Gluttony, not golf, reigned supreme at Wadsworth’s Midlane Country Club when Victory Memorial Hospital held its 14th Annual Chef Cuisine Benefit there last weekend.
Near the entrance, award-winning sugar artist Alain Roby held an admiring crowd spellbound as he rapidly turned a glutinous lump into rosettes, ribbons and a snail.
At the other end, enthroned like a jolly Old King Cole at a raised demonstration station, the rotund Chef Paul Prudhomme, “The Cajun Chef,” discoursed on the merits of searing fish and chicken as he prepared a lemon dill chicken dish before a couple of hundred adoring, note-taking subjects.
And in between the two masters, several of the executive chefs from the 35 participating area restaurants cooked up favorite dishes for sampling.
Guests followed their noses to Raffaelli’s Italian Cafe table, where Chef Zain Hansraj was sauteing garlic, sun-dried tomatoes and fresh basil for the restaurant’s Chicken Pasta a la Raffaelli’s.
“I enjoy getting out into the public,” said restaurant co-owner Frank Raffaelli, whose Libertyville restaurant is a five-year veteran at the event.
At the next booth, state Rep. Robert W. Churchill (R-Antioch) pronounced Southgate’s spinach polenta with ratatouille and a balsamic glaze “delicious.” Churchill had brought former clerk of the Illinois House Tony Leone from Springfield to prove that Lake County and environs provide some great eating.
“I’ve been bragging about this for years,” Churchill said. Plus Leone is a Prudhomme fan. He and Churchill annually treated the Republican Caucus to a cajun gumbo feast. “He cooked. I ate,” Churchill said.
In another room, Gurnee residents Jane and Duane Kovacek shared a plate heaped with sweets from Market Square Pastries of Lake Forest.
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“She goes for the chocolate. She’s a chocoholic,” Duane said. Jane explained her tasting system. “I’m just taking little bites of each. If it’s just a bite, I don’t feel so guilty,” she said.
The chance to pig out on some of the area’s best restaurant fare and hear Prudhomme attracted a record 900 guests. “We met our $15,000 goal, and attendance was much higher than in the past several years,” said Victory Development Director Bill Devore of Beach Park. This year’s benefit was in the name of HealthReach, a Waukegan clinic.