Franklin Eighth in NYC Holiday House

 I hope you had a chance to visit Holiday House in New York City.  If so, you had the good fortune of seeing the beautiful ladies lounge designed by my friend, Sarah Sarna, and her business partner, Tina Ramchandani, the design duo behind the new Franklin Eighth design firm of New York City.  

[continue reading….]

Thanksgiving Thankful!

Via

Thanksgiving has come and gone, but my feeling of thankfulness remains abundantly present.  I decided to take a break this week and focus on my family, hence no blog post since Monday.  My mother has been sick, so we traveled a day early to the family cabin, so that I could do things my mom usually does to prepare for the Thanksgiving gathering.  Our cabin is only 5 years old, but it feels as though we have always had it.  It's only about 10 minutes from my parent's house, but it has become a favorite gathering place for our family especially at Thanksgiving and Christmas.   I went a day early to the cabin, so I could make the flower arrangements and prepare some of the food. 

I wanted to share some pictures of our day with you.  {click to continue reading….}

Happy Surprise!! Traci Zeller and Lisa Mende In Traditional Home Magazine!!!

photo by Stacey Van Berkel

I'm so excited to share with you that Traci Zeller and I are honored to be featured in the October issue Traditional Home magazine along with a plethora of other fabulous designers.  The gentleman's dressing room we designed for the Adamsleigh Greensboro Junior League Show house, was highlighted in the latest issue, which just hit the stands!  Eric Cohler's chic room designed in partnership with Pearson Furniture made the cover!  Traci and I enjoyed getting to know Walker Hinnerman who oversaw the installation of the room.  Kuddos to the Eric Cohler team! Amazing job!

 I was walking back to my hotel in Paris last night, when I received a text from Traci saying we made the issue.   I had to laugh when I saw the picture used at the top of this post of our room, because on the chest is a book about the Louvre in Paris and I had toured the Louvre.    I feel really honored to be among such a star studded cast of designers.  Jason Oliver Nixon, John Loecke of Madcap Cottage, Suzanne Kasler, Lisa Kahn-Allen, Miles Redd, Warren Kessler, Jack Fhlillips, Megan Winters and Kara Cox.   I can't wait to see the issue when I return from my trip!!!  Thank you to Traditional Home Magazine for including us!!!  

P.S. Traci said the magazine is a must buy so grab your issue before they all disappear! 
Can't wait to get my own copy!  Hopefully I can find it in the airport if not, I'm sure it will be in my mailbox when I return from Europe!

Thanks to all of our wonderful partners in our room: Sharon Coppede & Custom Window Treatments of Charlotte, Hiddell Brooks Gallery,  Madegoods,  Leontine Linens,  PVE Design, Holly Blalock & C.R. Laine, Donna Stanley of J.R. Stanley, Christopher Spitzmiller, Century Furniture & Comer Wear, Stark, Ruby and Sarah Design Studios, Thibaut, Restoration Hardware,Circa Lighting,  HandyMan of Greensboro, Kris Hampton of Hampton Hardwoods, and Brian Sine. 

 Tomorrow I take the chunnel to London!!  Bon Nuit!

Interior design by Lisa Mende and Traci Zeller, showhouse partners-in-crime.  Photography by Stacey van Berkel. 

Day In the Thermador Test Kitchen, Winner announced & Recipes!!!

Chef Kyle

Our day in the Thermador test kitchen started out with the professional chefs giving us instruction on plating food and how to proceed with our preparing our items for our lunch menu.  

Speaking of menu, here is what we prepared:

Organic Baby Beets & Heirloom Tomato, Humboldt Fog Goat Cheese Crèma, 

Toasted Marcona Almonds, Micro Basil

Serves 18

5 bunches Organic Baby Beets, cleaned

3# Hierloom Tomato

2 ea Humboldt Fog Goat Cheese

1 C Heavy Cream

1 C Marcona Almonds

1 C Micro Basil

1 C White Wine

2 ea Thyme sprigs

Olive oil

Salt & Pepper

Procedure

1. Turn the combi-steam oven to combi-mode 375 degrees, fill the solid insert with the beets, 

wine, thyme, 1 oz olive oil, and salt and pepper. Roast for 30 minutes and cool down. 

2. Rub the beets between a kitchen towel to remove the outer skin and then trim the ends.

3. Heat the oven to 400 degrees; coat the almonds in olive oil and season. Spread on a sheet 

tray and roast for about 6 minutes until golden.

4. To make the goat cheese crema, cut the rind from the Humboldt Fog and crumble into a 

blender. Add half the cream and begin to buzz together. Add extra cream as needed and 

season.

Pan seared tuna with sweet corn coulis & cucumber-jalapeno relish

Serves 18

Sweet corn coulis

5ea yellow corn ears (shucked and kerneled)

½ ea White Onion, large dice

1ea Garlic Clove, minced

½ C chicken stock

½ C dry white wine

¼ C heavy cream

1T Avocado oil

Salt & White Pepper

1. Shuck and kernel (remove the corn kernels off the stock using a large knife), dice the onion 

and mince the garlic.

2. Heat a large sized sauté pan to level 8 on the freedom induction.

3. When the pan is hot add the avocado oil, onions, garlic and corn, sauté for 2-3 minutes 

(onions should be soft and semi caramelized).

4. Add the white wine and reduce until almost all liquid is gone.

5. Reduce heat to level 5 and add the chicken stock and heavy cream, let simmer for 3-5 

minutes. Turn off heat.

6. Transfer remaining mixture with liquid to vita mix blender and puree until smooth. Season 

with salt and white pepper.

7. Place coulis into shallow half pan and chill in refrigerator.

Tuna

3 # Grade A Tuna, cut into loins (1.5” x 1.5”)

2 Tbl Vegetable oil

Salt and Pepper

1. Heat oil on teppanyaki (high heat) until whispy

2. Sear tune on all sides, set aside and keep cool.

Cucumber-jalapeno relish

1ea cucumber (seeded, peeled and cut into brunoisette)

1ea jalapeno (seeded and minced)

1ea shallot (minced)

1T cilantro (finely chopped)

1T rice vinegar

1tsp fish sauce

Salt to taste

1. Complete all knife work on the vegetables and herbs

2. Place ingredients into medium sized mixing bowl and mix together.

3. Set aside wrapped in plastic and allow relish to marinate for at least 5 minutes.

Petite grilled filet mignon with baby carrots & foraged mushroom glaze
Serves 18
Petite grilled filets 
18ea 3.5oz filet mignons
½ C clarified butter
Salt & Pepper
1. Heat grill insert to 500 F.
2. Brush both sides of filets with clarified butter and generously sprinkle with salt and pepper.
3. Grill filets no more than 9 at a time, for about 3-4 minutes on each side.
4. Set aside on sheet pan lined with a baking racking
Sautéed baby carrots
5 bunches baby carrots
2 Tbl European style sweet butter
¼ C white wine
2tsp sugar
Salt and Pepper
1. Set steam oven on Pro Grand range to full steam setting, place carrots on perforated steam 
pan. 
2. When steam oven has reached full steam setting place carrots into oven and let cook for 5 
minutes.
3. Heat a large sauté pan to medium heat.
4. When carrots are done in steam oven, add butter and sugar to sauté pan and place carrots 
into pan and sauté for 3 minutes, add white wine and turn off heat. 
5. Season with salt and pepper
Foraged Mushroom Glace
3# assorted foraged mushrooms
2T garlic (minced)
2C veal glace
2T avocado oil
1. Heat a large sauté pan to extra high heat. When hot add avocado oil and mushrooms. Sauté
for 2 minutes.
2. Add garlic and sauté for additional 2 minute.
3. Reduce heat to medium and add veal glace and cook for an additional 3 minutes.


Grilled Organic Peaches with Marscapone Ice Cream, Amoretti Crumble, 
Musto
Serves 18
5 # Organic Peaches
5 ea Amoretti Cookies, grated
6 ea Egg Yolks
¾ C Sugar
1 qt Heavy Cream
1 ea Vanilla bean
1 C Mascapone cheese, softened
1 ea Lemon, juiced
½ C Musto
Olive oil
Salt
Procedure
1. Make the ice cream the day before, heat the cream over medium heat until steaming. Add 
the scraped out vanilla bean, cover the cream and let steep for 15 minutes.
2. In a large bowl, cream the eggs and sugar together until pale and thick. Temper in the warm 
cream, i.e. pour in a little bit and whisk quickly, as to not cook the eggs. Strain through a 
chinois.
3. Whisk in the marscapone and lemon juice in the ice cream base, transfer into the ice cream 
machine and mix for up 35 minutes. Scrape out into a container and freeze for at least 6 
hours.
4. Turn the grill onto 500 degrees and the oven onto 275 degrees. Cut the peaches in half and 
pull out the pit. Coat the peaches in olive oil, and a little salt. 
5. Grill the peaches cut side down until seared. Transfer to a rack and keep warm in the oven

The recipes were fairly easy and very delicious!  Did you note any unfamiliar terms in the recipes? Nadia and I were asked to "brunoistte" our cucumbers.  We found out that means to chopped really fine! 

The chefs had prepared our food and had it ready and waiting for us

 on the island in the middle of the kitchen.

And we are cooking...Beautiful baby carrots cooking on the range top.

Grilled peaches with just the right amount of grill marks!!!

Ashlina from The Decorista showing off her perfectly plated

 tenderloin and carrots.

Nadia Subaran was my partner in the kitchen and boy can this girl cook!  We prepared the seared tuna recipe together.  I finally learned how to perfectly sear tuna.  It goes a little like this: buy a Thermador induction cooktop(just kidding), next place a flat pan on the cooktop, sprinkle with avocado oil, then turn the heat up really high, sear by rotating the tuna a quarter turn til each side until all four sides are seared!  The key is for the pan to be really hot which is hard to do with just any range but the induction cook top gets it just right!

Here is our perfectly plated tuna with a dollop of sweet corn coulis. Did you notice we formed our tuna in the shape of Thermador's star burner? Nadia was the clever cookie who thought of doing that!

Thermador had a cute little buffet table decorated with glittery letters which formed "Thermador" for us to place our bounty upon. Don't you love those cheese and fruit boards Traci Zeller and Tamara Matthews-Stephenson made?  Just beautiful!  

After we went into the conference room, the chefs took our dishes and prepared them for serving. This is how our meal was presented at lunch. I thought ours looked good, but after they redesigned the plates the food really looked fabulous and was perfectly portioned to feed our group.  It was simply beautiful! A true feast for the eyes.  

Look what a beautiful plate our individual dishes created for our lunch

when plated together for a meal!

After lunch, we gathered in the conference room to discuss what we liked about using the appliances and also talked about our favorite one.  Here are Molly Hirsch and Tamara Matthews-Stephenson listening intently to the discussion.  It was really interesting to hear what all the designers had to say about their own practices,appliance preferences and kitchen design in general.

You can tell by these engaging faces and smiles that everyone was enjoying the discussions.  Many of the topics we talked about are topics I plan to discuss here on the blog like "how to design a perfectly functional kitchen in a small space".

The perfect ending to a perfect day!

I know you think Nadia and I should be the winners, of the plating challenge, especially since we cleverly shaped our tuna into the Thermador star! DUH!  But to be perfectly honest," the grilled peach group" also presented the peach with glaze shaped in a star, so we weren't the only clever ones.  Of course the judges, Ann Maine, Editor in Chef of Traditional Home and Marsha decided to be politically correct and gave everyone an award so we all won!  I think we were winners before the contest because we had such a fun time.

I was going to share my favorite appliance, but there is so much to share about it,I have decided it deserves a post of its own so you will hear about it later.  I think you will love it as much as I do!

photo courtesy of Thermador

Here is our group photo at the end of our Thermador Experience Day!

  Make sure to follow these this group of fabulous designers

 and read their blogs 

Ashlina Koposta, The Decorista

@thedecorista

Cheryl Kees Clendenon, In Detail Interiors/Details and Design 

@InDetailSays

    

  Molly Hirsch, Molly Hirsch Interiors

@MollyHirschint

  Sara Ingrassia, Sara Ingrassia Interiors / Style Stream

      @SaraIngrassia

Tamara Matthews-Stephenson, Nest by Tamara

@nestnest

      Traci Zeller, Traci Zeller Designs

 @tracizeller

   Vicki Edwards, Kitchen & Bath Images

   Nadia Subaran, Aidan Design

  @AidanDesign

If you haven't read Traditional Homes Great Kitchens Online Issue make sure you read it today!  Click Here!  It's chocked full of beautiful kitchens and lots of interesting information on how to design the kitchen of your dreams. 

     A special thank you to the Thermador Marketing Team, BSH Group and Finn Partners for a Fabulous Day!:

A very special thank you to :

Lore McKenna!

7 Things I Learned Cooking with Thermador Professional Chefs!

I'm back from my sabbatical and ready to share the details of the my wonderful trip to Irvine, California to the Thermador Experience with Traditional Home Magazine in celebration of the Great Kitchens Online Issue.  It was a fun, yet educational experience. I can't wait to share the fun events as well as the wealth of information I learned about the Thermador products, but for now,  let's focus on what I learned from the Thermador professional chefs, Chris Phipps and Kyle Jacobi.  These two amazing chefs are responsible for everything that happens in the Thermador test kitchens, working with designers and clients who visit the test kitchens, as well as preparing real gourmet meals for important guests of the showroom.

The first morning after we arrived in California, we were taken on a shopping excursion led by Chefs Chris and Kyle.  We were told that we would all be cooking and that there would be a plating contest at the end of our cooking experience. Everyone was a little anxious, so our trip to Whole Foods helped to distract and waylay the fears of our cooking and design skills being "put on a platter" so to speak! We learned some very helpful information along the way.   I thought you might enjoying learning what the pros taught us as well.  

 Our mission was to shop for the items we would need to prepare our lunch menu in the Thermador test kitchen.  (Yes, this is a real life chef's list! ) You know it is someone with very specific requirements with words like "baby beets, micro greens,heirloom tomato and pee wee potatoes".

Our large group was divided into two more intimate groups.  Chris led our group.  He first took us to the vinegar aisle to choose our balsamic vinegar.  Here are the two he chose for our menu.  He told us that high quality balsamic vinegar should have or "must" have "musto" in its ingredient list.  You don't want sulphates in your balsamic vinegar either.  The highest grade of balsamic vinegar is the so-called Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale de Modena which means "Traditional Balsamic Vinegar of Modena".  True Modena balsamic vinegar is only produced in Modena or neighboring Reggio Emilia,Italy.   It must be aged for no less than 12 years in a wooden barrel and made from the Trebbiano grapes grown in those regions. 

The other great tip we learned from the chefs was to use avocado oil for searing tuna!  Avocado oil can be used in many of the same applications as olive oil, but because it has a smoke point of 500F, it's perfect for high heat cooking which is what you want to perfectly sear tuna!  The benefits are amazing.  It's also great to drizzle over fresh fruit or use in salad dressing as it has that slight hint of avocado.

To read about the health benefits of using avocado oil click here!  I just might start slathering it on my face!   This is the actual brand we purchased. If you would like to order it online it can be found here!

Next, we went to the cheese section to learn about cheese and select the cheese for our menu.  Paul was our cheese connoisseur. (No that's not Paul in the picture! The only part of Paul I caught on film was his arm holding the tray of cheeses above!  If you want to see Paul, you can check out the video I made of he and Chris talking cheeses and butter at Lisa Mende on Vine!) The handsome guy in the picture is Mark Weinfeld of DGWB, he is serving Ann Maine of Traditional Home and Traci Zeller. 

Three cheese you need to know about!!!

 We sampled three goat cheeses.  Each one very different!  The first Mitica Capricho De Cabra (goat cheese) was from Spain.  It is affordable with a long shelf life, but most importantly creamy and delicious!  The second was a Cypress Grove Midnight Moon Gouda made from goat's milk.  It has a nutty flavor with a hint of caramel and fresh butter.  It is made in Holland by strict specifications from Cypress Grove Creamery in California. The last cheese we taste tested was Ovalie Cendree which is a goat cheese made in an artisanal goat dairy in France. It was so creamy.  The outside is sprinkled with food grade charcoal which develops the bloomy rind.  (This cheese will only be at Whole Foods til the end of August so get it while it's there.)  If you don't have a Whole Foods close by, you can buy the other two here and here  Just delicious!

 

Next up was a visit with Paul (yes another Paul, but no, I dont' think it is a prerequisite for employment at Whole Foods)  Paul the seafood man, told us all about the various fishes available.  He recommended the Sockeye salmon fillet, which we purchased!  He also allowed us to taste test salmon that he had sugar cured himself.  Wish he was at my local Whole Foods so I could buy it all the time!  I need to check to see if the seafood guy at our store does that.  

So here is a peek into our basket at the products we gathered from our list.  Oh!  I almost forget two biggies....

Are you familiar with european butter?  Wow, what a difference

is all I can add.  We picked up a package of Lurpak Danish butter. 

Butter your toast with this and you'll never go back to regular butter,ever!

 

Chris also shared this with us:

The Environmental Working Group created 

two lists for consumers...

"The Clean Fifteen"

These items are necessary to buy organic

 because they have little or no pesticides.

asparagus

avocado

cabbage

cantaloupe

sweet corn

eggplant

mangoes

mushrooms

onions

papayas

sweet peas (frozen)

sweet potatoes

"The Dirty Dozen"

These items are best bought organic to assure

 chemical free ingesting.

Apples

Celery

Cherry Tomatoes

cucumbers

grapes

hot peppers

nectarines (imported)

peaches 

potatoes 

spinach 

strawberries

sweet bell peppers

Next Chris schooled us on vegetables.  He said to always buy local when possible.  Whole Foods is known for having locally grown produce.  Farm to table fresh is what we are talking about folks.  Chris said when buying tomatoes always buy heirloom and when buying peaches for grilling always buy the hard white peaches when.  He is also very fond of "Yeti" farm heirloom tomatoes.

 Now do you see why I said Whole Foods was a feast for the eyes?

Vicki Edwards, of Kitchen & Bath Images from Brentwood, Tn completed her task of getting baby carrots.  

Beth Brenner, publisher of Traditional Home, double checking

the list to make sure we got everything we needed! Looks like we did!

Sara Ingrassia of Sara Ingrassia Interiors, Beth Brenner of 

Traditional Home, Our Whole Foods Hostess and moi waiting

for the items to be checked out.

Debbie Ehrman of Finn Partners is back on our bus with the loot!  

Come back tomorrow to read about our visit inside the Thermador Experience Showroom!  17,000 sq feet of nothing, but beautiful appliances and extremely nice people!   Can't wait to show you what we cooked!  We had sooo much fun!!!!

Ok, so I lied there were way more than 7 things I learned but I quit

counting after 7.  Hopefully, you learned something new as well!

"A big fat thank you to Thermador and Traditional Home for 

a fabulous day!"

Make sure you visit Thermador.com today, for all kinds of helpful advice on how to plan your kitchen, product info and other interesting info!

(All photos are property of Lisa Mende Design, please do

 not use without giving proper credit.)

(My trip was sponsored by Traditional Home and Thermador

 but the opinions in this post are my own.)