Two weeks out 'til Tamale time

Posted: Wednesday, October 3, 2018 8:40 am
Kristina Norman [email protected] | 0 comments
A little over two weeks remain until the kickoff of the seventh annual Delta Hot Tamale Festival that will welcome residents and guests who will fill Greenville’s streets. The week of festivities will get started Oct. 18 with the sixth annual gala welcome dinner and book signing with Southern writers and chefs at Belmont Plantation, said Julia Reed, an award winning author and Greenville native, who organizes the event each year. “This is the third year we are having the gala kickoff dinner of the Literary/Culinary Mashup at Belmont, which has been a great partner to us,” she said. “We are so blessed to have this plantation house so close to the city limits.”

Attendees at the ticketed event will be treated to a three-course dinner prepared by notable chefs from the Southern region of the United States, hors d’oeuvres, specialty cocktails, a live auction, cigar bar, dancing and live music.Chefs for this year’s dinner include Donald Link, of the Link Restaurant Group; Jason Goodenough, of Carrollton Market; Kristen Essig, of Coquette; Mason Hereford, of Turkey and the Wolf; Rebecca Wilcomb and David Rouse, of Herbsaint; and Billy Jones, of Cochon. They will be joined by the Delta’s own Cole Ellis, of Delta Meat Market, and Hugh Balthrop, of Sweet Magnolia Gelato Co. “We have a lot of beloved chefs who have been here before, like Donald Link, who has an enormous and fabulous empire of restaurants in New Orleans,” Reed said. “Kristen is one of the new ones and Mason Hereford is coming for the second year. He and Kristen will compete along with some others in the celebrity chef category we do on the main stage Saturday.”

Every year Reed said she tries to have a theme that the chefs can focus the dinner around. “Our theme of Delta Hunt and Harvest was so popular we’re doing it again,” Reed said. “Jason Goodenough, who made the amazing duck entree last year, is doing stuffed quail. We’ll have a nod to the mighty catfish and other game and Delta products.” Without the support of the chefs though, the event would not be possible, Reed said. “The chefs really love coming and we are pleased and so grateful because they come on their own dime and donate the food,” she said. The night’s auction will feature items for bid that include a duck hunt with Delta sportsman and writer Hank Burdine, a New Orleans trip and artwork.

The week will continue Oct. 19 with panel discussions and lunch, set to begin at 10 a.m. with a Bloody Mary bar at E.E. Bass Cultural Arts Center, 323 Main St. Friday’s event will include a lunch catered by Allen Sanders, executive chef of Downtown Grille, from noon to 1 p.m. Having events like the welcome dinner and mashup help keep people around Greenville for more than one day, Reed said. “One of the reasons I, along with a whole lot of great volunteers, worked so hard to add the mashup to the festival, is so that people would have a reason to stay in town,” she said. Throughout the day, panels comprised of chefs, artists and authors will cover topics such as Southern cuisine, the intertwining history of the blues and tamales, Greenville’s rich cultural, literary history and art focusing on Delta landscapes. Reed will sign copies of her latest book “South Toward Home, Adventures and Misadventures in my Native Land,” as will Burdine of his book “Dust in the Road: Reflections of a Delta Boy.”

2018 Celebrity Chef and Author Line-Up:

John Alexander, a painter who has exhibited extensively in the U.S. and around the world;
Hugh Balthrop, founder and creative director of Clarksdale-based Sweet Magnolia Gelato Co.;
William N. Beckwith, a Greenville native and sculptor who apprenticed at age 14 under Leon Koury;
Roy Blount, Jr., an author, humorist, panelist on the hit National Public Radio show “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!” and columnist for Garden & Gun magazine;
William Dunlap, a Mississippi native, artist, writer, noted curator, lecturer, and journalist who has contributed to many national magazines and books;
Cole Ellis, a Cleveland native and owner of Delta Meat Market;
Kristen Essig, a New Orleans-based chef who is co-chef and partner with Michael Stoltzfus. Both were 2018 James Beard Award finalists in the Best Chef in the South category;
Huger Foote, a photographer with deep Delta roots who was born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee;
Sara Foster, chef and co-owner of Foster’s Market, a gourmet food market and cafe in Durham and Chapel Hill, North Carolina;
Jason Goodenough, chef of the Carrollton Market in Uptown New Orleans named the 2017 Chef of the Year by New Orleans magazine;
Jessica Harris, a noted author, culinary historian, retired professor of English at Queens College in New York and the founder of the Institute for the Study of Culinary Cultures at Dillard University in New Orleans;
Mason Hereford, owner of Turkey and the Wolf, a New Orleans sandwich shop that was chosen best new restaurant of 2017 by Bon Appetit magazine;
John Huey, former editor-in-chief of Time Inc., and contributor to both Southern Living and Garden & Gun;
Billy Jones, the Chef de Cuisine at Cochon in New Orleans, a James Beard Award-winning restaurant that is part of the Link Restaurant Group;
Donald Link, a James Beard Award winner, executive chef and CEO of the Link Restaurant Group, which includes Herbsaint, Cochon, Cochon Butcher, Peche, and La Boulangerie;
Beverly Lowry, an author and novelist with Greenville roots;
Kim Sunée, a New Orleans-raised, Anchorage, Alaska-based author and food columnist for the Alaska Dispatch;
Malcolm White, executive director of the Mississippi Arts Commission, former director of the Mississippi Development Authority’s Tourism Division and co-founder of Hal and Mal’s restaurant in Jackson; and
Rebecca Wilcomb, the chef de cuisine at Herbsaint restaurant in New Orleans and the 2016 James Beard Award Winner for Best Chef South. She was also the 2015 winner of the Delta Hot Tamale Festival in the Celebrity Chef category.

A limited number of tickets are still available for both the dinner, which costs $185, and the mashup, which are available for $60.
To purchase tickets, visit https://www.mainstreetgreenville.com/literaryculinary-mash-up.html