FeastivALL beautifully pairs past, present

Roasted quail with risotto and carrots from FeastivALL at the University of Charleston

New Haystax coming to Charleston, Casa Garcia reopens in SC

This year’s FeastivALL dinner was another lively party, with a well-lubricated crowd enjoying delightful food, live entertainment and both silent and live auctions during the annual beer-and-wine pairing fundraiser for FestivALL.

Trout cake with ramp remoulade

And the menu during Saturday night’s celebration struck just the right chord, presenting traditional Appalachian recipes in elegantly modern presentations for nearly 250 guests inside the University of Charleston’s ballroom.

During a special reception before the event, VIP ticket holders were treated to a special welcome reception featuring tasty bites (that grilled steak crostini with creamy horseradish and caramelized onion!) from talented Chef Ke, marking her first return to catering since giving birth to a beautiful baby girl just a month ago.

The dinner itself started with a duo of communion wafers passed family-style: one topped with black walnut farmer’s cheese, bourbon-sage apple butter and toasted sage, and the other (my favorite) featuring a wedge of black pepper farmhouse bologna dolloped with six-pepper chow-chow from talented James Beard semifinalist Mike Costello and Amy Dawson from Lost Creek Farms.

Buttermilk cornbread soup with bacon

After a hearty trout cake with zesty ramp remoulade from Chef Madi Risk from Coco’s Kitchen + Cafe and a creamy buttermilk cornbread soup topped with crispy white beans, smoky bacon and onion from Chef Mandy Gum of Carver Culinary Arts, the night’s entrée featured miniature stuffed quails with Benton’s country ham risotto, heirloom carrots and red-eye jus from University of Charleston Executive Chef Seth Samples.

Quail was a bold choice for the fancy evening’s main course, with some guests trying to attack it with knife and fork, while others just picked up to gnaw meat straight off the bone. While my quail was considerably smaller and a bit overcooked, my wife’s portion was larger, juicier and delicious.

The definitely culinary highlight of the night for me, though, was Costello and Dawson’s showstopping Flossie Hannah’s old-fashioned vinegar pie with maple whipped cream and West Virginia salt.

Flossie Hannah's old-fashioned vinegar pie

Costello told guests that recipe was some 100 years old, created back in a time when homestead cooks used vinegar to mimic the taste of fresh lemons, which weren’t readily available. And it was, in a word, phenomenal. Bright, mildly sweet and not overly tart with a textbook-perfect crust.

Guests were given recipe cards for every course served Saturday night and Flossie Hannah’s fabulous pie is totally going into my baking rotation at home.

Oh, and as for the big “beer vs. wine” competition? It seemed to take a little bit of a backseat to the food this year, with pairings not consistently served with each course, but the verdict at the end of the night?

Beer and wine tasting notes at FeastivALL

Bridge Brew Long Point Lager handily beat Stoneleigh Sauvignon Blanc for the trout cake course, with Domaines des Maisons Brouilly wine topping Jackie O’s See Foam beer during the cornbread soup course.

Bella Glos Balade Pinot Noir edged out New Trail Crisp Amber beer with the quail, but beer was back on top again with High Ground Mamaw’s Gingerbread Stout beating out Bonanza Lot 1 Cellar Door Chardonnay.

When all was said and drunk, it was beer winning the night by a close 33 votes over wine.

And as someone who voted the same way in three of the four pairings, I’ll drink to that!

New Haystax restaurant coming to Charleston

According to a sign posted at 700 Virginia St. E. in downtown Charleston, a new restaurant called Haystax is opening inside the former location of Loopy Leaf this April. Promising “something better,” the sign says guests will be able to build their own bowls their way in thousands of combinations to create something fast, healthy and flavorful.

What kinds of bowls and flavors remains to be seen, but the new business was registered with the WV Secretary of State’s office in December to Charleston resident Brenda Francis. (Brenda, if you’re out there, we’d all love to know what’s in store. Give me a call!)

That location at the corner of Virginia and Summers streets has seen a fair number of restaurants come and go through the years, so here’s hoping we finally find something that sticks there.

Casa Garcia reopens in South Charleston

Three months after closing its longtime location at Riverwalk Mall in South Charleston, Casa Garcia Mexican Restaurant has reopened in a really nice-looking, renovated space just a mile or so down the road at 4843 MacCorkle Ave. SW.

The new location is open daily from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. For more information, call 304-720-1587 or visit the restaurant’s Facebook page.

Steven Keith is a food writer and restaurant critic known as “The Food Guy” who writes a weekly column for the Charleston Gazette-Mail and has appeared in several state, regional and national culinary publications. Follow him online at www.wvfoodguy.com or on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest as “WV Food Guy.” He can be reached at 304-380-6096 or at wvfoodguy@aol.com.