interest in American culinary culture and history through international programs and initiatives. One such project is the next World’s Fair, Expo Milano 2015, for which the James Beard Foundation is co-leading the effort for the State Department to design and produce the USA Pavilion, a global gathering of 147 countries addressing the challenges of how we will feed ourselves in the future. The Pavilion will showcase America’s contributions to global food security and gastronomy in a pavilion themed American Food 2.0: United to Feed the Planet. Find insights on food at the James Beard Foundation’s blog Delights & Prejudices and follow JBF on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.