The nominations for this years James Beard awards has been released. I want to take a minute to congratulate all local nominees in the Maryland, DC, northern Virginia area. So congrats to:
Jose Andres, Minibar DC- for outstanding chef
Amanda Cook, CityZen at Mandarin Oriental, DC- Outstanding Pastry Chef
Cathal Armstrong, Restaurant Eve, Alexandria, VA- Best Chef: Mid Atlantic
Peter Pastan- Obelisk, DC- Best Chef: Mid Atlantic
Bryan Voltaggio, Volt, Frederick, MD- Best chef: Mid Atlantic
Johnny Monis, Komi, DC- Rising Star Chef of the Year
Tim Carman, Washington City Paper, "How Not to Hire a Chef/ The Canning Process"- Newspaper feature writing aboutr restaurants and/or chefs
Joe Yonan, The Washington Post- Newspaper Food Section

Congratulations to all and good luck. Hopefully in the near future we will see more chefs from the Baltimore area make the list.